Southern Historical Society Papers, Volume 9.
Reverend J. William Jones, Ed.

[348] Arundle, took possession of the Annapolis Junction; Captain Gaither, of Howard, brought out his fine troop; Captain Nicholas Snowden patrolled the road from Annapolis to Washington and captured Lincoln's bearer of dispatches, whom he sent by an officer to Hicks, who immediately released him. Everywhere through the counties the young men armed and organized.

Then Hicks convened the Legislature to meet at Frederick “because the State Capitol would not be safe,” and in public meeting in Monument Square “called God to witness that he hoped his right arm might drop from its socket if he ever raised it against Virginia and the South.”

The Legislature met, ripe for action, but the same temporizing policy that had paralyzed preparations in the State before, now prevented action in that body. Three-fourths were ready to act — to appoint a Committee of Public Safety, to organize a State Guard, to appropriate $5,000,000 to arm and defend the State, and to form an alliance with Virginia. But a small body of influential, honorable, and sincere members were opposed to hasty action. They dallied and delayed and lost a week. A week in war, never to be recovered. A week in Revolution — a century in the tranquil current of civil affairs. They sent commissioners to Washington to parley with Lincoln. He parleyed — but Scott pushed his troops through by way of Annapolis, while at Chambersburg and Harrisburg, on our Northern frontier, he massed other columns. His cavalry marched acrossed from Carlisle to Georgetown. A week's delay and all was lost in Maryland by way of an appeal to arms--40,000 men in Washington and Annapolis to control Baltimore and the lower counties — and heavy masses in border. Pennsylvania to be precipitated on Frederick, Washington and Carroll, when necessary, these effectually crushed out hopes of organized resistance there. From that day to this, Maryland has never been without a garrison equal to 30,000 to 40,000 men.

When the disastrous delay of Virginia and the Middle States, and the want of preparation of our own people, had reduced us to this condition-many persons thought they had but one alternative with honor. This was, temporarily leaving home and friends, to carry the flag of Maryland with the Southern army, and then rallying around it such Maryland men as could be collected together, to form a body which should try to represent the ancestral honor of that old Line which before them, in another Revolution, had illustrated the fame of the State.

Such a Maryland organization would form the nucleus of future