Site of battles of Bull Run

Usage examples of manassas.

All the locomotives and stock had been taken south or else commandeered by the Yankees to shuttle their supplies from Alexandria through Manassas Junction to their forces on the Rappahannock.

Joseph Galloway owned property just outside Manassas itself, and that farm was now the depot for a regiment of Northern cavalry exclusively recruited from Southerners loyal to the government in Washington.

More and more supplies crossed the Potomac's bridges to be piled high in the gaunt warehouses at Manassas Junction while, on the sun-ruffled water of Virginia's tidal rivers, boat after boat carried McClellan's veterans north from the James River to Aquia Creek on the Potomac.

Or not until this war had marched them up to Manassas and across to Richmond to kill Yankees.

It was Starbuck who had humiliated him at Manassas, Starbuck who had suborned Adam, and Starbuck who had defied him by remaining in the Legion.

Messengers brought General Banks news of more Northern troops hurrying south from Manassas in case the rebel attack presaged a full-scale thrust northward.

Captain Billy Blythe, who had purchased the horses and shipped them to Manassas, sat long-legged on a wagon driver's high box and watched to see how Adam liked his animals.

Troops that had embarked in Alexandria and Manassas expecting to arrive in Culpeper Court House now waited for new orders, and meanwhile the rails south of Bealeton were being torn up and carried north for safekeeping, and the trains employed on that task were blocked by the stalled troop trains that had been heading south, so that now there were no fewer than eight trains marooned at the depot.

The Reverend Starbuck had been waiting a full day to leave for Manassas Junction, but his train was trapped in the town by three supply trains that were being unloaded.

Starbuck held a hazy map of Virginia in his head, and he sensed how they were now marching parallel to the Blue Ridge Mountains, which meant that just as soon as they reached the Manassas Gap Railroad they could turn west and follow the rails through the pass into the Shenandoah Valley.

Once, when the road rose to offer a view of the moonlit western hills, Starbuck saw the notch that marked where the Manassas Gap carried the railroad through the Blue Ridge and into the fertile Shenandoah Valley.

He recovered his footing and stepped safely over the metal to realize that the Legion had at last reached the Manassas Gap Railroad.

Every now and then Starbuck would see the rails of the Manassas Gap Railroad lying alongside the road like twin streaks of reflected fire, but no trains ran on those strips of molten steel.

The loco-motive was hauling a light load: just two sleeper cars showing red flags to denote they were carrying wounded men, a passenger car that was routed through to Alexandria, and a mixture of unladen gondolas and boxcars that would be unhitched in Manassas junction to be loaded with guns and ammunition for the next day's southward run.

The engineer was anticipating the com-forts of Manassas, where he and his fireman would cook their supper by grilling two steaks on a greased shovel held in the locomotive's firebox.