Alexandria gazette. [volume] (Alexandria, D.C.) 1834-1974, 1892-11-14
Down i'll Old I-irsinny.

Down i'll Old IirSinny.
The Washington correspondent O.
the Cincinnati Gazette writes as follows
The earliest morning hours in city
railway station are not the best to study
your fellow human beings from an op.
timistic standpoint The commuters
come streaming through the iron gates
as train after train arrives and dis.
gorges. The employees, gate-lleepers,
etc, look just as sleepy and cross as
they. As the day wears on this aspect
will change, the irowns will disappear,
and geniality succeed ill-temper.
In the B. 4 2. station there is one
object the interest i'll which never lags.
1t is the brass star in the floor of the
ladies waiting-room that marks the
spot where Garfield fell. People f;lmil-
lar with its location carefully avoid
stepping upon it, and when speaking OF
it and the event it commentaries they
unconsciously lower their voices, often
to whisper. A colored woman once
testified. when sending her son to the
House OF Refuge for incorrgibles, that
his misfortune was all owing to the fact
that she mad stepped upon that death
star" few days before her child was
born
The colored woman in attendance can
tell you many interesting things about
the questions asked about the star, g
not infrcquent one being, ''Who was
Garfield ?'
Another institution in the station is
bureau Of information, with the noti-
fcation 'All questions answered
here" 4 brilliant correspondent
thought he would test The concern. He
stepped up and asked "What is the
chief end of man ~ ''To ride on the
Pennsylvania railway" was the an
swer.
Still another attraction is the man
who calls out the departure of trains.
He reminds one ofthe Missouri river
no head to speak of, but what voice!
After he had made an extraordinary
vocal exhibition the four newspaper
men entered the train for Fairfax sta
ton, and soon were slipping swiftly
along over the famous old Long bridge
with the beautiful panorama of the Po-
tomac spread out before them in as
fair an autumn morning as ever shone
At the driving station OF historic
Alexandria, with its "reminiscences OF
long-departed glory, You have q plain
front view of Christ Church, in which
are the pews of the Washingtons and
Lees. preserved in the condition they
were when last occupied by them.
Farther down, you catch glimpse
of the Bladdock House, in which that
officer planned the expedition from
which he never returned, and not far
away, and in sight, is the building
which was the Marshall House, and in
which Ellsworth lost his life almost
simultaneously with the death of his
assassin. And now you pass fully into
the scenes and associations of the great
war. Upon the high grounds left and
right, as you speed along, are the earth
forts, in many of them the cmbrasures
for the heavy guns still to be traced
Your railroad folder tells you that this
road was practically one battlefield
from Alexandria to Culpeper. 1t is q
pretty country now, with well kept
farm Eolses and wide barns, and blood
ed stock grazing on the pasture slopes
and Just now it is particularly attrac-
tive in the rich and varied forest hues
of autumn.
At the close of the war all this region
and way over to Gordonsville, Cul.
pepper. Brandy Station, Manassas, Bull
Run, Chantilly, Gainesville, Vienna
and so on up to Balls Bluff, was q
scene of savage desolation, tramped
over, fought over, devastated, soaked
with blood and full of dead mems
bones. That awful harvest has been
gathered By reverent hands, and the
bones of the fallen rest beneath the
peaceful trees of Arlington.
At Fairfax Station we alighted, tc
take the stage for Fairfax Courthouse
four miles away. The stage looked
as though it had seen better days il
couldn't be worse and hold together
and it is possible it dates back to the
war as an ambulance. If it does it il
lnstrates the hardships to which the
wounded were subjected. 1t is cover
ed with black oil-cloth and has 6
"Black Maria appearance. The driver
sits up in front with q tin horn stuck
in a socket at his right hand. Into thi:
he blows vigorously to annouce- to The
people his arrival and departure; to tht
Courthouse people and those along The
route he is railroad. expressman, mai
man, messenger, telephone and tele
graph. From the government he get:
a hundred dollars a year for carrying
the mails and his charge for the trip i:
twenty-five cents each way.
We had hardly got under way wher
the correspondents turned loose theil
batteries Of inquiry upon him.
Fighting around here? Well,
should say. Every inch of the GROUND
in all this region has been fought over
All these plains and slopes were cover
ed with camps for years. The frs
army here was the Confederate, but af
ter that the yankees were here most o
the time. You see that church? Thai
was a federal hospital and headquar
tcrs. Right in the road here and il
that graveyard across was a lively fight
one morning. Two companies of New
York cavalry were camped in thai
yard about the church and were moi
watchful, as they had no idea thai
there was confederate anywhere near