of
rank; so the column was halted and Joe Nelson and Welt Hatcher were
ordered to search the house. Lt. Col. Johnstone of the Fifth New
York Cavalry, was spending the night there with his wife. For some
reason he suspected something wrong when he heard my men laugh and
immediately took flight in his shirt tail out the back door. Nelson
and Hatcher broke through the front door, but his wife met them
like a lioness in the hall and obstructed them all she could in
order to give time for her husband to make his escape. The officer
could not be found, but my men took some consolation for the loss by
bringing his clothes away with them. He had run out through the back
yard into the garden and crawled for shelter in a place it is not
necessary to describe. He lay there concealed and shivering with
cold and fear until after daylight. He did not know for some time
that we had gone, and he was afraid to come out of his hole to find
out. His wife didn't know where he was. In squeezing himself under
the shelter, he had torn off his shirt and when he appeared before
his wife next morning, as naked as when he was born and smelling a
great deal worse it is reported she refused to embrace him before he
had taken a bath. After he had been scrubbed down with a horse brush
he started in pursuit of us but went in the opposite direction from
which we had gone."

Mosby's Rangers at this time were composed chiefly of young men from
Fairfax and the adjoining counties, with some Marylanders. Among the
men from Fairfax County were Franklin Williams, Richard Ratcliffe
Farr, Capt. V. Beattie. The men had to arm, equip and supply
themselves, so although they turned captured cattle and mules over
to the Confederacy, they kept any horses they were able to find.
They wore Confederate uniforms and through necessity on occasion
captured overcoats. The "Jessie Scouts" of the Federal Army also
wore the grey uniform in order to deceive the people and gain
information.

An amusing illustration of the confusion and deception created by
this occurred near Fairfax.

"A party of Federal soldiers dressed in grey, rode up to a worthy
old farmer and after a short conversation asked him whether he was a
'Unionist' or a 'Secessionist'. The unsuspecting citizen told them
he was a 'Secessionist', whereupon the Federals carried off all of
his horses that were in sight.

A short while thereafter a party of Confederates rode up, wearing
the blue overcoats which ef