FIRST AND LAST BLOOD OF THE WAR.
While the battle of Bethel is recorded in the foregoing pages as the first decided fight of the war between the States, it may leave erroneous impression not to note the date of "first blood" really shed in action on southern soil. In the report of the Adjutant-general of the State of Virginia, for 1866, occurs this entry:
J. Q. Marr, graduated July 4, 1846. Lawyer, Member of the Virginia Convention. Entered military service as Captain of Virginia Volunteers, April 1, 1861. Killed at Fairfax Courthouse, Virginia, May 13, 1861. First blood of the war.
Naturally, many conflicting statements as to the last effective shot of the long struggle were made and received as true. The most reliable would appear to be the following, reproduced from a paper printed by the boys of Mr. Denson's school, in the village of Pittsboro, N.C., in 1866:
The accomplished author of that series of interesting papers, "The Last Ninety Days of the War in North Carolina," published in The Watchman, New York, states that the last blood of the war was shed near the Atkins plantation, a few miles from Chapel Hill, on the 14th April, 1865. In a later number of the same paper, a member of the First Tennessee Cavalry says that it is a mistake; that companies E and F, of the same regiment to which he belonged, skirmished sharply with the Federals on the 15th, and claims that this was the last blood shed. Both are in error; there was a skirmish near Mt. Zion church, two miles south-east of Pittsboro, North Carolina, between a body of Wheeler's cavalry and a party of Federals, on the 17th of April; two Yankees were wounded, and three others, with several horses, captured. There was other skirmishing in the neighborhood about this time, and as late as the 29th (two days after General Johnston surrendered), a squad of Federal cavalry rode through Pittsboro, firing upon the citizens and returned soldiers, and receiving their fire in return. These men were pursued and overtaken near Haw river, where a skirmish occurred, in which two of the Yankees were killed and two others wounded, one mortally. This Haw river incident is a familiar and well authenticated one and most probably it really showed the last of the long bloodshed.
WHY NO PURSUIT AFTER MANASSAS.
Attention has frequently been drawn to the restiveness of the entire southern people, under alleged neglect to seize golden opportunities for pressing the enemy, after Confederate successes. Most frequently repeated of all these charges, is that which puts upon the shoulders of Jefferson Davis the onus of delay—and of all resulting evil—after the first victory on Manassas Plains. This charge receives semi-official sanction, from ex-Vice-President Stephens; for his history of the war plainly asserts that to the President was due "the failure of the Confederate troops to advance after the battle of Manassas." The following correspondence between the two men most interested in that mooted question may therefore be read with interest by all candid thinkers:
Richmond, Va., November 3, 1861.
General J. E. Johnston, Commanding Department of the Potomac: