ny of
its' citizens already in the rebel ranks, and its houses a rendezvous
for the cavalry of the Virginia army, its seizure was construed to mean
real invasion.

The possession of this key to the land approaches of Richmond; its
great facilities of re-enforcement and supply by propinquity to the
depots at Washington and elsewhere; and the determined intention of the
Federals to hold and use it, could not be misunderstood.

And while the Southern Government felt the advantages its possession
gave the Union troops for concentrating and advancing, the people were
aroused to a pitch of high indignation by the choice of the troops sent
to first invade their soil.

The war, too, was yet young enough to leave all the romance about it;
scenes of violence were as yet rare; and the death of Jackson, with the
circumstances attending it, caused a deep and general feeling of
bitterness. While the southern public opened its arms and took to its
sympathy and protection the widow and orphans of the first Virginian
whose blood was shed in her cause, many and bitter were the vows made
around the bivouac to avenge his untimely end. The men who made the
grim vow were of the stuff to keep it; the name of "Jackson, the
Martyr," became a war-cry, and the bloody tracks of Manassas

"How that oath was kept can tell!"

On the 23d of May, Joseph E. Johnston received his commission as
General in the Regular Army, and went to Harper's Ferry in command of
all troops in that region--known as the Army of the Shenandoah.
Beauregard, with the same grade, was recalled on his way to the West,
and sent to command at Manassas.

From the great ease of putting troops across the fords of the Potomac
into Virginia, it was considered necessary to concentrate, at points
from which they could be easily shifted, a sufficient reliable force to
meet any such movement; and the two officers in whom the government had
greatest confidence as tacticians, were sent to watch for and checkmate
it.

Meanwhile, Missouri had risen, the governor had declared the rights of
the State infringed; and the movements of Generals Lyon and
Blair--culminating in the St. Louis riots between the citizens and the
Dutch soldiery--had put an end to all semblance of neutrality. Governor
Jackson moved the state archives, and transferred the capital from
Jefferson City to Boonesville. On the 13th of June he issued a
proclamation calling for fifty thousand volunteers to defend the S