St. Albans Raid 1864: Bennett Young's Fake Fishing Club Robs Three Banks

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On October 19, 1864, 22 Confederate soldiers robbed three banks in St. Albans, Vermont, about 15 miles from the Canadian border, in the northernmost land action of the Civil War. Their leader, Bennett H. Young, had ridden in Morgan's Raid through Indiana and Ohio, been captured, and escaped to Canada. He then traveled by way of Halifax and Bermuda, slipped through the Union blockade on a blockade runner, and pitched Richmond on cross-border raids that would raise cash and pull Union troops north. The Confederate government commissioned him a lieutenant, and he recruited 21 escaped Confederates who arrived in St. Albans in pairs posing as a hunting and fishing club.

Young moved the raid from a busy Tuesday market day to a quiet Wednesday, which put Captain George Conger of the 1st Vermont, home on leave, in town. In 12 minutes the raiders held townspeople on the village green, emptied the First National Bank, St. Albans Bank and Franklin County Bank, and traded fire with armed citizens; Elinus J. Morrison died of his wounds. Conger's posse crossed into Canada and beat Young until a British officer intervened. Defended by John Abbott, a future prime minister of Canada, the raiders argued that Young's commission made the raid an act of war outside the Webster-Ashburton Treaty, and the Canadian court freed them.

• The raiders took only lightweight paper money, leaving behind gold and silver coins and uncut sheets of banknotes.
• Hostages at the St. Albans Bank were forced to swear an oath of allegiance to the Confederate States.
• Bottles of incendiary liquid meant to burn the town failed to ignite properly.
• Canada returned $88,000 of the stolen money, and Secretary of State William H. Seward began requiring passports at the border.
• Rumors of a U.S. war with Britain pushed up Confederate bond prices in Europe, but Canadian backlash closed the northern theater to further raids.