Historedia
Episode 2 of 2

Saltville Massacre

When
October 3, 1864
Where
Saltville, Virginia
Part of
First Battle of Saltville, 2 October 1864

Wounded black troops were murdered following the battle, an event dubbed the Saltville Massacre.

Following the battle, a number of wounded black troops were murdered. William Marvel's 1991 analysis concluded that five black soldiers, wounded and helpless, were definitely murdered at Saltville on October 3, and as many as seven more may have suffered the same fate that day; the Confederates may have murdered as many as two dozen U.S. troops. Champ Ferguson was later tried, convicted, and executed for war crimes for these and other killings.

Sources

  1. Saltville, Virginia Wikipedia, revision of 2026-09-27
  2. First Battle of Saltville Wikipedia, revision of 2026-09-06

Machine-drafted from the cited Wikipedia passages and checked by a reviewing model, not by a human editor. Every passage cites the revision it was written from; dates and places follow those passages.