| Byram's Station, Miss. |
| on N. O. & Jackson G. N. Rl Rd {New
Orleans, Jackson & Great Northern RR} |
| April 4, 1862 |
|
|
| Capt W. S. Downer, M. S. K. |
| Richmond Va |
| |
| Sir, |
| I am laying over here since 11
o'clock last night -- indefinitely. As a bridge some 50 yards long
gave way entirely on yesterday just as the up train had crossed it.
There are some 20 hands at work since the accident. The train going
down is here, 6 miles from the spot and it is doubtful whether we will
be able to get over today. We would have arrived in N. O. today at 12
o'clock but for this accident. This place is 174 miles from N. O.;
there is little doubt of our getting in tomorrow, & will arrive in
the city the next day. |
| All the trains have been so crowded with
soldiers; and the way accommodations so wretchedly run that I am
without sleep almost the whole trip and pretty well used up. |
| Special freight would certainly
never get through without somebody accompanied it & watched it all
the time & even then at some points I almost had to fight to make
conductors take. Transportation Agents and Quartermasters are rarely
to be found contiguous to Depots or at them. |
| We had to break open the cask beyond
Lynchburg & carry the coils & cask separately in single
file on the edge of a high embankment where a locomotive & some
cars were off the track {probably on the
Virginia & Tennessee RR}. The Conductor said it was
impossible to get it along until the workman had replaced these
obstructions so as to remove them off: but I adopted the only way to
get the wire along. I had the cask coopered in Lynchburg; and
had it again coopered on application to Mr. Stone the Q. M. at Grand
Junction. It has been hurried along as fast as the mails: the
transportation of soldiers & government freights have so
preoccupied the RlRds from Grand Junction to Richmond that they are
miserably out of repair: |
| Yours truly |
| John Hawn |