This edition of the newsletter begins our journey westward along the John S. Mosby Highway, US Route 50. We begin our journey at the Mount Zion Old Baptist Church near the village of Aldie and the intersection of Route 50 and Route 15. Long before Route 50 was Route 50, it served as the main pathway for Native Americans traveling between the Potomac River and the Shenandoah Valley. As English settlers expanded westward from Tidewater Virginia in search of land and commerce during the 1600s, the pathway eventually became Belhaven Road, the main settler trade route between Alexandria and Winchester.

Aldie's beginnings were laid in 1765 when brothers James and George Mercer built and operated a tap mill near the location of the present Aldie Mill on the Little River. The location was a strategic choice, as the gap contained the intersection of the Belhaven Road and the Mountain road which ran northwest to Snickers Gap. When, in 1806, the Little River Turnpike Company opened 34 miles of "paved" road from Alexandria to the present Aldie location, James Mercer's son Charles Fenton Mercer and his business partner set out to develop a village on 30 acres he inherited from his father. He and his partners seized on the economic potential of this strategic location and soon built a new grist mill that today we know as Aldie Mill. The village grew up in the early 1800s around the economic pace of the Aldie Mill and the Little River Turnpike. The nearby 1810 stone bridge over the Little River is still in use today, and there one may take a quiet walk on a footpath running along the mill race to the mill pond.

Aldie is home to several historic shops, homes, and the Aldie Mill, which survives today as Virginia's only known gristmill powered by twin overshot water wheels. Aldie also was the birthplace of Julia Beckwith Neale, mother of Stonewall Jackson.

Mount Zion Old Baptist Church lies just east of the present day intersection of Route 15 and Route 50. But when established in 1851, the church sat at the intersection at that time. In fact, remnants of the Old Carolina Road—later to become Route 15—can still be clearly seen just beyond the Mount Zion Cemetery. Mount Zion Church, in its tranquil setting in Loudoun County, belies a turbulent history. Even though it was a place of worship, the Church served also as a barracks, battleground and burial place during the Civil War. As Colonel John Singleton Mosby’s fame grew in this area, the federal government resolved to destroy his base of support. Federal patrols scoured the countryside in that pursuit, and Mount Zion Church served as a stopover for the Union troops. In 1864, one of these Federal stopovers became the genesis of one of Mosby’s most famous fights.

Mt Zion’s history comes alive during a quiet stroll through the cemetery. The Church burial grounds are the final resting place for twelve Union cavalrymen killed in action, thirteen Confederates who died after the War, and sixty-three African-Americans who were slaves or freed men buried prior to 1865. Confederate flags still adorn family plots in an act of remembrance.

VisitLoudoun has an excellent video of the Mount Zion Baptist Church at http://www.veoh.com/watch/v2080779554bsp98X

______________ Historic narrative by Ryan J. Stewart, Warrenton, VA Images Copyright J. Riley Stewart, 2011 ( https://jrileystewart.com) (Please contact the photographer for high resolution digital images or fine art prints)