Civil War Round Table to show movie Tuesday

A movie night is scheduled for the January meeting of the Colonel Henry Ryerson Civil War Round Table.

“The Raid,” a 1954 film starring Van Heflin, Anne Bancroft, Richard Boone, Lee Marvin and Peter Graves, will be shown at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 17 in the second-floor Atrium Room at the Sussex County Community College’s Performing Arts Center, College Hill Road, Newton.

Admission is free; donations are appreciated.

The movie, which is 84 minutes long, in about the infamous raid Oct. 19, 1864, in St. Albans, Vt., during the Civil War.

When a band of Confederate soldiers escaped from a Union stockade, they made their way to the safe haven of Canada. Led by Major Neal Benton (Heflin), the fugitives plan to raid a small town in Vermont as payback for the North’s destruction of the South. Performing reconnaissance, Benton becomes familiar with the town’s layout and develops a relationship with a widow (Bancroft) and her son.

The movie is based on a true event: 21 Confederate cavalrymen entered the U.S. from Canada, arriving about 15 miles south in St. Albans. Confederate agent George Sanders organized the event, and Lt. Bennett Young led the raid.

Young mounted the steps of a hotel and shouted, “This city is now in the possession of the Confederate States of America!”

The Confederates robbed three banks, then ran back over the border. They had planned to blow up the downtown with dynamite but it rained.

In 1914, Vermont placed a historic marker in front of Taylor Park, commemorating what became the northernmost land engagement of the Civil War.

The Colonel Henry Ryerson Civil War Round Table provides educational programs, tours and fellowship for people interested in the Civil War era.

Meetings are free and open to the public.

For information, please call Jennifer at 201-320-5989 during the day.