Politics and John Brown's Raid

Boteler was fascinated by politics and was a member of several small and short-lived political parties. He was briefly the national secretary of the Know Nothing Party, and at other times a member of the Whigs (a delegate to the Richmond convention and presidential elector in 1852), and in 1860 became the national secretary of the Constitutional Union Party. He unsuccessfully ran as a Whig against incumbent Congressman Charles J. Faulkner (a Democrat) in 1853 and 1855, but defeated Faulkner in 1858 (Faulkner successfully ran against former Congressman William Lucas in 1857).^[15] Accounts of Boteler's party affiliation vary: from "Opposition" to a member of the American Party (which was nativist and related to the Know Nothings) or as a Whig.^[16]

During John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry, upon hearing of a possible insurrection from one of his daughters, Boteler hurried from his home ten miles down to Harpers Ferry, where he interviewed and sketched the rebel, among others.^[1][17]

Boteler represented Virginia's 8th congressional district in the United States House of Representatives from 1859 until resigning after Virginia voted for secession in April 1861.^[18] In a widely acclaimed speech as the House was organized in January 1860, Boteler declared himself for Union, as well as decried abolitionism and those who supported John Brown's raid, accusing them of encouraging the bloodbath he had witnessed at Harpers Ferry.^[19] In March 1861, Boteler met the newly elected President Abraham Lincoln and attempted to lobby him against a use of force bill. He would resign about a month later.^[20]

American Civil War

At the outbreak of the Civil War, Boteler sympathized with Virginia and his family's way of life. He enlisted in the Confederate Army and received a colonel's commission. However, he often noted his delicate constitution and did relatively little soldiering, unlike his son who enlisted in the Rockbridge Artillery.

In 1861 Boteler was chosen by the Virginia Convention to be a representative to the Provisional Confederate Congress. Later that year, Jefferson County voters and others in Virginia's 10th Congressional District elected Boteler as a Democrat [sic] to represent Virginia's 10th District in the Confederate States House of Representatives. Boteler was a member of the 3-man committee that designed the Confederate government's seal, which featured an image of George Washington.^[16] He failed to win re-election in 1864, losing to disabled Confederate veteran (and future Virginia governor) Frederick W.M. Holliday.^[21]

Meanwhile, Boteler's neighbor, William Augustine Morgan, had led the Shepherdstown Cavalry for several years (including responding to the 1859 John Brown raid). Morgan also became a Confederate colonel early in the war, and would fight many battles including under Generals Jackson and Stuart and not capitulate at the war's end. Boteler's son fought in the First Battle of Bull Run in July 1861.^[22]

Less than a month later, Union troops arrested Alexander Boteler at his home, "Fountain Rock" outside Shepardstown and imprisoned across the river. He convinced his captors to release him, but Union troops burned his cement mill on August 19, 1861, as an alleged snipers nest.^[23] The "Pleasant Valley" area was often contested; various troops would burn his plantation's fields many times during the conflict, and Union forces would captured four Confederate cannon in the mill ruins following the Battle of Antietam. The cement mill would also figure in the Battle of Shepherdstown in September 1862.^[8] Fountain Rock became a hospital for soldiers wounded at the Battle of Antietam, and also experience fighting in July 1863.^[24]

His major contribution to the Confederacy was political. In November 1861 Confederate papers publicized his escape from Union raiders at Fountain Rock, and his wife's outrage at the Yankee action. The following spring, Boteler convinced General Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson not to return to VMI, then continued on Jackson's staff as a courier or liaison until the general's death. Boteler returned to Richmond and his legislative duties, then in August 1863 volunteered to serve on the staff of General J. E. B. Stuart (where he continued to serve until that general's death).^[25]

In February 1864, on General Stuart's recommendation, Boteler became a military judge, and remained such for the remainder of the war.^[26] In July 1864, Union troops (following orders of Union General David Hunter during the final campaign against rebel sympathizers) looted and burned Fountain Rock, although only occupied by Boteler's wife, daughters and grandchildren.^[27] They had spent part of the war in Baltimore, and Lettie in particular was a fervent Confederate supporter. Fountain Rock was one of several plantations ordered destroyed: the homes of Andrew Hunter near Charles Town and "Bedford", the home of Edmund J. Lee (cousin of the Confederate general) were also burned per that order, although the home of Charles J. Faulkner in Martinsburg would be spared based on the entreaties of his wife and Union-allied relatives.^[28]

On April 25, 1865, Boteler wrote his wife about his attempt to return to Petersburg on April 2, 1865, then receiving a parole from Grant at Appomattox Court House on April 9, falling ill during his journey to devastated Richmond (feeling "utterly lost and bewildered in the midst of ruins which extend as far as the eye can reach"), and being unable to return home via the railroad from Baltimore because of Lincoln's assassination.^[29]

Postwar years

After the war, Boteler's cement mill was sold at auction in 1867 since he lacked funds to rebuild it (having invested in Confederate war bonds). Rebuilt by investors, it remained in operation until 1901.^[30]

Living in Shepherdstown, Boteler remained active in his community. He led projects to bring the Shenandoah Valley Railroad to Shepardstown, as well as to connect his hometown by telegraph to the wider world.^[31] In 1871, Boteler helped found Shepherd College, in the vacant building built by his late son-in-law that Shepherdstown had hoped would remain the county courthouse (Charles Town regained the county seat after considerable litigation). Boteler benefited from legislation restoring political rights to Confederates in June 1872, and then unsuccessfully ran for Congress as an Independent in 1872 and 1874.^[1]

Boteler also continued to write and sketch, although his books about James Rumsey and about temperance were never published. He traveled widely, speaking at Confederate reunions, which delighted in his tales about Stonewall Jackson and J.E.B. Stuart as well as John Brown's raid.^[1] In 1883, Boteler responded to a speech by Frederick Douglass at the dedication of Storer College in Harpers Ferry by publishing an article about his experience of that raid in Century Magazine.^[32] A decade later the Boston Military History Society bought some of his sketches. His account of Stonewall Jackson's Campaign in 1862 was published posthumously by the Southern Historical Society.^[33]

Appointed West Virginia's representative to the Centennial Commission in 1873,^[34] Botler was later appointed a member of the Tariff Commission by President Chester A. Arthur (which caused him to travel widely in 1882-1884). He also was employed as a pardon clerk in the Department of Justice by Attorney General Benjamin H. Brewster, serving until 1889. (Following the Panic of 1890, the Republican party would lose badly in the 1990 election)

In 1885, the Morgans Grove Agricultural Association held a fair on the property of his neighbor William A. Morgan. The Shenandoah Valley Railroad built a stop for the event, which was a great success. The fair continued annually, becoming a four day event and in June 1889 the association bought Boteler's Fountain Rock property, moved some fair buildings onto it, then constructed a wooden pavilion in 1890.^[35]