Petersburg and Little Billy Mahone

General Mahone’s wife Otelia said of her 5’5”, 100 pound husband when she heard he was wounded in the chest at Second Bull Run – “Now I know it is serious for William has no flesh whatsoever.” 

Even one of his men said that “he was every inch a soldier, though there were not many inches of him.” Another of his men said that he was “the sauciest little manikin imaginable and the oddest and daintiest little specimen” he ever saw.  Mahone had his own wardrobe putting comfort before military uniforms. On some occasions he wore a brown linen jacket with trousers to match, a large Panama hat, and sometimes a linen duster that was so long it covered up the tip of his sword. Pacing back and forth in his duster, his men said “he looked like the image of a bantam rooster or gamecock.” He had long hair, deep blue eyes under bushy eyebrows, a small straight nose, and a huge mustache and beard. His voice was high almost like a falsetto tenor. Can’t you just see him? 

He also had dyspepsia so he couldn’t eat anything but eggs, crackers, and fresh milk. He brought his own cow and chickens with him and hung all his cooking utensils on the cow’s back. He’s also been said to have a lot of nervous energy, a quick temper, and cussing fits. He also kept a flock of turkeys outside his tent. On Christmas day in 1862, two soldiers stole one of his turkeys. The perpetrators endured 39 lashes for their crime.

After first finding his grave in Blandford Church Cemetery many years before with the Boston Civil War Roundtable, the second interesting thing that I found about him was that he has a highway named for him called the General Mahone Highway, Route 460, south of Petersburg ending up in Suffolk, Virginia. The road is straight as an arrow, doesn’t have much traffic, and goes through Virginia’s peanut country and the Great Dismal Swamp if you want to bypass the Newport News and Norfolk areas. For me, it was a shortcut to the NC beaches.

General Mahone was born Dec. 1, 1826 in Monroe, Virginia, on the banks of the Nottoway River in Southampton County. The town is now called Courtland.  He was the son of a tavern keeper, Fielding Jordan Mahone and his wife Martha Drew.  Both of William’s grandfathers were veterans of the War of 1812. Isn’t it interesting how many of these Civil War generals have ancestor connections to earlier wars? Nat Turner’s insurrection occurred in Southampton County in 1831, and William’s father had a hand in quelling the insurrection. 

At age 17 in 1844, William was appointed a cadet at the newly opened Virginia Military Institute in Lexington, Virginia. He graduated eighth out of 12 cadets in his class in 1847 as a civil engineer. One of his teachers was Thomas J. (Stonewall) Jackson. 

After graduation he was a teacher at the Rappahannock Academy in Caroline County. He had a fascination for trains and was an engineer for the Orange and Alexandria Railroad. Later he was superintendant of the Norfolk and Petersburg Railroad. Using his engineering skills, he built a plank road between Fredericksburg and Gordonsville. While with the Norfolk and Petersburg Railroad, he designed a 12-mile long roadbed through the Great Dismal Swamp between South Norfolk and Suffolk. The roadbed had a long foundation laid at right angles beneath the surface of the swamp. This roadbed is still in use today. His 52-mile-long track between Petersburg and Suffolk has no curves, as well paralleling Route 460. He was also involved designing a beach community in Norfolk. The section is now called Ocean View. 

General Mahone was a civilian in 1861, but worked a ruse capturing the Gosport Shipyard in Portsmouth. He was able to bluff the Union troops into abandoning the shipyard when he ran a single passenger train back and forth into Norfolk with much noise and whistle blowing creating the illusion that there were many troops arriving in Norfolk. The Union army retreated to Fortress Monroe. Mahone then accepted a commission as Lieutenant Colonel in the Confederate Army. He was promoted to brigadier general in November, 1861. 

He fought in the Peninsula Campaign, defenses around Drewry’s Bluff, Seven Pines, Malvern Hill, Second Bull Run, Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, Gettysburg, the Wilderness, and Spotsylvania. Mahone was regarded as the hero of the Battle of the Crater. After Pennsylvania coal miners tunneled under the Confederate line blowing a huge crater in the Virginia landscape, Mahone repelled the attack. He was promoted to a major general at this point. He was also present with General Robert E. Lee at the Appomattox surrender. 

After the surrender, General Mahone went back to his love—the railroads. He was president of three lines—the Norfolk and Petersburg, South Side and the Virginia and Tennessee Railroad. He also lobbied the General Assembly to form the Atlantic, Mississippi & Ohio Railroad (AM&O). The abbreviation was said to stand for “all mine and Otelia’s” (his wife). The Mahones rode the new railroad line naming the stops along the way—Windsor, Waverly, Wakefield, Ivor, and lastly, Disputanta. Since the Mahones couldn’t agree on a name for the last stop, it was called Disputanta.

William and Otelia had 13 children, with only three reaching maturity. One of their former residences on South Sycamore Street in Petersburg is part of the Petersburg Public Library. Even though he owned slaves during the war, he started the Virginia Normal and Collegiate Institute for the education of former slaves and black children. The school later became Virginia State University. He also started Central State Hospital in Dinwiddie County. 

He was active in political life for 30 years, including the Virginia General Assembly, mayor of Petersburg, leader of the Readjuster Party (group of Republicans, Democrats, and African-Americans seeking to reduce Virginia’s pre-war debt), ran for Governor of Virginia losing to Democrat Phillip W. McKinney, and was a United States Senator. Virginia continued to elect Democrats as governors until 1969 when Republication A. Linwood Holton, Jr. was elected. 

He also worked on determining Virginia and West Virginia’s share of debt from the Civil War. The case was finally settled in 1915 when the Supreme Court ruled that West Virginia owed Virginia $12,393.929.50. The final payment was made to Virginia in 1939. A monument to the General’s honor stands on the Petersburg Battlefield near the Crater. The inscription reads:  “To the memory of William Mahone, Major General, CSA, a distinguished Confederate Commander, whose valor and strategy at the Battle of the Crater, July 30, 1864, won for himself and his gallant brigade undying fame.”

Little Billy Mahone died of a massive stroke in Washington, D.C. on September 8, 1895 when he was 68. He is buried in a large mausoleum at Blandford Church Cemetery in Petersburg, Virginia. I’m going to have to add him to my list of people that would have been interesting to know in person. He sounds like quite a character.

Ms. Rebelle is a member of the The Bull Run Civil War Round Table which  meets every second Thursday of every month at 7 p.m. at the . The public is invited to attend at no cost and visit the website www.bullruncwrt.org for additional activities (tours, etc.).