Editing Leesburg, Virginia (section)

===19th century===
During the [[War of 1812]], Leesburg served as a temporary haven for the United States government and its archives, including the [[United States Declaration of Independence|Declaration of Independence]] and the [[Constitution of the United States|U.S. Constitution]] and portraits of early American leaders, including [[Benjamin Franklin]], when it was forced to flee [[Washington, D.C.|Washington]] in the face of the [[British Army]].<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.connectionnewspapers.com/news/2008/jul/22/rokeby-house-becomes-nations-capital/ |title=Rokeby House Becomes Nation's Capital: Was Leesburg really the U.S. capital in 1814? |access-date=July 22, 2008 |archive-date=January 11, 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150111105315/http://www.connectionnewspapers.com/news/2008/jul/22/rokeby-house-becomes-nations-capital/ |url-status=live }}</ref> When reconstruction began on the [[United States Capitol]], [[Marble|Potomac marble]] from quarries just south of Leesburg was used.<ref name="Schneel"/><!-- p.26 -->

Early in the [[American Civil War]], Leesburg was the site of the [[Battle of Ball's Bluff]], a small but significant [[Confederate States of America|Confederate]] victory. The battlefield, along the Potomac River {{convert|2|mi|0}} northeast of the town center, is marked by one of America's smallest national cemeteries. The town frequently changed hands over the course of the war as both armies traversed the area during the [[Maryland campaign|Maryland]] and [[Gettysburg campaign|Gettysburg]] campaigns.

The [[Battle of Mile Hill]] was fought just north of the town prior to its occupation by [[Robert E. Lee]] in September 1862.<ref>{{cite book |editor1-last=Turner |editor1-first=Fitzhugh |title=Loudoun County and the Civil War |publisher=Willow Bend Books |location=Leesburg VA |year=1998}}</ref> Leesburg also served as a base of operations for Col. [[John S. Mosby]] and his partisan [[43rd Virginia Cavalry Battalion|Raiders]]. The local courthouse is among the few courthouses in Virginia that was not burned during the Civil War; the present one was built in 1894.

In 1889, a 14-year-old black American [[Lynching of Orion Anderson|Orion Anderson]] was killed by a white mob at the town's freight depot; his murder would be the second of three recorded lynchings in [[Loudoun County, Virginia]], between 1880 and 1902.<ref name="wamu">{{cite news |url=https://wamu.org/story/19/06/18/first-of-three-young-black-lynching-victims-in-loudoun-county-to-be-memorialized/ |access-date=November 9, 2022 |title=First Of Three Young, Black Lynching Victims In Loudoun County To Be Memorialized |date=June 18, 2019 |publisher=[[WAMU]] |archive-date=November 20, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201120205300/https://wamu.org/story/19/06/18/first-of-three-young-black-lynching-victims-in-loudoun-county-to-be-memorialized/ |url-status=live }}</ref>