Vermont in The American Civil War - Civil War Sites in Vermont

Civil War Sites in Vermont

St. Albans, Vermont, is the site of the northernmost land action in the Civil War, the St. Albans Raid. On October 19, 1864, Confederate raiders, under the command of Lieutenant Bennett H. Young, robbed three banks, escaped to Canada, were captured, and put on trial. The Canadian courts decided they were acting under military orders and they could not be extradited back to the United States without Canada violating her neutrality.

Most Vermont towns have a monument in memory of the soldiers who participated in the Civil War. Decades after the war, the upland hillsides of the state were littered with the cellar holes of long-gone farmhouses from farms that had been abandoned because all the family's sons had been killed in the Civil War.

There are several facilities in the state that have significant collections of manuscripts and archives of the war, including the Vermont State House, the Vermont Historical Society, University of Vermont Bailey Howe Library, the Bennington Museum, the Sheldon Museum (Middlebury), the Vermont Veterans Militia Museum and Library, and the State of Vermont Public Records Division.