The Battle of Harpers Ferry was a battle that was fought on 12-15 September 1862 during the Maryland campaign of the American Civil War.
As the Confederate general Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia advanced down the Shenandoah Valley into Maryland, he sent three columns of his army, led by Stonewall Jackson, Lafayette McLaws, and John G. Walker, to capture the Federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry and secure his flank in northern Virginia. Union general George B. McClellan had given orders for the commander of Harpers Ferry's garrison, Dixon Stansbury Miles, to keep his troops in the town rather than occupy the nearby heights. On 12 September, Confederate forces attacked the thinly-defended Maryland Heights, and two Confederate brigades captured the heights on 13 September. The west and south of the town were undefended against the other two Confederate regiments, and Jackson placed his artillery on the surrounding heights as Major-General A.P. Hill arrived with his force and received orders to launch a flank attack against the Union defenders. On 15 September 1862, Jackson unleashed a 50-gun artillery barrage against Harpers Ferry from Maryland Heights, and Miles was mortally wounded by an artillery shell shortly after deciding to surrender the city amid an infantry assault. 12,000 Union soldiers were taken prisoner, and Jackson's men rushed to Sharpsburg to join the Battle of Antietam.
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