Hanover Junction is a small unincorporated community, which is located in south-central York County, Pennsylvania, United States, near the borough of Seven Valleys.

In early 1853, newspapers reported arrivals and departures, at the Hanover Junction Railroad Station, of "The Accommodation Train" from and to Baltimore, Maryland.

[4][5] In April 1861, during the opening months of the American Civil War, Hanover Junction became a frequent gathering point for Union Army soldiers from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania for transportation to and from points south, where they were stationed to protect the nation's capital city, Washington, D.C., and other sites that were endangered by advancing Confederate States Army troops.

News reports at that point indicated that Confederate troops led by Jubal Early, which had reached Gettysburg on June 26 and were "in force at Abbottstown and Kingston," had reached the Northern Central Railroad sometime around noon on June 27, where they were able to hamper Union Army leaders from communicating by telegraph with their superiors in Harrisburg.

[9] During the siege of Hanover Junction young John Shearer had the forethought to throw the telegraph key out of the window where it was unable to be found by the Confederate raiders.

According to local legend, he stayed awake at the telegraph key for the duration supplied with generous amounts of coffee provided by the inhabitants of a village within earshot of the artillery roar some thirty miles west Following the 1863 Battle of Gettysburg, Hanover Junction became a major route for the transport of wounded soldiers from Gettysburg to hospitals in Baltimore, Harrisburg, York, and other Northern towns.