Guarding the Bridges

The Aqueduct Bridge, looking from Georgetown towards Rosslyn (LOC)

In mid-June, Colonel Charles P. Stone had been dispatched with the District of Columbia militia, the 1st New Hampshire, and 1st Pennsylvania, some cavalry and two field pieces, on the Rockville Expedition in order to guard the river crossing points between Washington and Harper's Ferry and strengthen general-in-chief Winfield Scott's cordon defense. By July 11, the ferries were undefended, the DC Militia was licking its wounds at home, and Stone had joined the two three-month volunteer regiments with the army of Robert Patterson near Martinsburg. Scott had chosen to abandon the goals of the Rockville Expedition in order to better execute an attack under Irvin McDowell on Confederates defending Manassas Junction.

But the ferries were not the only Potomac River crossings in 1861, three bridges also existed (all of which are located at river crossings today). The first was the Long Bridge, extending from the intersection of Maryland Avenue (today subsumed on an expanded rail right-of-way leading to L'Enfant Plaza) and 14th Street to Arlington Heights (today the site is the 14th Street Bridge). The second was the Chain Bridge (yes, that Chain Bridge) which went from rural Alexandria County (it wouldn't be renamed Arlington County until 1920) to rural Washington County (DC at the time consisted of Washington City, Georgetown, and Washington County within its current boundaries). The third bridge was the Aqueduct Bridge, which was a bridge of water that brought the C&O Canal from Georgetown across the river, extending it to Alexandria City (just up-river from today's Key Bridge).