Fishing Creek Confederacy The Fishing Creek Confederacy was an alleged military uprising in northern Columbia County , Pennsylvania and southern Sullivan County , Pennsylvania during the American Civil War . Residents of Columbia County strongly opposed military draft s that were being conducted there , leading to widespread desertion and draft evasion . In a Columbia County draft in July 1863 , 618 people were drafted . Of these , approximately 75 % evaded the draft . On July 30 , 1864 , several people rode into northern Columbia County from Luzerne County to search for deserters , and one of the riders was shot . By the summer of 1864 , rumors had begun to circulate that these deserters and draft evaders , as well as Confederate sympathizers , had built a fort with cannons on North Mountain , not far from the headwaters of Fishing Creek . This fort was supposedly manned by 500 people . Upon hearing these rumors , 1000 soldiers gathered near Bloomsburg , in Columbia County . On August 21 , 1864 , the soldiers began traveling up Fishing Creek . For the next week , they searched the northern portion of Columbia County for deserters and draft evaders . They were unable to find any , but on August 28 they arrested 100 local citizens . Most were released , although some were taken to Fort Mifflin . The soldiers continued heading into the northernmost reached of the Fishing Creek watershed . Unable to find any evidence of a conspiracy , they returned to Bloomsburg and remained in the county until December 1864 . The last of the prisoners were released from Fort Mifflin several months after their arrest . The events of the Fishing Creek Confederacy were widely covered in both Democratic and Republican newspapers . In addition to contemporary coverage , the event was later reported by newspapers in the 1960s and 1970s . Professional historians began to do significant study on the confederacy in 1941 , and it was mentioned in academic writings as late as 2009 . Amateur historians have researched the event since the 1950s . Background . In the early 1860s , many counties in Pennsylvania were staunch supporters of the Democratic Party , while the newly elected president of the United States was the Republican Abraham Lincoln . When a large number of men were drafted from Columbia County , tensions led to raids and arrests in Columbia and neighboring counties . As early as 1862 , the local press expressed outrage at a draft of 636 men , mostly mechanics and laborers . An 1863 law requiring all men from 20 to 45 years old to be drafted increased tensions further . On July 20 locals broke into the district draft office and stole the items inside . But besides this event , there was little active violence against officials of the 1863 draft . In response to the draft law , meetings in Stillwater and Jerseytown resolved that " A war carried on contrary to the rules and provisions of that instrument [ the Constitution ] , whether it be a crusade against slavery , or any other fanatical or delusory scheme , never can and never will receive our support . " " The Columbia Democrat " also objected to the new draft laws . When Samuel F . Pealer , a draft officer , attempted to recruit four men in Stillwater , one of the men threatened to " knock his [ Pealer ' s ] brains out " . Unrest increased still further after a costly military campaign in Virginia in early 1864 . By June of that year , opposition to the draft was made clear when 75 percent of all people drafted in Columbia County failed to show up . Tension was especially high in the community of Mifflinville , where many people in the county accused one another of conspiracy . The accusations became exaggerated , leading to the rumors of a fort in the mountains at the headwaters of Fishing Creek . Some people even claimed to have seen the fort and the trails along which cannons were supposedly dragged . A Union soldier named Robinson was shot in July or August 1864 near Raven Creek , a tributary of Fishing Creek . That shooting was originally blamed on the political group known as the Knights of the Golden Circle , though it was eventually proven that the group had disbanded in 1863 . Initial search for deserters . In late July 1864 , Lieutenant James Stewart Robinson , Solomon Taylor , and six other Republicans from near Harveyville gathered together to search for Democratic deserters . This group , consisting mostly of veterans of the American Civil War , was deemed the " Lincoln Midnight Riders " by " The Columbia Democrat " . Though they initially intended to search Union County , they ended up searching Columbia County instead . On July 30 , 1864 , the group set out from Fairmount Springs . Initially they sought a deserter named Silas Karns , but they were unable to find him . They next sought for a deserter named Wolf instead , supposedly hiding in the home of a man named Joseph Hess , and then for a deserter named Gomer Smith in Sugarloaf Township , but neither could be located . Finally they attempted to find a man named Thomas Smith , living in Benton Township near Raven Creek . It was in this area that four more people joined the Lincoln Midnight Riders . Thomas Smith escaped into a cornfield while his wife alerted the neighborhood about the arrival of the group . A party of locals arrived , including at least three armed deserters . Solomon Taylor ordered the group of locals not to fire . It is unclear which ground fired first , but three shots were heard , one of which hit Lieutenant Robinson . When the deserters fled the scene the Lincoln Midnight Riders chased them approximately a quarter mile before turning back . The shooting was mentioned in the " Columbia Democrat " which also wished Robinson a full recovery . Robinson died from peritonitis on November 3 , 1864 . Search for the fort . On August 4 , 1864 , after rumors of a conspiracy in Columbia County reached Harrisburg and Washington , D . C . , a Captain Manville requested that 40 to 45 soldiers be sent to Columbia County to arrest the local deserters and draft evaders . Fort - eight soldiers arrived on August 13 at the Bloomsburg Fair grounds in Bloomsburg , Pennsylvania , near the mouth of Fishing Creek . The carried two cannons and a battery of artillery . Two days later , 250 more soldiers arrived in Bloomsburg . Several prominent residents in the county , including United States Senator Charles R . Buckalew , assured the soldiers that there was no opposing armed force within the county . On August 16 Major General Darius Couch arrived to oversee the troops , and another group of soldiers arrived that same day . Colonel John Gosse Freeze delivered a message to the northern part of Columbia County , stating that any draft evaders who reported to Bloomsburg by August 20 would be pardoned . By August 21 , there were a thousand soldiers in Columbia County , and they began marching up Fishing Creek to search for the alleged fort . That evening the soldiers made camp at Coleman ' s Grove near Benton , Pennsylvania . While many soldiers were still arriving , the citizens of Benton held a meeting on August 14 to decide whether or not they would resist the soldiers . Many argued against it , but approximately 75 men declared they were prepared to resist any military occupation of their part of Columbia County . These men were led by Jacob Schultz , Samuel Kline , and one person from Orangeville . Kline went south to the town to learn more about the soldiers in Bloomsburg . According to an account by Edward McHenry , the other members of the resistance were told to remain at home until news arrived from Bloomsburg . When the draft evaders discovered that the army coming from Bloomsburg was too strong to defeat , McHenry and 20 other draft evaders in the county escaped to North Mountain . Throughout the next week scouts from the army were sent through the northern townships of Columbia County . The scouts failed to find any evidence of a military uprising . They raided hen roosts , cornfields , and pigpens that they encountered . At this point Major General George Cadwalader arrived to take command of the soldiers . On August 28 , 1864 , soldiers surrounded 100 houses in the northern townships of Columbia County and parts of western Luzerne County , including Cambria and New Columbus . One hundred Democrats termed " Copperheads " were arrested and marched to a church in Benton . Forty - five of the prisoners were charged with disloyalty and taken to Fort Mifflin near Philadelphia . Most of these prisoners were 40 years of age or older . Only seven were convicted of the charges , and six were soon pardoned . Most people incarcerated were released within eight months . The morning after the arrests the soldiers continued marching north , proceeding 10 miles ( 16 kilometers ) further to the headwaters of Fishing Creek and the base of the mountains in northern Columbia County . From here they marched up the valley of East Branch Fishing Creek to its headwaters . The soldiers extensively searched the mountains of northern Columbia County for half a day , going as far north as the headwaters of East Branch Fishing Creek in southern Sullivan County , where they climbed to the top of North Mountain in three groups . At the headwaters of East Branch Fishing Creek the soldiers turned south again , then headed up West Branch Fishing Creek as far as the Sullivan County line . They found some evidence that people had been in the area , but these appeared to have been hunting or logging camps . Eventually , unable to find any evidence of a fort in the area , the soldiers went back down Fishing Creek to Bloomsburg . Dissatisfied with their findings , the soldiers conducted a search of several unfortified homes in northern Columbia County . They captured a number of residents of Sugarloaf Township on August 31 , but these were soon released . Aftermath . After returning from the mountains , the soldiers made camp in Colemans Grove and returned to Bloomsburg on September 6 . That day George Cadwalader said of the alleged uprising : " The whole thing is a farce " . Even after the attempt to find the fort was abandoned , the people held in Fort Mifflin were not released . The soldiers remained in Columbia County for several months while continuing to hunt for deserters . As late as November 2 , the newspaper " Star of the North " reported that deserters were still being arrested , although there were fewer prisoners . On November 16 approximately 30 soldiers went as far as Dushore to arrest deserters . As they were still in Columbia County on Election Day in 1864 , the soldiers guarded the polls during the local and state elections . That day between four and sixty armed soldiers were stationed at each of the polling locations within the county . According to two local newspaper editors named Tate and Jacoby , the soldiers were positioned there to stop Democrats from voting . They arrested 44 Democrats and took them to Fort Mifflin . In four townships in Columbia County ( Beaver , Fishing Creek , Benton , and Sugarloaf ) , the voter turnout was 27 % to 47 % lower than the previous year , but the county still trended Democratic . Local newspaper editors Tate and Jacoby blamed the low turnout on local abolitionists . By December 1 , 1864 , all soldiers had left the county to search for armed resistance in other parts of Pennsylvania . Though widespread draft evasion was evidenced in Columbia County , there was never serious armed resistance . At the end of Columbia County ' s occupation , the county ' s Democrats were deeply embittered by the arrests . It is likely that the rumor of the fort originated from sightings of large piles of shingles gathered by draft - evading shingle makers . Wooden tubs for gathering sap from sugar maple s seen from a distance were likely mistaken for the fort ' s cannons . A deserters ' hideout on North Mountain , a cabin 20 feet ( 6 meters ) square and two stories high , may have been the subject of exaggerated claims by Republicans that the cabin was a fort . This cabin was rediscovered on July 13 , 2007 . In December 1864 , the soldiers who left Columbia County went on to Clearfield County to continue their search for deserters and draft evaders . The trials for the Columbia County residents held at Fort Mifflin were held in October and November 1864 . At least three of those tried admitted to having been at a secret meeting on August 14 , that many people were armed at the meeting , and that the people at the meeting intended to resist the soldiers in Bloomsburg . However , most of the prisoners were released on or before January 1865 , although a few were held until May 1865 . No one was charged for the murder of Lieutenant Robinson until 1891 , when Elias Young was arrested and charged . Although Young admitted to firing a gun , he stated that two people in the party searching for deserters had fired fist . The court ruled that Young was acting in self - defense , and he was declared not guilty . Media response . Contemporary coverage . The term " Fishing Creek Confederacy " was first used by an editor in Muncy on August 23 , 1864 . This editor , as well as J . R . Cornelius of the " Union County Star and Lewisburg Chronicle " both blamed the events of the Fishing Creek Confederacy on biased stories in Democrat newspapers . " Forney ' s War Press " of Philadelphia blamed the events on the Columbia County leaders , stating that the leaders led the people of Columbia County into treason . However Democratic newspapers instead held the abolitionists responsible for the events of the Fishing Creek Confederacy . For instance , Truman Purdy , editor of the " Northumberland County Democrat " stated that Bloomsburg ' s abolitionists sent for military forces to arrest unarmed farmers due to having believed exaggerated stories of the shooting on July 30 . However the " Sunbury Gazette " stated that the farmers were actually armed and prepared to resist the law . The conflict between the opposing newspapers reached its most severe level in May 1865 . At one point Republican newspapers such as the " Harrisburg Telegraph " ran stories that connected Charles R . Buckalew with the events of the Fishing Creek Confederacy . Later media response . In the 1950s amateur historians first began writing accounts of the events of the Fishing Creek Confederacy . In January 1950 William M . Scnure mentioned the event at a meeting of the Northumberland County Historical Society , and the fort on North Mountain was said to exist in an article written by Myrtle Magargel in 1955 . In 1958 the Fishing Creek Confederacy was mentioned in the " History of Columbia County , Pennsylvania , " which was intended to be used in schools in Columbia County . In the 1960s and 1970s local newspapers occasionally ran articles summarizing the Fishing Creek Confederacy . In 1998 the Bloomsburg Theater Ensemble compiled a book of Columbia County history based on letters to the editor , and several of these letters mentioned the Fishing Creek Confederacy . In 2012 Byron Heller wrote a piece of historical fiction called " The Fishing Creek Confederacy " , inspired by the events of the Fishing Creek Confederacy . The confederacy has been the subject of satirical works . The Fishing Creek Confederacy has also been the subject of a number of academic writings . In 1941 William Itter devoted a paragraph to the event in his doctoral dissertation , and in 1956 the historian William W . Hummel wrote an article on the Fishing Creek Confederacy . In 2009 the book " Deserter Country : Civil War Opposition in the Pennsylvania Appalachians " was written by Robert M . Sandlow as an extension of his doctoral dissertation .