. Battles and leaders of the Civil War : being for the most part contributions by Union and Confederate officers . that he believed they were spies. I wentout to see who they were, and f(iund Jackson and one of his staff. As Iapproached them, he put his finger on his lii:)s and shook his head as a signalfor silence. In a low tone he said he preferred it should not be known he hadcome there. He ajiproved of all I had done, and soon galloped away. I after-ward suspected that the visit was siuiply to familiarize himself with the lineof the canal and raihoad from Point of Rocks to Harpers Ferry pr
. Battles and leaders of the Civil War : being for the most part contributions by Union and Confederate officers . that he believed they were spies. I wentout to see who they were, and f(iund Jackson and one of his staff. As Iapproached them, he put his finger on his lii:)s and shook his head as a signalfor silence. In a low tone he said he preferred it should not be known he hadcome there. He ajiproved of all I had done, and soon galloped away. I after-ward suspected that the visit was siuiply to familiarize himself with the lineof the canal and raihoad from Point of Rocks to Harpers Ferry preparatoryto a sharji bit of strategy which he practiced a few days later. From the very beginning of the war the Confederacy was greatly in needof rolling-stock for the railroads. We were jiarticularly short of locomo-tives, and were Avithout the shops to build them. Jackson, appreciatingthis, hit iijion a plan to obtain a good supply from the Baltimore and Ohioroad. Its line was double-tracked, at least from Pi^int of Rocks to Martins-burg, a distance of 25 or 30 miles. We had not iutcifered with the inmniug. JACKSON AT HARPERS FERRY IN 1861. 123 of trains, except on tlie occasion of the arrestof General Harney. The coal traffic fromCumberland was immense, as the Washing-ton government was accumnlating suppliesof coal on the seaboard. These coal trainspassed Harpers Ferry at all hours of the dayand night, and thus furnished Jackson witha pretext for arranging a brilUant he sent me to Point of Rocks, heordered Colonel Harper with the 5tli Vu-ginia Infantry to Martinsburg. He thencomplained to President Garrett, of theBaltimore and Ohio, that the night trains,eastward bound, disturbed the repose ofhis camp, and requested a change of sched-ule that would pass all east-bound trains byHarpers Ferry between 11 and 1 oclock inthe day-time. Mr. Garrett complied, andthereafter for several days we heard the con-stant roar of passing trains for an hour- PEN SKETCH OF GENERAL J
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