“The grand army is a grand and awful sight to behold,” wrote Captain Alfred Dart from Charles Town, Virginia on July 18, 1861.

Dart was composing his letter from the Jefferson County courthouse where abolitionist John Brown had been sentenced to death less than two years earlier – seated, he noted with evident satisfaction, in the cushioned armchair of Judge Richard Parker who had condemned Brown to death. How the tables had turned.

For Dart, a committed abolitionist who had arrived in Carbondale, PA from Connecticut decades before and put a musket in the hands of his Black servant at the war’s outset, the symbolism was not lost. Brown had been hanged on December 2, 1859 for leading the raid on the U.S. Arsenal at Harpers Ferry.

The fiery anti-slavery crusader was captured, tried in this very building, and executed within sight of where Patterson’s army was now encamped. The men who had wielded that power were the enemy Dart had spent three months preparing to kill on the battlefield with the 25th Pennsylvania.

Patterson’s plan to attack the Confederates had not gone as planned. Patterson’s army had pushed south and west from Martinsburg through Bunker Hill with Winchester in its sights, only to pull back without a fight – the Confederate force at Winchester judged too strong, the Union forces not yet ready to strike. They didn’t know it yet, but these decisions would have major consequences for the Union cause in the first summer of the Civil War.

The famous First Defenders in the 25th PA, their 90-day enlistments expired, were furious at this decision to back away from a fight. Some companies were threatening to go home regardless of the consequences. Dart’s company voted to stay, but only as long as there was a prospect of a real battle.

Readers of the Carbondale Advance had followed Alfred Dart since his first letter home from Alexandria. This is his latest dispatch to appear in this series.

From the Carbondale Advance, July 27, 1861

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WAR CORRESPONDENCE. 

CHARLESTOWN, Va., 

July 18, 1861. 

Mr. EDITOR:

You are no doubt not a little annoyed at so much army scribbling for your paper, but we are here under somewhat peculiar circumstances, and it may be interesting to some of your readers to know some of them. We have had hard times since I wrote you last such as hard and forced marches through, the hot sun without water, and to sleep in the open air upon the ground.

We have driven the enemy from their difficult points; but they are now safe and secure at Winchester, and I think, will not run; but Gen. Patterson thinks we are not able for a fight. They are from 80,000 to 100,000 strong, and strongly intrenched -w hile we are only about 40,000 or 50,000  thousand strong. 

We expected a fight yesterday, and Carbondale city has the honor of having the Company that had the right of the grand army, Col. Cake commanding. We have the Minie rifles, which will hold up pretty well for three-fourths of a mile. This accounts for our being placed on the right in time of battle. Gen. Patterson was on hand in all glory.

But the enemy soon disappeared. We left a place called Burke’s Hill, yesterday, and expected that our division of the army would proceed direct, and the other would take a central route, and the other a left flank. We marched in that way, extending our flank, for about 15 miles, and then it could be said that our train of baggage had hardly started. 

We have considerable artillery, among which is Doubleday’s battery, which is said to be the best in the world. We were aroused from our slumbers at 1 o’clock in the morning, and proceeded on our march until about 8, A, M., when evidently the whole design was changed, and the fact fully settled that we were unable to fight the enemy.

The line of march was changed simultaneously in all the divisions, when we were marched directly for this place. We arrived here about 10 A.M., and shall probable stay here for some days. 

Gen. Patterson came out and made our regiment a speech this afternoon, on account of some of the companies being determined to go home, as their 3 months has fully expired. They are determined to go, but will only get a disgraceful discharge. They were the first regiment in the war.

He said he asked of us as a special favor that as we were now in the face of the enemy that we should stay for 10 days. Our Company voted to stay, and will stay, as long as there is a prospect of a fight. Some, however, jokingly remarked that they had only been in the back of the enemy so far. I think Patterson is a pretty good General, and that Col. Cake is a good Colonel, but you will soon hear a terrible howl about both.

We are now here at this place, and let me say to you the grand army is a grand and awful sight to behold. This place is distinguished by being the place where John Brown was tried and executed. 

Our grand army is encamped in full view of where he was executed less than a year ago. How great the contrast! They had the power then, and executed a man, that if he had committed any offence at all, bore no comparison in point of enormity to the crime they have committed since. I have been upon the ground where he was executed. Have examined the prison where he was confined, and am now writing this letter in the court-house where he was tried, and am sitting in the same that Judge Parker sat when be sentenced him to be hung. 

I do not know but it is even worse than sacrilege to so pollute Virginia’s “sacred soil” and her judicial bench, but for the time being, I must confess I feel no inconvenience from sitting in a nice, well-cushioned arm chair, and even find it rather a luxury, as it is the first chair I have sat in for about three months. 

This is the strongest secession hole I have met with since I left Carbondale. The women all boast of it.

The John Brown affair accounts for it. Our scouts have brought in a lot of prisoners. Your invaluable paper comes, (when it does come) very acceptable. 

Yours, etc., 

ALFRED DART, 

Capt. Carbondale City Guards.

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Read the previous letter from the Letters from War: 1861 series.

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This is part of an ongoing series called “Letters from War: 1861” that will share correspondence written on the front lines during the turbulent first year of the Civil War.

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