consequence of the abandonment of the town, there were comparatively few persons left to experience the horrors of this barbarous act of destruction. There were some, however, who lingered in their old homes, a score or so of whites and a larger number of negroes, upon whom the calamity fell with all its terrors. Hastily roused from their beds, these remaining occupants were driven out to wander through the night, seeking a place of safety, or, spell bound and unable to escape, remained to witness the burning of their property. To add to the dangers and alarm of the scene, a sharp firing was going on between the Union defenders of the bridge and the rebels on the shore. and highly respectable people, known to sympathize with the rebellion, and about the only couple who could but did not flee when Hampton was deserted three months since, and who, notwithstanding the well-understood views of Mr. Jones, lived in undisturbed quiet, were roused from their slumbers and scarcely given time to dress. They did take out a very few things that were sacred in the household so long maintained, and now so rudely and suddenly set in flames, and retreated to the rear of the yard; and there they stood all night silent, solitary spectators amid the glare of conflagration, barely escaping the flames that almost lapped them in their folds. This morning, two gentlemen, old acquaintances, solicitous for their fate, set out from the fortress, and, at their own risk, went into the village and found the aged couple standing there still under the rays of the sun that were scarcely less scorching than the flames that all night had raged around them. The protection which was due to them from the rebels, but was worse than denied them, was given by the two loyal citizens, who by their acts evinced that fidelity to the Government was but humanity to man. Certain features of Mr. Jones' case are peculiarly aggravating. In the afternoon, a relative, holding an office in the Secession army, came to his house, and after enjoying his hospitalities, informed him that the order was out to burn the village. So absurd was the statement that he did not credit it. In the evening he went into the streets, where all was quiet, and no evidence of such a purpose. Rebel guards were stationed; besides this, there was nothing unusual. About ten o'clock he returned to his house and "Mr. and Mrs. Wilson Jones, two old retired. Scarcely had the aged couple The correspondent of the New York Tribune at Fortress Monroe, writing the next day, mentions several cases of peculiar hardship. "One old, half-dying, speechless, and utterly helpless man, Mr. George L. Massenberg, one of the oldest inhabitants of the place, surrounded by a few devoted servants, was taken by them from his house, near the bridge, and, while the fight was going on, the flames raging, the stifling smoke surging, and bullets whizzing all around, was removed on a wheelbarrow to a point on the creek, where a small boat was found, in which he was taken in safety to our side. To-day he found security and attention in the fortress hospital. He is an undisguised secessionist, and, though the fact was as well known as any other, he received neither mercy nor the manifestation of human feelings from the rebels. But for the devotion of his servants he, no doubt, would have perished in the flames that were the legitimate consequences of his own doctrines. THE REBEL ACCOUNT. fallen asleep when they were aroused by a knock at the door, where a former neighbor, and, I believe, relative of Mr. Jones, awaited him, and informed him that he had been detailed specially to set fire to his dwelling. Hurrying back to the chamber of his wife and informing her of the message, they had barely time to dress themselves and flee to the yard with a few articles, when the flames burst through the house." 273 houses of Hampton. There was no other casualty known to have occurred." The only explanation given by the perpetrators of this wanton act was that the place might be occupied by the Union troops, who were understood to be on the way, and that it was best to destroy it to deprive them of such a convenience. If there was any significance to be attached to the proceeding other than as an unaccountable military blunder, it was to be found in the rising spirit of fanaticism of which it might be taken as an indication-a fanaticism encouraged by the more violent of the rebel leaders and the secession journalists, with the same motives with which they after It was at first thought that the town had been burnt under some military necessity by the orders of General Butler, since it could hardly be supposed that the enemy would thus destroy their own homes and property. But the fact was soon established on their own avowal.wards incited their deluded followers "The town," said the Richmond Exam- to the burning of cotton and other proincr of the 12th, in an account of the ducts of the Southern soil. Courting ruin movement, "was burned to the ground as a means of gaining independence, it by the order of General Magruder. The would appear that the conspirators were expedition for its destruction was com-impressed with the idea that the more posed of the Mecklenburg Cavalry, Cap-desperate the cause was rendered the tain Goode; Old Dominion Dragoons, more persistent would be the rebellion; Captain Phillips; York Rangers, Cap-that the less their dupes had to lose the tain Sinclair ; Warwick Beauregards, more regardless would they be of final Captain Custis; and six companies of consequences. the 14th Virginia regiment, the whole A few days after the destruction of force being under the command of Colo- Hampton, General Wool was ordered nel James J. Hodges, of the 14th. The to the command of the South Eastern town was most effectually fired. But a District of Virginia, with his headquarsingle house was left standing. The vil- ters at Fortress Monroe. Immediately lage church was intended to be spared, after his arrival at that place, on the but caught fire accidentally, and was 18th of August, he assigned the comconsumed to the ground. Many of the mand of the volunteer forces in the Demembers of the companies were citizens partment outside the fortress to General of Hampton, and set fire to their own Butler, who presently embarked, with a houses-among others, Captain Sinclair detachment from the regiments in the fired his own home. It was supposed joint naval and military expedition, to that a man of the name of Paschal Lati-Hatteras, the incidents of which will be mer had perished in one of the burnt related in a future chapter. 35 CHAPTER XIX. WESTERN VIRGINIA. mountains and the Ohio river, and bor dering on the north upon Pennsylvania, had little indeed in common with the slaveholding, slavetrading interests and Southern sympathies of the eastern division. Thus socially and industrially, as well as geographically, separated from their brethren, and complaining more. over of an unequal burden of taxation, which, in consequence of the immunities secured in the legislature by the slaveholders, they were compelled to bear for the great works of improvement undertaken for the benefit of the other portions of the State, it was hardly to be expected that when the paramount question was raised of union or disunion they would patiently submit to an evil which would throw all others into the shade, in the severance of the State from that national government under the protection of which they had their greatest hopes of prosperity. THE vote for secession cast in the Virginia State Convention was 88 in favor of the measure, 55 against it. After the confirmation of the act by the people, the Convention again assembled formally to complete the work of disunion, when there were but 91 of the previous 143 members present to sign the ordinance. The recusants in the first instance, the missing names afterward, represented the dissent of the western part of the State. The divided vote answered generally to the proportions of the separate portions of the country, whether by the number of counties or their population-the western having about one-third of the whole. There was, however, one important exception to be made in comparing the number of inhabitants. Whilst the slaves in the 50 western counties were counted at 15,000, in the remaining 98 middle and eastern counties they numbered more than 480,000; and of the last, nine-tenths were east of the Blue Ridge. It was noticed also that of the increase of white population in the whole State in the ten years, from 1850 to 1860, more than one-half belonged to the western region, a striking evidence of the advances making in that district in the development of its agricultural and industrial resources in comparison with the stagnation in the counties more favored in many respects on the seaboard. That extensive western region, bounded by the Alleghany 12, 1861. Accordingly, when by the act of the 17th of April the State Convention had declared its purpose of disunion, and the western members, unable to stem the torrent, had fled or were driven ignominiously from the capital, it required but little agitation to array Virginia on the other side of the Alleghanies, in opposition to the usurping authority at Richmond. The people consulted to *See Henry C. Carey's letter to an English economist on the Rights of Southern Freemen, Philadelphia, August |