Too Few Trains

The Reinforcement of P. G. T. Beauregard at First Manassas

By Charles T. Harrell © 1999
reprinted by permission of the author

Last update
Jul 13, 2005

Notes

Known locally as Tudor Hall before the railroad came.

Marshall was educated at Washington University, class of 1833, (now Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Va.) and moved to California. He represented his newly adopted state in the U.S. House of Representatives 1851-1853. While serving, he was also engaged in railroad building in Northern Virginia. His large family is detailed in the Fauquier County, Va. 1850 census, Ashby District p. 265 and 1860 census Markham P.O. p. 222. As a wealthy land owner, he evidently had input on the location of the railroad as passing his own farm in the Manassas Gap. Information obtained from Internet source relating Washington & Lee University Alumnus.

Information concerning the building of the railroad found in the Manassas Museum display in Manassas Va. and files located in the Library of Virginia's Board of Public Works file 136.

As found at an Internet site, Robert Moore, II and Jeffrey C. Weaver; H. E. Howard, Inc. Rt. 2 Box 496H Appomattox, Virginia 24522 Page established: 01/12/98 Last revised: 01/15/98 ©1998

Black, Robert C. III, The Railroads of the Confederacy, The University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, NC 1998, p. 57.

McMichael, Andrew, The Little Engine That Couldn't: The Orange & Alexandria Railroad, 1865-1877, 1995. Thesis found on the Internet on the George Mason University Web Server.

Jackman, John S. Diary of a Confederate Soldier: John s. Jackman of the Orphan Brigade, University of South Carolina Press, Columbia SC, 1997.

Davis, William C., The First Battle of Manassas: Civil War Series, Eastern National, 1995, p. 29. (Hereafter referred to as Davis.)

Davis, p. 11.

Imboden, John D. "Incidents of the First Bull Run", Battles and Leaders of the Civil War, Castle Books, New York, NY, Vol. 1, p. 229. A more extensive discussion of this dispatch is found in Joseph E. Johnston's article in the same volume beginning on page 240.

Beauregard, P.G.T., "The First Battle of Bull Run", Battles and Leaders of the Civil War, Castle Books, New York, NY, Vol. 1, p. 201.

Imboden, John D., "Jackson at Harper's ferry in 1861", Battles and Leaders of the Civil War, Castle Books, New York, NY, Vol. 1, p. 111-125. Also see Davis, p. 8 relating to Scott's order for Patterson's army to begin organizing at Chambersburg, Penn.

Letter to the Editors of the Century Magazine by Col. Roger Jones (Inspector-General of the U.S. in 1886) printed as a footnote in Battles and Leaders of the Civil War, Castle Books, New York, NY, Vol. 1, p. 125.

Jackson during a spectacular capture of Baltimore & Ohio Railroad rolling stock contained fifty-two locomotives and near three hundred cars. Not all the captured railroad equipment was lost. Some cars and four light locomotives escaped to Winchester on the Winchester & Potomac Railroad. For an excellent description of Jackson's May 23^rd railroad capture and succeeding destruction can be found in Turner, George Edgar, Victory Rode the Rails, The Strategic Place of the Railroads in the Civil War, University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln Neb., 1953, pp. 73-77.

The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, Series I, Vol. 2, p. 172. (Hereafter to as OR)

Buck, Capt. Samuel D., With the Old Confeds, Actual Experiences of a Captain in the Line, H.E. Houck & Co., Baltimore, Md., 1925, p. 22.

OR, Series I, Vol. 2, pages 157-179. Patterson often is criticized by his inaction during First Manassas but many arguments omit the problem facing many Federal Troops of expiring enlistments during those hectic days of mid-July, 1861. Patterson was replaced by Nathaniel Banks even before the engagement of July 21^st. No mention is made to Johnston's understanding of the disintegration of the Union Army in his official report. OR, Series I, Vol. 2, pp. 470-478.

OR, Series I, Vol. 2, p. 473 and 478.

Johnston, Joseph E., "Responsibilities of the First Bull Run", Battles and Leaders of the Civil War, Castle Books, New York, NY, Vol. 1, p. 243-244.

Brown, Maud Morrow, The University Greys, Garrett and Massie, Inc., Richmond, Va., 1940, p. 13. (Hereafter referred to as The University Greys.)

Brown, J. W., Personal letter to his father, a copy to be found in the files of Manassas Battlefield Park, Manassas Va. in the Kentucky file, dated August 2^nd, 1861.

As quoted in Davis, p. 18.

Johnston, Joseph E., Narrative of Military Operations, Directed, During the Late War Between the States, D. Appleton and Co., New York, NY, 1874, pp. 36-37.

McKim, Randolph H., A Soldier's Recollections; Leaves from the Diary of a Young Confederate, Zenger Publishing Co., Washington D.C., 1910, pp. 28-29.

Johnston, Joseph E., Narrative of Military Operations, Directed, During the Late War Between the States, D. Appleton and Co., New York, NY, 1874, pp. 36-37. (Hereafter referred to as Johnston.)

Davis, p. 19.

Casler, John O., Four Years in the Stonewall Brigade, Morningside Bookshop, Dayton, OH, 1971, p. 22.

The University Greys, p. 18, letter by W.A. Evans reprinted.

Zettler, B.M., War Stories and School Day Incidents for the Children, The Neale Publishing Company, New York, NY, 1912, pp. 57-58.

Davis, p. 19. Johnston, p. 38.

In nearly every personal account, the ordinary soldiers make reference about how it was the general belief that the railroads retained a "northern element."

The University Greys, p. 18. Brown gives clues on which companies of the 11^th Mississippi Infantry were available for the battle and which were still on the trains. Davis, p. 19. Johnston, p. 38.

Brown, J. W. letter to his father dated Aug. 2^nd, 1861.

The University Greys, p. 19 reprints the letter by W.A. Evans of a companion named Faulk on July 25^th, 1861.

Anderson, Keller Col., "Kentuckians Defend Their State", Confederate Veteran Magazine, No. 1908, pa. 597.

McDaniel, Henry D., With Unabated Trust: Major Henry McDaniel's Love Letters From Confederate Battlefields as Treasured by Hester McDaniel's Bonnet Box, edited by Anita B. Sams, Historical Society of Walton County, Ga., 1977. Letter dated July 28, 1861. I am in doubt to which regiment in which he served as the notes in Sams' book mentions the Walton Infantry., 11^th Ga. Infantry., Company H, commanded by Col. George Thomas (Tige) Anderson who was not present with the Army of the Shenandoah in the summer of 1861.

Davis, William C., Battle of Bull Run, A History of the First Major Campaign of the Civil War, Louisiana State University Press, Baton Rouge, La., 1977.

Riggs, David F., 13^th Virginia Infantry; The Virginia Regimental History Series, H.E. Howard Inc., Lynchburg, Va., 1988, p. 5-6. It is unclear if Lt. Col. Walker actually operated the train or if other soldiers did. I searched the regimental roll and found only one other qualified railroad worker in Private Garrett Gideon Gooch who had been working for the Virginia Central Railroad prior to the war as conductor, baggage, express, and mail agent. See page 116.

McHenry Howard, Recollections of a Maryland Confederate Soldier and Staff Officer Under Johnston, Jackson, and Lee, Morningside Bookshop, Dayton OH, 1975, 34.

The University Greys, p. 17-18 reprints this Beauregard quote.

Poland, Charles P., as stated during a grueling field trip in the Summer of 1999 to Manassas Battlefield Park.

Much work still may be investigated on this point. As of present, I have not searched will records of possible conductors that disappeared about this time. Nor a work by D.C. Love, The Prairie Guards, A History of Their Organization, Their Heroism, Their Battles and Their Triumphs, Starkville, Miss., 1890, in rare book collection at Mississippi State University. Also the records of the Manassas Gap railroad are missing and have been searched for without success. As far as can be ascertained, all that has been written about this incident is what I have included in this dissertation.