23rd May in which the ordinance of secession was overwhelmingly ratified there: Precincts For Secession Against Aldie 54 5 Goresville 117 19 Gum Spring 135 5 Hillsboro 84 38 Leesburg 400 22 Lovettsville 46 325 Middleburg 115 0 Mt. Gilead 102 19 Powells Shop 62 0 Purcellville 82 31 Snickersville 114 3 Union 150 0 Waterford 31 220 Waters 26 39 Whaleys 108 0 --- --- Total 1626 726 The great mass of the American people, North and South, neither expected nor wanted war. The overwhelming tragedy of it all lay in the nation being caught and carried on in a flood of events beyond its imagination or control and these, with sinister assistance from fanatics and trouble-makers on both sides, brought on the devastating deluge. With Lincoln's call for volunteers, Virginia rallied to resist what she believed to be a threat of hostile armed invasion. The die was cast. It is not the purpose of this book to attempt a detailed account of the war-epoch in Loudoun. Much of her story during those dreary years already has been recorded by other writers. The full narrative deserves, and sometime undoubtedly will have, a volume to itself. Inasmuch as fate had made it a border county, it was inevitable that intense factional bitterness should exist and that much fighting should take place within its boundaries; but no major engagements occurred there. Loudoun at least was spared the terrible slaughter that destiny staged in Tidewater, the Valley and north of the Potomac. It required but little imagination on the part of the county government to foresee the probability of fighting in the county and the subversion of the civil authority, with the confusion and lawlessness that would consequently ensue. Therefore the Loudoun Court, headed by its then presiding Justice Asa Rogers, ordered the county clerk, George K. Fox, Jr., to remove the county records to a place of safety and to use his discretion for their preservation. Pursuant to these instructions, Mr. Fox loaded the records into a large wagon and with them drove south to Campbell County. For the next four years he moved his precious charge about from place to place, as danger threatened each refuge in turn, and in 1865 was able to bring back to Leesburg every record intact as will appear in the following chapter. Thus to Mr. Fox's faithful performance of his duty, Loudoun owes the preservation of her records in happy contrast to the loss, damage and destruction which came upon the archives of her sister counties during the ensuing conflict. From a subsequent entry in the court's records, we also learn that no court was held in the county from February, 1862, until July, 1865.[152]