While Unionist sentiment remained strong throughout the Shenandoah Valley as Virginia debated secession in late 1860 and early 1861, those pro-Unionist leanings waned significantly throughout much of the Valley following Virginia’s secession in the spring of 1861.
However, in Martinsburg and surrounding Berkeley County, Unionist sentiment remained stout. Unionist feeling remained so strong that it proved the one place in the oft-contested Shenandoah Valley that Union soldiers felt any level of comfort. Corporal Charles Lynch noted that comrades in his regiment, the 18th Connecticut Infantry, viewed Martinsburg as “our home town.”