These troops were taken on transports from Philadelphia to Annapolis, another town of { 25} Southern sympathies, where, except for the hospitality of the United States Naval Academy, they were most unwelcome. From that point they made their way, at first by train, and then, being obstructed by the destruction of railroads and railroad bridges, by forced marches, until they reached Annapolis Junction, where they were met by a regiment sent out from Washington to meet them, and thence proceeded by rail again. The strict discipline of Colonel Lefferts, to which they owed their successful pioneer work in opening the way to the capital, took them in review past President Lincoln at the White House before they breakfasted, and they had no let-up on the hardship of their service until they were quartered in the House of Representatives, where they were subsequently sworn into the service of the Government.
This episode is worth recounting, since it was the determined advance of these troops--the Eighth Massachusetts, under Colonel Hinks, accompanying them--in spite of rumors of a large secessionist force between them and Washington, that made access to the seat of government practicable for the regiments that promptly followed them, including more men from Pennsylvania and Massachusetts, the First Rhode Island, the Sixth, Eighth, Ninth, and Seventy-first New York, the latter regiments reaching Annapolis before the Seventh New York and Eighth Massachusetts left, thus keeping the way open. Had the rumored fifteen thousand rebels actually lain between Annapolis and Washington, it would have gone hard with the Government and the fortunes of the Union.
Troops continued to pour into Washington, until it really became an embarrassment to know what to do with them. They "bunked" all over the city, were quartered so far as practicable in the Government buildings, and made the national capital festive with the pranks in which they let off the animal spirits they carried into the grand picnic they seemed to have started on. Among them, a regiment of Zouaves, recruited from the New York Fire Department by Col. Elmer E. Ellsworth, was conspicuous. They were the last of the old-time "toughs," and they made things lively in the capital. They swarmed over the Capitol building, scaling its walls and running about its cornices in true fire-laddie fashion, and once they rendered a distinct service to the city of Washington by saving a burning building adjoining Willard's Hotel, displaying a reckless daring that gave the District firemen some new ideas.