Asa Rogers (June 4, 1802 – September 1, 1887) was an Virginia farmer, lawyer, merchant and politician who represented Loudoun County, Virginia in both houses of the Virginia General Assembly before the American Civil War, during which he became a Confederate officer and helped create Mosby's Raiders, and after which he lived in Middleburg.
Early life and education
Born at Stone Hill plantation about a mile east of the county seat to Hugh Rogers and his wife, the former Mary Coombs, he was one of eleven children, seven of whom survived to adulthood. Rogers received a private education appropriate to his class and graduated from the University of Virginia.
Career
After admission to the Virginia bar, Rogers practiced law, as well as operated his own plantation using enslaved labor.
Rogers also operated a store at Madison and Washington Streets (which remains today as a contributing property to the Middleburg Historic District). Middleburg had prospered from its location on a major wagon route from Alexandria, Virginia and Washington, D.C. westward into Winchester, Virginia and the Shenandoah Valley (later U.S. Route 50) as well as its proximity to a major north-south route through Virginia's Piedmont region and northward into Maryland (later U.S. Route 15). In 1836, the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad was completed, and by the 1840s, the wagon route trade had diminished significantly, to the detriment of merchants such as Asa Rogers.
In 1826 Loudoun County voters elected Rogers as one of their representatives in the Virginia House of Delegates, and re-elected him once, so he served from 1826 until 1828. In 1842, Loudoun and Fairfax County voters elected Rogers to the Virginia Senate, and re-elected him until the year after the Virginia Constitutional Convention of 1850, when the entire Senate was redistricted. In the final year of his term, his district had expanded to include Alexandria, which had been retroceded from the District of Columbia. Rogers unsuccessfully ran to become one of Loudoun County's representatives to the Virginia Secession Convention, polling 1,103 votes but losing to popular Quaker John Janney as well as John A. Carter (who polled 1,945 and 1,411 votes respectively and had previously represented the county at the 1850 Constitutional Convention), but outpolling secessionist John R. Carter of Philomont (who only received 269 votes).
After his legislative service, Rogers had served as one of the county's justices of the peace with fellow slaveowners Hamilton Rogers and John A. Carter, as well as Thomas S. Ellzey, who did not own slaves. In 1850, Hamilton Rogers owned 25 enslaved people, Asa Rogers 17, and John A. Carter 32. Asa Rogers also served on the vestry of Emmanuel Episcopal Church in Middleburg.
Civil War
When Virginia seceded from the Union on April 10, 1861 as the American Civil War began, Rogers and his brother Hamilton Rogers enlisted in the local militia, as did four sons of each man. Asa Rogers Sr. was commissioned as a Brigadier General on April 27, his brother Hamilton as a Colonel, and Asa's son Arthur Lee Rogers was commissioned as a Major in the Artillery. All 115 of Middleburg's eligible voters unanimously to secede from the Union. Asa Rogers Senior was captured twice (on February 24, 1862 and July 16, 1862) and exchanged each time. His son Arthur (1831-1871) was sent home as disabled, where he designed a flag for the Confederate States of America which incorporated the Confederate Battle Flag.
Mosby's Rangers were formed at Hamilton Rogers' Oakham Farm in December 1862, and several cavalry battles were fought around the area in July 1863, after the Battle of the Wilderness to the south, and both before and after the Battle of Gettysburg further up Route 15 in Pennsylvania. General U.S. Grant in December 1864 authorized a burning raid around Middleburg in retaliation for the damage Mosby's Rangers continued to inflict behind Union lines despite the Confederate Army's decisive loss at the Third Battle of Winchester in September and General Sheridan's march down the Shenandoah Valley.