Hell on DC-Area Roads, Civil War-Style

Commuting in the Washington, DC metro region is certainly no walk in the park.  My daily drive of nine miles home from the city can take up to an hour or more on any given day.  Washington consistently wins top honors for having the worst traffic in the country.  And bad weather like snow turns the roads into a sheer commuter nightmare.  The study of history, however, often puts things in perspective, and that certainly was the case when I came across a Civil War-era account of a trip over roughly the same route I follow everyday.

In January 1862, Hugh Young, the editor of the Wellsboro (Pa.) Agitator, came to Washington City.  He intended to pay a visit to the Pennsylvania Reserves at Camp Pierpont in Langley.  Going to the Old Dominion in those days required a military pass, so Young headed first to the Provost Marshal's Office.  Here, "with the assistance of a line . . . vouching for our loyalty" from Speaker of the House Galusha Grow of Pennsylvania, he procured "a pass into the land of Dixie." 

Young headed next to the Langley Stage Office at the Clay Hotel to find transportation across the Potomac to the camps.  From the hotel situated on Pennsylvania Avenue between 3rd and 4 1/2 Streets,* a "diligence" or "long covered wagon with hard seats" ran the eight miles to Langley twice a day for a fare of one dollar.  The editor boarded the wagon with his traveling companion and around a dozen others.  Now the fun really began.

As Young described the journey:

. . . soon we were on the road to the Chain Bridge. And such a road! Properly speaking, it was a canal filled to the depth of six to twelve inches with a sloshy mud, through which the horses waded with a slow and patient gait.**

Section of 1862 Union Army map of N.E. Virginia and the Vicinity of Washington showing likely route taken by Young from the Clay Hotel in Washington to Langley, Virginia (courtesy of Library of Congress).  A modern view of approximately the same route can be found here.

Along the way, soldiers stopped the wagon to examine the passengers' passes, likely causing additional delay.  The last check occurred at the entrance to the Chain Bridge.  Incredibly, the editor recognized the soldier as a Simon Doorlacher from Wellsboro, who was serving with the Tioga Invincibles, or Company H of the 6th Pennsylvania Reserves.  After crossing Chain Bridge, the wagon headed up the Leesburg-Georgetown Turnpike and traveled a few more miles to Langley, where it was already "quite dark."  All told, Young seemed pleased that the trip had taken "just four hours."


"Washington, D.C. Chain Bridge over the Potomac; Chesapeake and Ohio Canal in foreground (courtesy of Library of Congress)

My own route home is very similar, but starts a little further west at 17th and G Streets, N.W.  I avoid the heart of the city and Georgetown by taking the Whitehurst Freeway and drive along Canal Road until I hit Chain Bridge.  Rt. 123 on the other side takes me to a point just beyond Langley.  This route can be nerve-wracking and time-consuming, but I have nothing on the editor of the Agitator.  The next time I feel myself becoming annoyed and impatient with my commute, I will think back 150 years and remember that things could be much worse.

Notes
*Today, 4 1/2 Street, N.W. does not intersect with Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.  The hotel was likely located around the present-day site of the Federal Courthouse.

**The diligence probably traveled through the streets of Washington City, most likely Pennsylvania Avenue, and into Georgetown. From there, it may have taken the carriage road along the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal to Chain Bridge. John G. Barnard, former chief engineer to the Army of the Potomac, described this carriage road as "excellent" in his report on the defenses of Washington.  (Barnard 2.)  The editor of the Agitator may have disagreed with him on this point!

Sources
John G. Barnard, A Report on the Defenses of Washington to the Chief of Engineers, U.S. Army (1871); Johnson's Map of Georgetown and the City of Washington, 1862; Washington National Republican, Mar. 4, 1862; Wellsboro (Pa.) Agitator, Jan. 29, 1862.

The Presentation of the Colors to the Victors of Dranesville

The month of January 1862 was cold, damp, and miserable for the Pennsylvania Reserves encamped at Langley.  The men huddled inside their crude huts as the snow and rain fell and the ground outside turned into mud.  The winter weather even interfered with the daily routine of army life.  As a soldier from the 7th Pennsylvania Reserves wrote to the Philadelphia Press, "owing to the unfavorable weather with which we have been visited, drill and other duties have been almost suspended."  Nothing, however, not even the elements, could get in the way of bestowing honors on the victors of Dranesville. 

The Pennsylvania Reserves had become the darling of  the political and military establishment ever since the battle.  At the end of the December, Pennsylvania Governor Andrew Curtin visited the Reserves at Camp Pierpont and declared that the regiments involved at Dranesville would have the name of the battle inscribed on their standards.  (See here for a recent post on the governor's visit.)  The flags were soon sent to Washington to be painted with the battle honors. 

Flag of the 6th Pennsylvania Reserves with a barely visible "Dranesville" inscription (courtesy of Pennsylvania Capitol Preservation Committee)

Flag of the 9th Pennsylvania Reserves with a faded "Dranesville" inscription (courtesy of Pennsylvania Capitol Preservation Committee)

A couple weeks later, on January 11, the entire division participated in the presentation of the colors to the men who had won the day at Dranesville.  All fifteen regiments, "in full uniform," formed and marched out to the parade ground, which was "in a wretched condition, occasioned by the rains of the previous day."  ("Letter from Camp Pierpont," Phila. Press, Jan. 20, 1862.)  A fifteen-gun salute was fired by the Reserves' artillery, and various regimental bands "returned the compliment."  ("Letter from Camp Pierpont," Phila. Press, Jan. 20, 1862.)  Speaker of the House Galusha Grow of Pennsylvania traveled to Langley for the occasion and met the Reserves on the parade ground.  As the soldier from the 7th Pennsylvania Reserves described the scene:

. . . the color companies attached to the different regiments in [E.O.C.] Ord's brigade took an advanced position, when the flags on which were neatly inscribed the word "DRANESVILLE," in honor of the late victory, were presented by [Grow] -- the ceremony winding up with a few complimentary remarks from that gentleman.  The cavalry and artillery that accompanied the brigade were also on the ground, and were presented with new flags similarly inscribed.*

Rep. Galusha Grow,  Speaker of the House, 1861-63 (courtesy of Wikipedia)

The regiments then filed past Grow and the other notables gathered on the parade ground.  Overall, the soldier from the 7th considered that "the affair passed off admirably" despite the muck and mire.  Perhaps the review lifted more than a few spirits in the middle of the harsh winter.  The glow of Dranesville, however, would grow dimmer as the new year progressed and the war's toll grew to unimaginable proportions.

Note
*Ord's brigade was comprised of the 6th, 9th, 10th, and 12th Pennsylvania Reserves.  All of these regiments were engaged at Dranesville. The 1st Pennsylvania Rifles ("the Bucktails"), although not part of Ord's brigade, also participated in the battle, and it is likely that they also received the inscribed flag during the ceremony.

Sources
"Letter from Camp Pierpont," dated Jan. 14, 1862, Philadelphia Press, Jan. 20, 1862;  O.R. Howard Thomson & William H. Rauch, History of the "Bucktails" (1906).