WASHINGTON 1860-1870
Washington in 1860 was still a comparatively small and undeveloped
city, with a population of 61,122. But the people were soon aroused to
intense excitement because of the strife between the States. When the
Civil War began, the eyes of the Nation were turned on Washington. The
city increased in population to over 100,000 in a few months time and
was the center of great war-time activities. On April 18, 1861, 500
Pennsylvania troops, the first to answer President Lincoln’s call for
volunteers, entered the city, and the day following they were joined by
the Sixth Massachusetts Regiment. Soon thousands of additional men were
here from all the States in the North. Washington became an armed camp.
Schools, churches, and public halls were turned into hospitals to care
for the sick and wounded. A chain of forts and batteries was erected
about the city to protect it, and by October 1862 there were 252,000
soldiers encamped around Washington on both sides of the river. There
were 70 hospitals, caring for 30,000 sick and wounded men.
[Illustration: OLD CAPITOL PRISON]
[Illustration: THE CAPITOL, SHOWING UNCOMPLETED DOME, 1860]
[Illustration: WASHINGTON, FROM ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, 1865]
[Illustration: SECOND INAUGURAL OF PRESIDENT LINCOLN, 1865]
On the morning of July 11, 1864, great fear spread over the city as
Gen. Jubal A. Early reached a point about 6 miles to the north of
the city where the Walter Reed General Hospital now stands. General
Grant sent the Sixth and part of the Nineteenth Corps to Washington,
and their arrival on the afternoon of that day saved the city. On the
following day a skirmish of troops and sharp engagement took place,
which President Lincoln witnessed as a spectator at Fort Stevens,
exposing himself for a time to the fire. That evening General Early,
finding himself opposed by a greater force than he was prepared to
meet, withdrew, recrossing the Potomac at White Fords, Va.
During the four years of the war thousands of troops passed through
Washington on their way to the front, thrilled by the thought of being
in the Nation’s Capital. Even though the Civil War was a great handicap
to the carrying out of improvements in the city, still several notable
improvements were made, among these being the work of enlarging the
Capitol and completing the Dome as we see it to-day. In that period
also the first street-car line was opened, the Long Bridge was rebuilt,
and work on the Washington Aqueduct developed so that from that time
water has been brought from the Potomac at Great Falls to the city.
In 1861 the number of employees of the Government was 3,466, and in
1865 they numbered 7,184.
On October 2, 1862, the first horse-drawn street cars commenced
operation, running from the Navy Yard to Georgetown; they continued in
use for 40 years.
On April 14, 1865, occurred the great tragedy when President Lincoln
was assassinated at Ford’s Theater by the actor John Wilkes Booth. The
funeral procession was a great solemn occasion, for Abraham Lincoln,
on whom the Nation had depended during four years of war to guide it
safely through the bitter conflict, had given his life for the cause
that the Union might be preserved. On May 23 and 24 took place the
Grand Review on Pennsylvania Avenue of 200,000 men, requiring six hours
for General Meade’s army on the first day and seven hours for General
Sherman’s army on the second day to pass before President Johnson and
General Grant. In a few days those who made up these armies passed from
military life and resumed their places among their fellow citizens.
Buildings that had been used as hospitals were again given over
to peaceful pursuits, and the forts that surrounded the city were
dismantled. Lumber from temporary buildings that were torn down was
used to begin the construction of houses in a new subdivision called
Mount Pleasant. But the great era for civic improvements was not
to take place for another five years, until the administration of
President Grant.
[Illustration: _Photograph by courtesy of the Oldest Inhabitants
Association_
GRAND REVIEW OF UNION ARMY, MAY, 1865]
[Illustration: OLD HAYMARKET SQUARE, LOUISIANA AVENUE BETWEEN NINTH AND
TENTH STREETS]
[Illustration: THE CAPITOL, 1870]