Then Roxy led her father under the arch to the swing, where he admired the wide seat around the tree, and declared that General McClellan himself could not have had a finer welcome.
It proved a day that the little group would long remember; not alone on account of Roxy’s celebration for her father, but because it was the 29th of August, 1862, the day when General Pope found himself facing Stonewall Jackson, the great Confederate general, on the battlefield of Bull Run. A battle where the Union forces were driven from the field with great loss, and were pursued by Lee’s army until, at Chantilly, Lee gave up the pursuit, and the broken battalions of the Union Army struggled back to Washington.
It was Roland Hinham who brought this news, several days later. Captain Delfield and Roxy were on the broad seat under the butternut when Roxy exclaimed: “Here comes Roland Hinham on horseback!”
“What is he riding like that for? His horse is coming at a gallop,” said Captain Delfield, rising to his feet and watching Roland as the boy urged his horse up the slope.
The tired horse came to a standstill in the yard and Roland swung himself from the saddle and ran toward Captain Delfield and hurriedly told him the news of the battle of Bull Run. “And that isn’t all, sir,” continued the excited boy. “General Lee’s troops are marching into Maryland.”
CHAPTER XII
STARTLING NEWS
“Will the Southern soldiers come here?” Roxy asked, clinging to her father’s arm, but Captain Delfield did not reply; he was questioning Roland for news of the advancing army, and hearing that President Lincoln had given the command of the Army of the Potomac to General George B. McClellan.
“Then there is some hope of saving the Union,” declared Captain Delfield; “but if Confederate troops are moving into Maryland they will seize horses and cattle wherever they find them. We must drive our stock into the mountains and keep them out of sight until the danger is over.”
“What danger?” questioned Mrs. Miller, who had come down from the house to greet Roland, and Roxy again heard Roland tell the story of the rumors of advancing armies.
Captain Delfield encouraged them all by saying that these hillside farms were too far from the direct routes of travel to make it likely that marching armies would trouble them; but Mrs. Miller nevertheless at once started Jacob and the other negroes to harvest the wheat, and to gather every crop in the fields bordering the highway.