"The USM at Harper's Ferry - 1859" Topic

"James Ewell Brown Stuart, First Lieutenant, U. S. Cavalry, was enjoying six months' leave from his frontier post at Fort Riley, Kansas Territory.
Yet, the joys of coming home to Virginia had not made him forget that he was a cavalryman by profession. On the rainy morning of 17 October 1859 he had ridden over the muddy streets of Washington to the office of the War
Department, and now he sat waiting to speak with Secretary of War John B. Floyd. Jeb Stuart had an idea for a new type strap to fasten a cavalryman's sabre to his belt. While the young lieutenant was rehearsing in his mind for
the coming interview, the Secretary himself was face to face with the spectre of a slave insurrection.
John B. Floyd was a poor administrator, a failing which almost resulted in his removal from office but on this day there was no need for paper shuffling. Word had come by way of Baltimore that an insurrection had broken out at Harper's Ferry. A band of armed men had captured the United States arsenal there and was formenting a slave rebellion. A native of Virginia, the Secretary most have heard the oft-told tales of the Haitians revolt against
their French masters with all its barbarism. Nor had any son of the Old Dominion forgotten Nat Turner's Rebellion, a slave uprising which occurred a generation before and claimed the lives of 55 whites in a single bloody
night.
Swinging at once into action, Floyd fired off a telegram to Fort Monroe; and by noon Captain Edward O. C. Ord with 150 coast artillerymen was on his way toward Baltimore on the
first leg of the journey to Harper's Ferry.There was no question as to who would command operations against the insurgents. Floyd called for his chief clerk and set him to writing orders summoning to the War Department Brevet
Colonel Robert E. Lee, then on leave at his estate, Arlington, just across the Potomac from the Capital.
Message in hand, the harassed aide came dashing out of the office, only to halt when he spied the forgotten cavalry officer. Stuart, by now thoroughly bored, was easily persuaded to deliver the sealed envelope. Even
as this message was speeding toward its destination, President James Buchanan called upon Secretary Floyd to move even faster a demand which was to bring
the Marine Corps into the picture…"
Full article here
link

Amicalement
Armand

Good stuff!
Though I believe I once saw a movie of the fight with mounted cavalry charging the engine house! Horse marines, perhaps? Don't know how the writer could have left that out. 8^)

Grelber

Glad you had enjoy it my friend.

Amicalement
Armand