County, and upon the rear of the army manoeuvering
against Lee. This explains--what at the time seemed to many of the
readers of the Northern newspapers a mystery--how Mosby's men could be
in so many different places at the same time. The safety and success of
the Rangers were enhanced by these subdivisions, the Federals having
become so alert as to make it extremely difficult for a large command
either to evade their pickets or manoeuver within their lines. From
fifty to one hundred men were all that were usually marched together,
and many of their most brilliant successes were achieved with even a
smaller force. Mosby had only twenty men with him when he captured
Brigadier-General Edwin H. Stoughton. With these he penetrated the heart
of the Federal camp, and carried off its commander. General Stoughton
was in charge of an army of cavalry, infantry, and artillery, with
headquarters at Fairfax Court-house. One dark night in March, 1863,
Mosby, with this small detachment, evaded the Federal pickets, passed
through the sleeping army, and with their camp-fires gleaming all
around him, and their sentinels on duty, aroused their general from his
slumbers, and took him captive with thirty-seven of his comrades.

But the novelty of Mosby's mode of warfare consisted chiefly in the
manner of subsisting, quartering and protecting his men. The upper
portion of Loudon and Fauquier counties, embracing a circuit of about
thirty miles in diameter, was then known as "Mosby's Confederacy." By a
glance at the map it will be observed that it bordered upon the Blue
Ridge Mountains on the west, and the Bull Run Mountains on the east. The
valley between is one of the richest, most beautiful, and highly
cultivated in the State of Virginia. It was thickly inhabited with old
Virginia families, who were loyal and true to the Southern cause. These
people received Mosby's men into their houses as their guests, and
neither danger nor want could tempt their betrayal. Robin Hood's band
sought safety in the solitudes of Sherwood Forest, Marion's men secreted
themselves "in the pleasant wilds of Snow's Island" and other South
Carolina swamps, but the Partizan Rangers of Virginia protected
themselves by dispersing in an open country among a sympathizing people.
They never established a camp; to have done so would have invited
capture. Each soldier had his boarding-house, where he lived when off
duty, as a member of the family. From these they would come