Clinch Valley news. [volume] (Jeffersonville, Va.) 18??-2019, 1916-06-30
.BATTLESH|IP WAS BUILT
FROM MASS OF RAILS
Jackson Tore Up b. < o. Tracks
Around Martinsburg ana Ar
mored Merrimac With Them.

x
mOred Merrimac With Them.
tFrom The Cumberland, Md, News. J
On the morning of March s, 1862,
OIL theVirginia coast ut the point
where the James emptics it's water
into the Chesapeake MS the latte. is
about to merge its food with the brine
OF the Atlantic. toatsmen sailing IN
the bay beheld Il strange sight. A
great bulky aprarition, as Ii seemed,
was moving out from Norfolk and the
most seasoned 81 the water men could
not for the life of ,!'em tell what it
wa; Its appearance was THAI !.
mass of railroad Ion bull. into Il
py:amidal heap,with something with
in the crib-like structure that b"lchcd
forth smoke and steam.
rs 1t came within closer view it
was seen that along its corrugated
iron sides at regular intcrvals-,for il
was entirely cascd in rails-.there
frowned on the outer world the grim
muzzles of ponderous cannon.
The moving monster had been, UNI
Ill few months beforc, the United
States steam frigate Nerrmac. Sal
vaged by the Comfc;lerates from the
wreck of the GosporL Navy yard, up
posite Norfolk-burned by order OF
United States officers within Il weel;
after the firing on Sumter--it had
Leen taken in hand and, by ,lint of
The labor of skilled mechanics, plat
ed with railroad iron, and thus made
into one of the most formidable Of
Ges,royers the world had ever seen.
How the Merrimac defeated the
United States frigate Congress and
Cumberland, with loss of go men
that day, and how the next day the
strange little cheese box Monitor sent
the armored Merrimac back to Nor
folk so badly crippled that it was not
again heard of during the Civil War,
is history with which every school
boy and girl is familiar Not so gen,
orally known is the history of how the
Merrimac came to be armored.
Had the railroad iron which plated
the sides of the Merrimac been en-
dowed with the power of speech, it
could have told of blue-crested noun
tains far from the tida: waters, the
most picturesque section OF the Blue
Ridge, the superb region of the up
per Potomac and Shenandoah, en-
bracing Harper's Ferry and Martins
pui x, WHeic IL Huu Iail pcacclully
enough.
But "Stoncwall" jackson came
along with his freshly organized
army and massed his forces along the
railroad and in those towns. For Il
period of two months after the firing
on Sumter he held that part of Vir-
ginia, together with section of
about so miles of the Baltimore and
Ohio railroad.
Before the middle of June, 1861,
Jackson saw he must evacuatc. The
Union troops from the direction of
Washington were pressing down the
railroad OH Harper's Ferry, and from
Hagerstown and Cumberland, in
Western Maryland, they had begun
to hem him also.
AT each end of the 50-mile section
which he dominated lay hostile terri
tory. The railroad as transporta-
ton medium was of no use to him,
as its route was not in the right di-
rection.
But there was valuable rolling
stock at Martinsburg-no less than IL
locomotives and 100 freight cars. If
the Baltimore and Ohio had been
routed north and south instead of
east and west he could have run the
engines and cars into the heart of
Dixie, where they would have plenty
of use for them. AS the matter stood
it was almost 25 miles bv turnpike
across country from Martinsburg to
Winchester. ut which point lay just
the railroad needed, the Virginia and
Atlantic passing to Richmond and
the sea.
In Jackson's army was an officer,
Colonel Thomas A. Sharp, who was an
accomplished civil engineer. Before
entering the army he had been Il rail:
road man in Georgia. His merits had
brought him to the front in the com
mand and the general had placed him
in charge of the transportation serv-
ice. 1t was under him, by Jackson's
order, that the Baltimore & Ohio
Railroad bridge that spanned the Po-
tomac at Harper's Ferry was burned.
After dstroying the structure,
Jackson's men tore up the tracks for
many miles westward, place dthe ties
in piles, laid the rails on top and
treated the country folks thereabouts
to the spectacle of series of fine
bonfires.
As the rails became red hot they
would be taken with huge pliers and
wound around the nearest trees uS-
til almost every live trunk that rear
ed it's head along the line sported i
necktie of unique pattern.
Hundreds of tons of rails were
saved, however, and heaped up in