Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1912-12-22

ment inscribed: ITO the Memory OF
Seventeen Unknown Confederate Dead
Who Fell in Front Of Washington: D.
c.. July II, 1864. BY their comrades"
word in big letters Confederate. \
funeral mound at the base of the monu-
ment is matted with myrtle and few
evenings ago there lay there a tribute
of flowers. dry-dead, put there by pious
hands.
A map made by the engineer bureau or
the War Department in 1865 gives the
following names of men living. or owning
land. along or near the Seventh street
road between Fort Stevens and Grace
Church: \. Shoemaker, ]. Seiden, L. Car
berry. d. Colclazer. F. P. Blair NJ. Blair,
]. Wilson, r. Wilson, d. Clagett's heirs.
Grammer's heirs. Crops, A. Talbot, j.
Thomas Eslin, George Riggs and r. w.
Burch.
The Star man talked with the tol'gate
keeper. who had lived in the neighbor-
hood sixty-five years. He knew Capt.
Carberry and also knew the Lays, who
succeeded to the Carberry property. Some
Of the Lay descendants are living. Col
clazer was also captain. He ran
blacksmith shop on the site of the boiler
house Of the florist greenhouses that
stand on the road near Walter Reed Hos
pital He had three sons. William. Harry
and George-all of them blacksmiths. The
tollgate keeper had lost all trace of this
family
In the grounds of the Walter Reed
Hospital is the standing trunk with crop
ped limbs of dead tree. 1t was large
tulip poplar. 1t grew north of a rise in
the ground that gave the lower part of it
defilade against Fort Stevens. From the
branches of this tree could be obtained a
clear field of fire against the skirmishers
sent forward from the fort line and the
rifle trenches fianking the fort. This
tree was made use of by Confederate
sharpshooters. and the death shots of
many of the men whose bones lie under
the sod Of battle-ground cemetery We're
fired from the branches Of this poplar.
The Lay house is tenanted but is falling
into decay. 1t is a successor Of the
house that stood there during the early
moments of the fight. that having been
set on fire by shots from Fort Stevens
because it provided shelter for the enemy.
4 X
The battle Of Fort Stevens may be
Closely followed by reading the work
written on that subject by William v.
Cox. who has been prominent in the agi-
tation having for its end the preservation
of the fort. In a paper on the beauti-
fcation of the Capital, printed in the APP
pendix Of the volume. concentrating
the celebration Of the one-hundredth an
niversary of the establishment Of the
seat Of government in the District of
Columbia, Mr.. Cox wrote:
1.-The line of old forts and earthworks
from Fort Reno to Fort Totten should
for history's sake be preserved as a bat
tlefield park. 1t was at Fort Stevens,
midway in this line. where President Lin
coin stood exposed to the Confederate
fire, and it was this fort that saved the
capture of the capital of the nation by
Gen. Jubal A. Early during the engage
ments of July II and L. 1854. The site
where Commodore Joshua Barney planted
his guns in 1914 to stop the advance of
the British from Bladensburg should also
be marked as one of the few creditable
incidents of the campaign Of Gen. Ross
and Admiral Cockburn that resulted In
the capture of Washington"
The story of Early's march from the
Monocacy, his fight with detachment