d post of our army in Fairfax County,
and has been the scene of several picket skirmishes. Falls Church was
built in 1709, and rebuilt, as an inscription on the wall informs us, by
the late "Lord" Fairfax, whose son, the present "Lord" Fairfax, is
supposed to be serving in the rebel army. The title of "Lord," we may
observe, is still given to the representative of the family. The
inscription on the old church reads as follows:

[Illustration: Mr. John S. Garrison]

'Henry Fairfax, an accomplished gentlemen, an upright magistrate, a
sincere Christian, died in command of the Fairfax Volunteers at
Saltillo, Mexico, 1847. But for his munificence this church might still
have been a ruin.'

Service was held in the old church two Sundays since, Rev. Dr. Mines,
Chaplain of Second Maine Regiment, officiating, and most of the troops
in the neighborhood being present."

Captain Henry Fairfax, to whose memory the tablet alluded to was placed
in the old church, was a graduate of West Point. At the outbreak of the
Mexican War, he organized a company called the Fairfax Volunteers
sailing to Mexico with the regiment of Virginia volunteers under command
of Colonel John F. Hamtramck. Upon arriving in Mexico, Captain Fairfax
fell a victim to the climate and died at Saltillo, August 16, 1847. His
body was brought home and buried near the church he loved so well, and
it is thought that the grave which may be seen in the foreground of the
war-time picture of the church on page 62 may be his. The tablet to his
memory has long since been destroyed, and every vestige of his
tombstone has disappeared, but nature, not forgetting his generous gifts
to the old church, has sent up a spire-shaped cedar to mark his grave.
Colonel Hamtramck died April 21, 1858, at Shepardstown, Va.

[Illustration: Mr. F. A. Niles]

The damage to the old church, according to one of the oldest citizens of
the town, Mr. George B. Ives, was done by a company of Union cavalry on
picket duty under command of a captain of the regular army. He permitted
his men to tear out the floor of the church and use it for a stable. The
building might have been damaged beyond repair had it not been for Mr.
Ives and the late Mr. John Bartlett, who reported the matter to General
Augur, the Military Governor of this district, by whose orders the
captain was arrested and further desecration prevented.

About three miles from Falls Church, on the Alexandria turnpike, is
Bailey's Cross