Here is word...
https://historyengine.richmond.edu/episodes/view/5784
First Lieutenant Blackford, who served in the Confederate Army, wrote to his wife, Susan, on October 21, 1862, to update her on the situation on the front. Blackford explained his troops had made progress on the line despite the lack of engagement from the Union. Not far from Blackford’s soldiers, Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson’s troops had implemented a vital military mission to destroy the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad lines. “Burning bridges and tearing up tracks retard the movements of the enemy,” commented the lieutenant, “but not burning up a depot, or the houses of the railroad employees.” The lieutenant explained that although the majority of citizens working in the railroad depots were Union, the men remained silent while the army destroyed the railroad lines.
Here are the owner views ...
Baltimore & Ohio President John Garrett, a Virginian by birth, made no secret of his affinity for the South and often referred to Confederate leaders as his ‘Southern friends.’ When Union Maj. Gen. Benjamin Butler arrested Confederate supporters during his occupation of Baltimore in the first days of the war, executives who used the B&O to transport goods realized their commercial and financial ties lay with the North. Additionally, Baltimore’s north-central location physically precluded the B&O from supporting the Confederacy. So when President Abraham Lincoln and the Northern states called, John Garrett answered with his full support. The B&O stayed with the Union.
Here man in the middle...
Despite that decision, the B&O came under suspicion from both the United States and the Confederacy. In April 1861, Garrett received an anonymous letter containing threats that pro-Confederate forces promised to destroy tracks, burn bridges and demolish company buildings if the B&O continued to transport Union soldiers. Within a week, Garrett read an editorial in the pro-Union Wheeling Intelligencer criticizing the railroad’s willingness to transport Confederate soldiers from western Maryland and Virginia. Later in the summer, Secretary of War Simon Cameron warned Garrett that transporting Southern soldiers constituted a trea-sonous act. During the entire war, John Garrett’s B&O came under continual attack in both Northern and Southern editorial columns..
Here... he saves the day against Gen. Early... Garnett saved Washington!!!!
Garrett personally assisted in foiling the last major Confederate drive north of the Potomac River. In the summer of 1864, Lt. Gen. Jubal Early led his Army of the Valley north through the Shenandoah Valley to Harpers Ferry. At his Baltimore headquarters, Garrett began to receive reports that Rebels were along the B&O line in force.Union authorities ignored that information and remained convinced the movement was nothing more than a cavalry raid, and that all the sizable Confederate infantry forces were tied up around Petersburg.
Garrett decided to see for himself, and headed west on his own special train. He quickly learned the Southern presence was real, and hurried back to Baltimore and the headquarters of Middle Department commander Maj. Gen. Lew Wallace to tell him the news.
Convinced, Wallace began to move troops to Monocacy Junction, a spur of the B&O just south of Frederick, Md., so he could be in a position to cover the approaches to both Baltimore and Washington. He also called for reinforcements from Petersburg. Grant sent those men, a division of the VI Corps, on boats up the Chesapeake Bay to Baltimore, where they hopped on B&O cars provided by Garrett that whisked them to Monocacy Junction.
Here at last...
John Garrett’s wily leadership, and his ability to separate his company’s best interests from his personal preferences and side with the Union, allowed the B&O to remain a viable company through most of the war, despite the hardships visited upon the rail line. He continued in his role as the B&O Railroad’s president until his death in 1884, and lived long enough to see the federal government support him in several railroad strikes. Garrett was always proud, and rightly so, of the time in his railroad’s history when the belch of his locomotives meant as much to the Northern war effort as the blast of cannons.
Link:
https://www.historynet.com/baltimore-ohio-railroad-the-unions-most-important-supply-line.htm
The link goes into some detail of Jackson actions but Garnett seems to have a story...
