ton's orders. The Upper
Potomac was held by the enemy in force. General Banks, a volunteer
officer, who was yet to learn more of Stonewall Jackson, was in
command. The headquarters of his division, 18,000 strong, were at
Frederick City in Maryland; but his charge extended seventy-five
miles further west, as far as Cumberland on the Potomac. In addition
to Banks, General Kelly with 5000 men was at Romney, on the South
Branch of the Potomac, thirty-five miles north-west of Winchester by
a good road. The Federal troops guarding the Chesapeake and Ohio
Canal and that portion of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad which was
still intact were necessarily much dispersed, for the Confederate
guerillas were active, and dam and aqueduct, tunnel and viaduct,
offered tempting objectives to Ashby's cavalry. Still the force which
confronted Jackson was far superior to his own; the Potomac was broad
and bridgeless, and his orders appeared to impose a defensive
attitude. But he was not the man to rest inactive, no matter what the
odds against him, or to watch the enemy's growing strength without an
endeavour to interfere. Within the limits of his own command he was
permitted every latitude; and he was determined to apply the
aggressive strategy which he was so firmly convinced should be
adopted by the whole army. The Secretary of War, Mr. Benjamin, in
detaching him to the Valley, had asked him to "forward suggestions as
to the means of rendering his measures of defence effectual."* (*
O.R. volume 5 page 909.)

The earliest information he had received on his arrival at Winchester
pointed to the conclusion that the enemy was meditating an advance by
way of Harper's Ferry. His first suggestion thereupon was that he
should be reinforced by a division under General Loring and a brigade
under Colonel Edward Johnson, which were stationed within the
Alleghanies on the great highways leading to the Ohio, covering
Staunton from the west.* (* Loring was at Huntersville, Johnson on
Alleghany Mountain, not far from Monterey. General Lee, unable with
an inferior force to drive the enemy from West Virginia, had been
transferred to South Carolina on November 1.) His next was to the
effect that he should be permitted to organise an expedition for the
recapture and occupation of Romney. If he could seize this village,
the junction of several roads, more decisive operations would at once
become feasible. It has been said that the force of old associations