Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 3.djvu/77



HE United States arsenal and armory at Harper's Ferry, at the junction of the Shenandoah and Potomac rivers, was the coveted object that first led to military operations in the Shenandoah valley in 1861. Ex-Governor Wise, early in April, urged the authorities at Richmond, by letter, to press forward on three points, the first, "Harper's Ferry, to cut off the West, to form camp for Baltimore and point of attack on Washington from the west."

In Richmond, on the night of April 16th, when it became evident that the Virginia convention would pass an ordinance of secession. Wise called together at the Exchange hotel a number of officers of the armed and equipped companies of the Virginia militia: Turner and Richard Ashby of Fauquier, O. R. Funsten of Clarke, all captains of cavalry companies; Capt. John D. Imboden, of the Staunton artillery; Capt. John A. Harman of Staunton; Nat Tyler, editor of the Richmond Enquirer, and Capt. Alfred M. Barbour, late civil superintendent of the United States armory at Harper's Ferry. These gentlemen, most of them ardent secessionists, discussed and agreed upon a plan for the capture of Harper's Ferry, to be put in execution on the 17th, as soon as the convention voted to secede, if the concurrence of Governor Letcher and railway transportation could be secured. Col. Edmund Fontaine, president of the Virginia Central railroad, and John S. Barbour, president of the Orange & Alexandria railroad, being called in consultation about midnight, agreed to provide the necessary trains for the movement of troops if requested to do so by Governor Letcher. A committee was then sent to the governor, which roused him from sleep and laid before him the scheme for the capture of the armory and arsenal. He refused to take any official steps until after the passage of the ordinance of secession, but