February 19
Thirty-three Guns for Donelson.:Yesterday morning about 2 o'clock, by order of Gen. Rosecrans, the brass Parrott guns for the Virginia batteries were brought out at the foot of Third street, centre Wheeling, and thirty-three guns and a squib were fired for the taking of Ft. Donelson. There was an interval of ten seconds between the shots. We have yet to see a single person in or about the city who did not hear the roaring guns, although the firing commenced at an hour when most people sleep soundly. The echoes were awakened away beyond the Ohio hills, and had we not known of the good news from Donelson, we should have supposed that the city was being bombarded.
The night was generally a wild one. In consequence of the glorious news quite a number of excitable young people were drunk, and went howling around town in a warlike manner, and giving vent to their patriotism in insane screams.
Timeline of West Virginia: Civil War and Statehood: February 1862