New York Herald
April 28, 1861
Everything appears to go on favorably at the seat of war. The Northern troops in Washington are in good health and spirits. The Fifth regiment of Pennsylvania and Massachusetts regiments attended divine service yesterday in the Hall of Representatives, the bands supplying the sacred music on the occasion. The steamer City of Richmond, plying between Richmond and Philadelphia, was seized at the former port on the 18th, and a force of Virginia troops placed on board; but the captain subsequently obtained her release from Governor Letcher, and she arrived at Philadelphia yesterday, with the crews of the New York steamers Jamestown and Yorktown, 60 men, and 120 passengers.
Large bodies of troops are said by the Richmond papers to be raising in all parts of Virginia and North Carolina, that batteries are being erected at Portsmouth Hospital and Craney Island, mounted with Dahlgren guns, and that five volunteer companies from Georgia had arrived at Portsmouth. The ladies of Virginia, it appears, are following the example of their sisters at the North, in manufacturing uniforms and clothing for the soldiers.
Twelve thousand troops in all had reached Annapolis from the North up to Saturday, and it is stated that no more volunteers will be ordered unless they are fully equipped for service. It would appear that the preparations to receive the troops at Annapolis were very imperfect, and had not the weather been very mild, they would have suffered much. As it was, a thousand of them had to sleep in the open air on Friday night, and although there is abundance of provisions the commisariat was so badly managed that some of the troops were without food for twenty four hours.
The Tenth Company of the Massachusetts Eighth regiment, under Captain Briggs, made a bold coup on Friday night. They started for Baltimore in a steamtug, cut out the receiving ship Alleghany, lying in the harbor, and anchored her safely under the sheltering guns of Fort McHenry.
The road from Annapolis to Washington is well protected by government troops, large bodies of men being posted at intermediate stations, so as to repel all attacks of the secessionists and keep the way open for our troops to the capital. General Butler, of the Massachusetts forces, says that there is a musket guarding every rail between Annapolis and Washington, so that the communication with Washington may be considered intact. Meantime the Superintendent of the railroad has been arrested for taking up the rails. The President ordered the Secretary of War to take possession of the road from the Junction to Annapolis, and the road from Baltimore to York, Pa., known as the Northern and Central road. There appears to be a panic among the residents of Annapolis, arising from its occupation by the federal army, for half the population are said to have left the city. Baltimore and Washington are reported by travellers from those cities to be perfectly quiet and the regular lines of steamers are beginning to ply between the neighboring places.
We learn from Philadelphia that a proposition to act as arbitrators in the quarrel between the North and South has been made by Mr. C. J. Ingersoll of that city, to the five ex-Presidents—Buchanan, Pierce, Fillmore, Tyler and Van Buren—from which fossil court of arbitration, we need hardly say, nothing is to be expected. Little more of importance reached us from the seat of war yesterday.