Nonprofit aims to save Civil War's 'Kitty Hawk'

MECHANICSVILLE, Va. (AP) — It was the Civil War's "Kitty Hawk moment," and it happened here when balloons manned by Confederate and Union aeronauts floated above a field of battle — the first time warring armies sent their air ships aloft simultaneously over U.S. soil.

The historic encounter in the skies occurred on June 27, 1862, when two Union balloons — the Intrepid and the Washington — rose aloft only miles west of Richmond while their Southern counterpart, Gazelle, floated over the capital of the Confederacy. These balloons were the unarmed drones of war, collecting intelligence on rival troop movements from a vantage of 1,000 feet above the earth.

"You had the Confederate balloon up and the Union balloons up, all trying to exploit the advantages of being above and over the battlefield and providing tactical information to their respective generals," says Mike Boehme, director of the Virginia Aviation Museum. "This was the first time that opposing air forces were facing each other."...