About this episode:

In 1969 - 104 years after the fact - Canadian Robbie Robertson wrote a song for his group The Band. It was a first-person narrative relating economic and social distress for a poor white Southerner during the last year of the American Civil War. Robertson’s song was voiced by the band’s lone American, drummer and native Arkansan Levon Helm whose haunting rendition opened with,

“Virgil Kane is the name

And I served on the Danville train

'Till Stoneman's cavalry came

And tore up the tracks again

In the winter of '65

We were hungry, just barely alive

By May the 10th, Richmond had fell

It's a time I remember, oh so well

The night they drove old Dixie down…”

This is the story of that Federal incursion. This is the story of Stoneman’s Raid.

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Some Characters Mentioned In This Episode:

Additional Resources:

Full Route of Stoneman's Raid, March-April 1865

Stoneman's Raid in Tennessee, March 14-27

Stoneman's Raid from Boone to Mt. Airy, March 28-April 2

Stoneman's Raid in Virginia, April 3-9

Stoneman's Raid in the Piedmont, April 9-11

Stoneman's Raid approaches Salisbury, April 11-12

Stoneman's Raid on the Catawba, April 13-23

Stoneman's Raid, Final Days

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Thank you to our sponsor John Bailey.

Producer: Dan Irving

097 - "Driving Ol' Dixie Down": Stoneman's Raid