=462. First Bloodshed.=—Among those in the North who had foreseen the conflict, one of the foremost was Governor John A. Andrew, of Massachusetts. Inaugurated early in January, 1861, he had set about preparing for hostilities by organizing the state militia and by purchasing arms in Europe. Only four days after the call for troops, therefore, the 6th Massachusetts Regiment was ready to move to Washington. While passing through Baltimore, the regiment was attacked by a mob and several men were killed. This was the first bloodshed of the war. The road through Baltimore was closed, and all trains with men and supplies were for several months obliged to pass around the city by way of Annapolis. But this was not the worst. The railroad from Annapolis to Washington was torn up and every telegraph line from Washington to the North was cut. Exit from the capital in any direction was, for a time, made impossible. With the news that Virginia had seceded, came the rumor that a large Southern force was on the march to take Washington. General Winfield Scott, then in command as general in chief of the United States armies, placed barricades about all the public buildings, and distributed the few guns he had at the various approaches to the city. There were only twenty-five hundred troops at his disposal. But officers and men in the departments were brought into service, and many citizens enlisted. The women and children were ordered out of town. During all this terrible excitement and anxiety, a committee from Baltimore appeared before the President and protested that the soil of Maryland should not be “polluted” by troops designed to invade the South. Lincoln replied, “We must have troops, and, as they can neither crawl under Maryland nor fly over it, they must come across it.” The alarming rumor proved to have no foundation. The South was not ready for an attack upon the capital.