The First Ohio Volunteer Infantry under General Robert Schenck was reinforcing the Alexandria, Loudon, and Hampshire Railroad line in Fairfax County, Virginia using a railroad train to carry the deploying troops.  Towards the end of the day, near Vienna, Virginia, in what may have been the first engagement of its kind in military history, a small Confederate artillery battery fired on the moving train, killing eight men.  Troops under Colonel Maxcy Gregg then attacked the detraining Ohioans and drove them back along the track on foot. (By John Osborne)

Major General George McClellan led a large Union force from Ohio into western Virginia forcing the Virginians to give up the towns along the Potomac, including Harpers Ferry. Confederate troops burned the railroad bridge there and at Martinsburg, as well as the bridge at Shepherdstown as they withdrew.  Railroad stock and machineshops at the Martinsburg depot of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad were also destroyed in the retreat.  (By John Osborne)

William Wrigley, Jr. was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, one of nine children of a soap factory owner.  He founded his own company in 1891 selling soap and baking powder, then introduced chewing gum to his sales.  Soon gum became the company's only product.  He also developed Catalina Island in Southern California as a resort and famously owned the Chicago Cubs Baseball team.  He died a multi-millionaire in Phoenix, Arizona in January 1932.  (By John Osborne)

Violence continued on the streets of St Louis the day after federal forces, including a largely German-speaking Home Guard, had captured Camp Jackson and the pro-secession militia there. Score of civilians had attacked the troops the day before, resulting in score of civilian injuries and fatalities.  Again, the Home Guard were shot at from windows on Walnut Street and returned fire as before, reportedly killing seven more citizens.   (By John Osborne)  

Camp Jackson, on the edge of the city at Lindell's Grove, was the headquarters of the pro-secession militia in St. Louis. Union Captain Nathaniel Lyon, with regular troops and the largely German-speaking volunteers he had recruited captured the camp and the 639 men there under the command of General Daniel M. Frost.  While marching the prisoners into the city, Lyon's men were attacked by pro-southern mobs and when shot at, returned fire, killing around 28 civilians and wounding many more.  (By John Osborne)  

A 3500-man Union garrison under Colonel James A. Mulligan dug in at Lexington, Missouri to halt Confederate General Sterling Price's drive into Missouri. After completing their encirclement, Price's 12,000 troops attacked the Union fortifications, centered around the town's Masonic College, on September 18, 1861. After three days of fighting in which the defenders suffered a fatal shortage of drinking water and 25 Confederates and 39 Federals were killed, the garrison surrendered and Price, on his 52nd birthday, took possession of the town.  (By John Osborne) 

The United States Post Office ordered the Louisville Courier excluded until further notice from the mails due to its demonstrated "hostility to the Government and authorities of the United States."  Its proprietor, Walter Newman Haldeman, later fled to Confederate-held Bowling Green, Kentucky and published the paper there and later in Nashville.  He returned to Louisville after the war and resumed publication of the Courier there once again.  (By John Osborne)

At around eight o'clock in the evening, a train carrying four companies of the 19th Illinous Volunteer Infantry crashed into Beaver Creek near Huron, Indiana, around 140 miles west of Cincinnati when the bridge gave way after a derailment.  Two cars suffered the most severe damage when, after landing in the creek, the box car and caboose landed on top of them. Eighteen men in these cars were killed and dozens others injured, many severely.  Sabotage was suspected but later a broken rail was determined to be the cause.  (By John Osborne)