“A mile or two back I passed a line of Southern horsemen, just as wet and bedraggled as ours.”
“Might they not have been our own men? It would be hard to tell blue and gray apart on such a night.”
“One could make such a mistake, but in this case it was not possible. I saw my own cousin, Harry Kenton, riding with them. I recognized them perfectly.”
“Then that settles it. The Confederate scouts and cavalry are abroad to-night also, and on our side of the river. But they must be few who dare to ride in such a storm.”
“That's surely true, sir.”
But both Dick and his commanding officer were mistaken. They still underrated the daring and resolution of the Confederate leaders, the extraordinary group of men who were the very bloom and flower of Virginia's military glory, the equal of whom—two at least being in the very first rank in the world's history—no other country with so small a population has produced in so short a time.
Earlier in the day Stuart, full of enterprise, and almost insensible to fatigue, had crossed the Rappahannock much higher up and at the head of a formidable body of his horsemen, unseen by scouts and spies, was riding around the Union right. They galloped into Warrenton where the people, red hot as usual for the South, crowded around them cheering and laughing and many of the women crying with joy. It was like Jackson and Stuart to drop from the clouds this way and to tell them, although the land had been occupied by the enemy, that their brave soldiers would come in time.
News, where a Northern force could not have obtained a word, was poured out for the South. They told Stuart that none of the Northern cavalry was about, and that Pope's vast supply train was gathered at a little point only ten miles to the southeast. Stuart shook his plumed head until his long golden hair flew about his neck. Then he laughed aloud and calling to his equally fiery young officers, told them of the great spoil that waited upon quickness and daring.
The whole force galloped away for the supply train, but before it reached it the storm fell in all its violence upon Stuart and his men. Despite rain and darkness Stuart pushed on. He said afterward that it was the darkest night he had ever seen. A captured negro guided them on the final stage of the gallop and just when Dick was riding back to camp behind Colonel Winchester, Stuart fell like a thunderbolt upon the supply train and its guard.
Stuart could not drive wholly away the Northern guard, which though surprised, fought with great courage, but he burned the supply train, then galloped off with prisoners, and Pope's own uniform, horses, treasure chest and dispatch book. He found in the dispatch book minute information about the movements of all the Union troops, and Pope's belief that he ought to retreat from the river on Washington. Doubtless the Confederate horseman shook his head again and again and laughed aloud, when he put this book, more precious than jewels, inside his gold braided tunic, to be taken to Lee and Jackson.