Union troops defeat Confederate units in a brief skirmish at Blue's Gap in western Virginia

In a diversionary attack designed to distract Confederate General T.J. Jackson's advance in western Virginia, Colonel Samuel Dunning led a regiment-sized Union force against the Virginia militia at Blue's Gap in Hampshire County in what is now West Virginia.  The Confederates forces were pushed back with ease and Dunnings's men marched back to Romney, Virginia, indulging in looting and destruction of property along the way that did not endear the local population to the Union.  (By John Osborne)