Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 3.djvu/55

Rh The same day Governor Letcher made public the following call for volunteers:

Immediately after the passage of the ordinance of secession, most of the members of the convention and of the general assembly of Virginia from the Trans-Alleghany section left Richmond, and they presently called a meeting of the citizens of that region who were opposed to secession to assemble at Clarksburg. That meeting issued a call to the Trans-Alleghany counties to send delegates to a convention to meet at Wheeling on the 13th of May, which convened with so-called representatives from 26 of the 140 counties of Virginia, and issued a call for an election, on June 4th, of delegates to a convention "of the State of Virginia," to meet in Wheeling on June 11th. It also advised its supporters to vote at the coming May election against the ordinance of secession, and at the same time to elect members to the United States Congress from the three Trans-Alleghany districts of Virginia.

On April 21st the governor of Virginia, in pursuance of his call of the 20th, issued the following proclamation:

By virtue of authority vested in the executive by the convention, I, John Letcher, governor of the commonwealth of Virginia, do hereby order that each volunteer company, equipped and armed, whether infantry, artillery or riflemen, in the counties lying west of the city of Richmond, between Richmond and the Blue ridge, and in the valley of Virginia from the county of Rockbridge to the Tennessee line, establish forthwith on the lines of speedy