L. P. Brockett, The camp, the battlefield, and the hospital: or, lights and shadows of the great rebellion

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[195] pass. At the first station where this happened, the engineer of the road made his appearance, and was about to step on the engine, when Andrews told him he could not come on board, as this was an extra train running through to Corinth, and that his party were engaged to run it, and in support of his assertion the iron safe was shown. This apparently satisfied the engineer, and after taking in wood and water, the train again started. A second time they were compelled to switch off, and in order to get the switch-keys, Andrews, who knew the road well, went into the station and took them from the office. This caused considerable excitement, which he partly quieted by stating that the train contained gunpowder for Beauregard, at Corinth. About an hour was lost in waiting to allow these trains to pass, which, of course, enabled their pursuers to press closely after them. But they pushed on as rapidly as possible, removing rails, throwing out obstructions along the track, and cutting the telegraph lines from time to time-attaining, when in motion, a speed of sixty miles per hour-but they could not regain the time which they had lost. Reaching a bridge about twenty miles south of Dalton, Georgia, they set fire to one of their cars, piled on wood, and left it on the bridge, to which they thus hoped to set fire.

Now, let us return to the rebel engineer, conductor, and passengers, thus unceremoniously left at Big Shanty, by the amazing and sudden disappearance of the engine and part of the train. The party who had thus stolen the march upon them, had evidently done so at that time and place, with the presumption that pursuit could not be made by an Engine short of Kingston, some thirty