On the 30th he drove the Federal cavalry back upon their camps; and the same afternoon Jackson, leaving Elk Run Valley, which was immediately occupied by Ewell, with 8000 men, marched up the river to Port Republic.  The track, unmetalled and untended, had been turned into a quagmire by the heavy rains of an ungenial spring, and the troops marched only five miles, bivouacking by the roadside.  May 1 was a day of continuous rain.  The great mountains loomed dimly through the dreary mist.  The streams which rushed down the gorges to the Shenandoah had swelled to brawling torrents, and in the hollows of the fields the water stood in sheets.  Men and horses floundered through the mud.  The guns sunk axle-deep in the treacherous soil; and it was only by the help of large detachments of pioneers that the heavy waggons of the train were able to proceed at all.  It was in vain that piles of stones and brushwood were strewn upon the roadway; the quicksands dragged them down as fast as they were placed.  The utmost exertions carried the army no more than five miles forward, and the troops bivouacked once more in the dripping woods.

May 2.

The next day, the third in succession, the struggle with the elements continued.  The whole command was called upon to move the guns and waggons.  The general and his staff were seen dismounted, urging on the labourers; and Jackson, his uniform bespattered with mud, carried stones and timbers on his own shoulders.  But before nightfall the last ambulance had been extricated from the slough, and the men, drenched to the skin, and worn with toil, found a halting-place on firmer ground.  But this halting-place was not on the road to Staunton.  Before they reached Port Republic, instead of crossing the Shenandoah and passing through the village, the troops had been ordered to change the direction of their march.  The spot selected for their bivouac was at the foot of Brown’s Gap, not more than twelve miles south-west of the camp in Elk Run Valley.

May 3.

The next morning the clouds broke.  The sun, shining with summer warmth, ushered in a glorious May day, and the column, turning its back upon the Valley, took the stony road that led over the Blue Ridge.  Upward and eastward the battalions passed, the great forest of oak and pine rising high on either hand, until from the eyry of the mountain-eagles they looked down upon the wide Virginia plains.  Far off, away to the south-east, the trails of white smoke from passing trains marked the line of the Central Railroad, and the line of march led directly to the station at Mechum’s River.  Both officers and men were more than bewildered.  Save to his adjutant-general, Jackson had breathed not a whisper of his plan.  The soldiers only knew that they were leaving the Valley, and leaving it in the enemy’s possession.  Winchester, Strasburg, Front Royal, New Market, Harrisonburg, were full of Northern troops.  Staunton alone was yet unoccupied.  But Staunton was closely