Taking the train from Philadelphia, I went to Harrisburg, Lancaster, and York in Pennsylvania, and thence into western Maryland. Everywhere the people were arming. All the able-bodied men were drilling. All labor was at a stand-still. The fires of the founderies went out; the farmers left their uncut grain in the field. Men worth millions of dollars were in the ranks as privates. Members of Congress, professors of colleges with their classes, iron-masters with their workmen, ministers and the able-bodied men of their congregations, were hastening to the rendezvous. The State Capitol grounds were swarming with men, receiving arms and ammunition. It was a glorious exhibition of patriotism; yet I could but think that they would offer a feeble resistance in the open field to well-drilled troops. At Bunker Hill raw militia stood the fire of British veterans; but such instances of pluck are rare in history.
Going up the Cumberland Valley I reached Greencastle on the 14th of September, ten miles from Hagerstown. I could hear a dull and heavy booming of cannon to the south, in the direction of South Mountain; but the Rebels were at Hagerstown, and had made a dash almost up to Greencastle. The only troops in the place were a few companies watching the border, and momentarily expecting the Rebels to appear. Citizens of Maryland, some from Virginia, Union men, were there, ready to run farther North on the slightest alarm.
Sept., 1862.
The little village was suddenly excited by the cry, "They are coming!" "They are coming!" It was not a body of Rebels, however, but the Union cavalry, which had cut their way out from Harper's Ferry in the night before the pusillanimous surrender of Colonel Miles. They crossed the pontoon bridge, moved up the Potomac, through wood-paths and by-ways, twice coming in contact with the Rebel pickets, and falling in with Longstreet's ammunition trains between Hagerstown and Williamsport, consisting of one hundred wagons, which were captured. Many of the teamsters were slaves, who were very glad to see the Yankees. They were contented under their capture.
"Were you not frightened when you saw the Yankees?" I asked of one.
"Not de leastest bit, massa. I was glad to see 'em. Ye see, we all wanted to get Norf. De captain of de guard, he tell me to whip up my horses and get away, but I done cut for de woods right towards de Norf."
He chuckled merrily over it, and said, "I's in de service of de Union now."
He was driving the horses with evident satisfaction at the sudden change in his fortunes.
When John Brown woke the world from its dreaming at Harper's Ferry, he had an accomplice named Cook, who escaped and concealed himself in the mountains of Pennsylvania, but who was hunted down by Fitz Hugh Miller of Chambersburg. Among the Rebel prisoners was this same Fitz Hugh, dressed in a suit of rusty gray, with a black ostrich plume in his hat, sun-burned, dusty, having a hang-dog look. He was a captain in the Rebel service. The Dutch blood of the citizens, usually as calm and steady in its flow as the rivers of their Fatherland, came up with a rush.
"Hang him! Down with the traitor! Kill him!" they shouted. They rushed to seize him, but the guards kept the populace at bay. The excitement increased. Miller appealed to the guards to protect him. He was quickly hurried into the jail, which was strongly guarded. A great change had taken place in the opinions of the people. They had been indifferent to the questions of the hour, but the Rebel raid, by which they had lost their horses, had taught them an excellent lesson. Self-interest is sometimes a stimulant to patriotism. They even began to look with complacency upon what John Brown had done.