At the hour when Davis was disembarking at the southern end of Sixth Street wharf, Early's headquarters were at Silver Spring, barely five miles away to the northward, and his skirmishers were drawing within range of the guns of Fort Stevens. Behind the defences of Washington there were but twenty thousand soldiers of all arms. Of these less than half formed the garrison of the works, and even of this fraction nearly all were raw, undisciplined, uninstructed, and lacking the simplest knowledge of the ground they were to defend. But five days before this, Grant had taken Ricketts from the lines of the Sixth Corps before Petersburg, and sent him by water to Baltimore, whence his superb veterans were carried by rail to the Monocacy just in time to enable Wallace, with a chance medley of garrison and emergency men, to face Early on the 9th, and compel him to lose a day in crossing. Then, at last, made quite certain of Early's true position and plans, Grant hurried the rest of the Sixth Corps to the relief of Washington, and thus the steamboat bearing the advance of Wright's men touched the wharf about two hours after the _Crescent_ had made fast. The guns of Fort Stevens were already heard shelling the approaches, and thither Wright was at once directed, but in the great heat and dust Early had pressed on so fast that his men arrived before the works parched with thirst and panting with exhaustion. Moreover, evening came before the rear of his column had closed up on the front, and during these critical hours Wright's strong divisions of the veterans of the Army of the Potomac lined the works and stood stiffly across the path, while in supporting distance to the eastward was the little handful from the Gulf. Early, who had seen something of this and imagined more, waited, and so his opportunity, great or little, went. On the afternoon of the next day, the 12th of July, Early still not attacking, Wright sent out a brigade and roughly pushed back the Confederate advance. Then Early, realizing that he had not an hour to lose in extricating his command from its false position, fell back at night on Rockville. On the 13th of July the _Clinton_ arrived at Washington with the 29th Maine and part of the 13th Maine, the _St. Mary_ with the 8th Vermont, the _Corinthian_ with the remaining six companies of the 114th New York, the _Mississippi_ with the 90th and 116th New York and the 30th Massachusetts, the _Creole_ with the 47th Pennsylvania. As the detachments landed they were hurried, in most instances by long and needless circuits to Tennallytown, where they found themselves at night without supplies or wagons, without orders, and without much organization.