The bridge at Point of Rocks, a few miles down the Potomac toward Washington, was seized and fortified against a possible attack by General Butler, who was near Baltimore; and by a clever _ruse_ a great number of trains on the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad were "bagged," and the cars and engines side-tracked into Strasburg, greatly facilitating the Confederate train service in Virginia. Horses and supplies were secured from the neighboring country, and when Gen. Joseph E. Johnston superseded Jackson a month later at Harper's Ferry, the Confederates were in good shape to confront an advance on their position from Maryland or Pennsylvania, or to send reinforcements, as they did, when the first considerable struggle of the war came at Bull Run, fifty miles south of them. [Illustration: ALEXANDER H. STEPHENS, Vice-President C. S. A.] Another destruction of Government property by Government officers, about this time, most unnecessary and unfortunate, deprived the Navy Department of ships and material that would have been incalculably precious, and furnished the Confederates with three ships, one of which, the _Merrimac_, was to be heard from later in a signal manner. At the Gosport Navy Yard, opposite Norfolk, Va., there were, besides many munitions of war, no less than eleven fine war ships, a majority of which were armed and ready for sea. The Government made prompt preparations to secure these after the fall of Sumter; and but for the delay of the commandant, Commodore Charles S. McCauley, in executing his orders, a number of the vessels, with stores, armament, and crews, would have been withdrawn into safe waters. But under the influence of his junior officers, most of whom subsequently joined the Confederacy, he deferred action until better prepared. This delay was fatal; for on April 18 he suddenly was confronted by a hostile force, though small in numbers, under General Taliaferro, which had seized Norfolk and threatened the navy yard. The {29} action of the latter in waiting one day for expected reinforcements from Richmond, and Commodore McCauley's promise not to move a vessel or fire a shot except in defence, gave the Union commander time to do what he could to destroy the property in his charge; and on April 20 he scuttled every ship in the harbor, sinking them just before the arrival of Capt. Hiram Paulding in the _Pawnee_ with orders to relieve McCauley, and to save or destroy the property. Seeing that it would be possible for the enemy to raise the sunken vessels, and that after the ships had been rendered useless he could not hold the place with his small force, Paulding decided to complete the work of destruction as far as possible, and told off his men in detachments for this duty. Ships, ship-houses, barracks, wharves, were at the signal (a rocket) set ablaze, and the display was magnificent as pyrotechnics, and discouraging to the enemy, which had expected to secure a ready-made navy for the taking of it.