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The 1861 Wheeling Convention was an assembly of Southern Unionist delegates from the northwestern counties of Virginia, aimed at repealing the Ordinance of Secession, which had been approved by referendum, subject to a vote.
The first of its two meetings was held before the vote, and some were keen to preempt ratification. But most preferred to elect delegates for a second meeting, should the vote go against them. When it did, the assembly formed its own Restored Government of Virginia, recognized by the federal government, and empowered to authorize the creation of a new state of West Virginia.
First Wheeling Convention
thumb|right|220px|West Virginia Independence Hall
The First Wheeling Convention was held on May 13 through May 15, 1861. Twenty-seven northwestern Virginia counties were represented. Of the 429 delegates who attended, over one-third were from the area around Wheeling. Most had been chosen at public meetings, while others attended on their own initiative. William B. Zinn, who had represented Preston County many times in the Virginia General Assembly, was elected chairman. Immediately, a debate ensued over which delegates should be allowed to participate in the convention: Gen. John Jay Jackson of Wood County suggested seating all northwestern Virginians, but John S. Carlile insisted that only those who had been legitimately appointed by their constituencies be allowed to participate. Chester D. Hubbard of Ohio County ended the debate by proposing the creation of a committee on representation and permanent organization.
left|thumb|1913 photos of five survivors of the First Wheeling Convention
Some, including Jackson, argued that preemptive action against the Ordinance of Secession before it was ratified was unwise. The Ordinance of Secession would not be presented to the citizens of Virginia for a vote until May 23. Others, including Carlile, insisted on immediate action to "show our loyalty to Virginia and the Union," and on May 14, he called for a resolution creating a state of New Virginia. Waitman T. Willey responded to Carlile's plan by saying that it was "triple treason"—treason against the state of Virginia, the United States, and the Confederacy. Carlile's motion was condemned as revolutionary, and most at the convention instead supported resolutions offered by the Committee on State and Federal Resolutions, which recommended that western Virginians elect delegates to a Second Wheeling Convention to begin on June 11 if the people of Virginia approved the Ordinance of Secession.
Second Wheeling Convention
Background and composition
A Second Wheeling Convention included 32 western counties, Alexandria and Fairfax County. Twenty-nine of the convention delegates were members of the Virginia General Assembly as state delegates or state senators, such as John J. Davis of Harrison County and Lewis Ruffner of Kanawha County.
Arthur I. Boreman was selected to serve as president, and he declared, "We are determined to live under a state government in the United States of America and under the Constitution of the United States."
Counties adhering to the Confederate cause either did not send representatives or were not entitled to seats. Among the more prominent not to send a delegate to the Wheeling Convention was Greenbrier County. Delegate Mason Mathews from Greenbrier County instead attended the Virginia General Assembly in Confederate Richmond.
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File:JohnJDavisWV.jpg|John J. Davis<br>Member of suspended Virginia Assembly
File:JCarlile.jpg|John S. Carlile<br>Floor leader then Virginia U.S. Senator 1861–1865
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On June 17, Carlile attacked the rebellion as treason: "it is the result sir, of mature deliberation, concocted in treason, for the express purpose of breaking up constitutional liberty in this country... The plot was one that was conceived in perjury at Washington, and carried out by falsehood throughout the country, attended by coercion, intimidation, insult and a reign of terror, which was equally concerted throughout Virginia, as well as in the other Southern States." Carlile then recounted events at the Richmond Secession Convention in which he had been an Unconditional Unionist. "For several days before the Convention passed the Ordinance of Secession, it was absolutely besieged; members were threatened with being hung to the lamp posts; their lives were jeopardized; the mob was marching up and down the streets, and surrounding the Capitol, and everything was terror and dismay."
Carlile continued to impeach the legitimacy of Virginia's referendum on secession. "Immediately upon the passage of the Ordinance of Secession, in every county, as far as I can learn, a systematic reign of terror was inaugurated." Throughout the state, "irresponsible persons assembled, under the name of 'committees of safety', who [told Union men] that they must leave the State... All Union men were admonished that they would be prosecuted for treason." Carlile then described the days leading up to the referendum: " Before the day of election arrived we see the troops from South Carolina, Georgia and other Southern States, placed all over the eastern and southern parts of the States running up into the valley, and in some parts of Western Virginia. In those parts of the State freedom of election was completely suppressed, and men who dared to vote against secession done it at the hazard of their lives. Thus, sir, you see the concert by which secession has been inaugurated and carried out in Virginia; and we see that same spirit that reigned in it from the beginning... TREASON..."