Ernest Shriver

“ The delay was owing, in some degree, to the peculiar character of the mechanical obstacles to be overcome, but much more to the frequent changes in the positions of the contending armies. The "railroad corps" had always to follow the armv.
The operations were not confined to the carrying off of cars and engines. The best portion of the equipment of the Raleigh shops, above described, including lathes, planers, drill presses and last, but not lightest, a turn-table! were all conveyed to Raleigh in cars, by the way of the pike and railroads, from the Baltimore & Ohio roundhouse at Martinsburgh. ”

“ The time made varied according to state of the weather and the roads, the condition of the teams and various other causes. Sometimes the whole distance to Winchester, eighteen miles, was made in a single day, while at others only three or four miles would be covered in the same time. The average time of the entire trip was three days to Strasburgh, thirty-eight miles south of Martinsburgh. Often the macadam covering of the road would break through under the unwonted weight and let the iron monster down into the soft earth. ”

“ All the engines were kept at Richmond until the last one had been seized, the original intention having been to do the repairing and refitting there, but in Mav, 1862, when McClellan began his movement up the Peninsula and preparations to evacuate the capital were made, the dismantled locomotives and their dislocated members were among the very first freight started out of Richmond. To have allowed those precious "camelbacks " to fall into the hands of the northern troops after such risks and the expenditure of so much time, ingenuity and labor, would have been galling indeed. ”

“ Now and then the squad in "turnpiking" the engines, found it advisable in view of information received from scouts, to retire at night to Bunker Hill, a point well within the Confederate lines, to avoid the risk of capture, returning early next morning to resume operations. The loss of one of the skilled men would have been a far more serious affair than that of a private soldier, who was merely a fighter, or, perhaps, even than that of some of the commissioned officers. ”

“ The tenders were conveyed to Strasburgh in the same manner as engines, eight horses being employed to the team. Cars were not so much in demand as engines, but a number of these were taken in the same manner. They were not only used afterward for transporting war supplies on the southern roads, but served the immediate purpose of carrying the detached portions of the locomotives. ”

“ On levels, where there was good, solid road and all went well, the teams proceeded at a fast walk; up the hills they generally went faster, because it was only by a good running start that they could get to the top at all. As it was, the big horses had to strain every muscle in ascending the grades. ”

“ The movement was successfully accomplished, and the engines found another temporary resting place. Meantime the large shop buildings of the Raleigh & Gaston railroad at Raleigh were leased by the Southern government, fitted up with improved machinery, and the "Confederate States locomotive shops" were established. The shops were ready for work by July, 1862, and the captured locomotives and the carloads of accessories were hauled back to Raleigh and a large force of workmen began the refitting and repairing. ”

“ Smiling fortune could hardly have fashioned a situation more favorable to the plans of the Confederates, covetous of northern locomotives, for right between the hostile lines, and yet generally within the grasp of the southern forces, ran the Baltimore and Ohio railroad, a prosperous trunk line of standard gauge, extending from Baltimore to St. ”

“ Louis and completely equipped with first-class rolling stock, while at Martinsburgh, only thirty-eight miles from the nearest southern railroad, and but eighteen miles from Winchester, which the Confederates at that time held without dispute, was the terminus of one of the divisions of this trunk line, with shops and roundhouse, a point of assembly and distribution for cars and engines. ”