n, on which they made an attack. After a few weeks they took
the Fort and remained there all winter and until a few days before the
fall of Richmond.

Early in April, 1865, on a Sunday afternoon the troops in Fort
Harrison saw a large mass of Confederates marching in plain view in
front of them. "We thought there must be a million of them marching
there!" It was supposed that the Confederates intended soon to attack
Fort Harrison. The occupants of the Fort sent out videttes so as to
give the earliest possible notice of it. Those in the Fort made every
preparation for resistence. But there was no attack. That night three
unarmed Confederates came to the videttes and reported that there were
no troops in front; that the Confederate lines had long been very thin
and that the Federals could march right into Richmond.

This was found to be true, for on the following day the Union troops
started for the Confederate capitol. Fowler's regiment reached there
on the morning of the fall and went to State House Hill, but camped
close to Libby prison, down near the river. A few days later--a day or
two before Lincoln was shot--they left Richmond for City Point, where
they first heard of his death. From there they were taken to Point
Lookout, Maryland, to aid in the search for Booth. After Booth was
captured, the regiment returned to City Point, and a week later was
ordered to Brownsville, Texas, for the special purpose of getting the
supplies,--a great collection of cotton, wagons and all sorts of
munitions--that General Kirby Smith had tried to take to Mexico. The
regiment remained there until the 15th day of October, when Fowler and
the others were mustered out of the United States service.

In the spring of 1876 he was appointed a messenger in the Library of
Congress, which was then and until about 1900 in the Capitol just west
of the great dome. He was a strong willing worker. Doctor Spofford
relied on him to find and bring forth from dark and dusty storerooms
the files of old newspapers when needed for historical purposes. By
the time that the magnificent Library of Congress building was
completed and things were in shipshape, Fowler had reached an age when
he was entitled to and given less heavy work.

For nearly twenty years he was daily at the door of the Reading Room
to admit readers and to refer sightseers to the gallery for the best
view of the grand and beautiful rotunda. He was always so cheerful and
polite that it