Swift Run Gap

Swift Run Gap is a wind gap located in the Blue Ridge Mountains. At an elevation of 2,365 feet, it is the site of the mountain crossing of U.S. Highway 33 between the Piedmont region on the eastern side and the Shenandoah Valley (or Great Valley of Virginia) to the west.

Generally following the mountain ridge tops, the bucolic Skyline Drive, which is part of Shenandoah National Park, has an entry point at Swift Run Gap and the Appalachian Trail also passes through nearby. The mountain ridge forms the border between Greene County and Rockingham County.

History

Swift Run Gap is a long-used and historic crossing in the Blue Ridge Mountains. In 1716, Royal Governor Alexander Spotswood of the Virginia Colony, with 62 other men and 74 horses, led a real estate speculation expedition up the Rapidan River valley during westward exploration of the interior of Virginia. The party reached the top of the Blue Ridge at Swift Run Gap on September 5, 1716, and drank the special toasts to the king and to Governor Spotswood, and named a peak for each.

Upon descending into a portion of the Shenandoah Valley on the east side of Massanutten Mountain, they reached a point near the current town of Elkton, where they celebrated their arrival on the banks of the Shenandoah River with more multiple toasts of brandy and claret.

After the journey, Spotswood was believed to have given each member of the expedition a pin made of gold and shaped like a horseshoe on which he had inscribed the words in Latin "Sic jurat transcendere montes", which translates in English to "Thus he swears to cross the mountains." 

The members of Governor Spotswood's expedition soon became popularly known as the "Knights of the Golden Horseshoe." A historical plaque and pyramid-shaped stone mark their historic crossing of 1716.

The Swift Run Gap Turnpike, a privately owned toll road, was first completed through Swift Run Gap in the early 19th century. In the 1840s, plans for the Louisa Railroad (renamed the Virginia Central Railroad in 1850) originally anticipated a crossing the Blue Ridge at Swift Run Gap to reach Harrisonburg, but projected construction costs after surveying were prohibitive. 

This was primarily due to the steepness of the terrain on the eastern slope. Addressing the dilemma, Claudius Crozet, the legendary Chief Engineer of the Virginia Board of Public Works, determined that a system of tunnels at Rockfish Gap to the south about 30 miles would be more feasible. Despite later technological advances, no railroad crossing was ever attempted at Swift Run Gap.

Even in modern times, the two lane highway (U.S. 33) at the lower elevations follows a small creek named "Swift Run" west from Stanardsville, but then about half way up, requires multiple horseshoe curves on the steep grades of the eastern slope as it ascends an increasingly winding pathway to reach Swift Run Gap.

Crozet was also first commandant of the new Virginia Military Institute (VMI), where one of the young instructors during his tenure was Thomas Jonathan Jackson, who later was to become well-known by his nickname of Stonewall Jackson. Their relationship may have facilitated some of the tactics used by Jackson during the first several years of the American Civil War (1861-1865). 

Stonewall Jackson and his famous "foot cavalry" used Swift Run Gap (and several others) to rapidly shift his troops from the Shenandoah Valley to the Piedmont battle areas. Jackson's use of intimate knowledge of this and other crossings of the Blue Ridge Mountains allowed him to often appear before Union forces unexpectedly on numerous occasions, intimidating leaders such as General George B. McClellan, causing them to be less aggressive with their own plans of advancement.

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