St. Albans Raid

The St. Albans Raid was the northernmost land action of the American Civil War. It was a raid from the Province of Canada by 21 Confederate soldiers. They had recently failed in engagements with the Union Army and evaded subsequent capture in the United States. The mission was to rob banks to raise money, and to trick the Union Army into diverting troops to defend their northern border against further raids. It took place in St. Albans, Vermont, on October 19, 1864. They got the money, killed a local, and escaped back to Canada.
In this wartime incident, Kentuckian Bennett H. Young led the Confederate army forces. Young had been captured after the Battle of Salineville in Ohio ended Morgan's Raid the year before. He managed to escape to Canada, which was not then a unified nation. After meeting with Confederate agents there, he returned to the Confederacy, where he proposed raids on the Union from the Canada–US border to build the Confederate treasury and force the Union Army to divert troops from the South. Young was commissioned as a lieutenant and returned to Canada, where he recruited other escaped Confederates for a raid on St. Albans, Vermont, a quiet city just 15 miles from the Canada–U.S. border.

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