From the head of navigation on the Kanawha to Parkersburg on the Ohio was about one hundred and fifty miles; but the rivers were so low that the steamboats proceeded slowly, delayed by various obstacles and impediments, At Letart's Falls, on the Ohio, the water was a broken rapid, up which the boats had to be warped one at a time, by means of a heavy warp-line made fast to the bank and carried to the steam-capstan on the steamer. At the foot of Blennerhassett's Island there was only two feet of water in the channel, and the boats dragged themselves over the bottom by "sparring," a process somewhat like an invalid's pushing his wheel-chair along by a pair of crutches. But everybody worked with a will, and on the 21st the advanced regiments were transferred to the railway cars at Parkersburg, according to programme, and pulled out for Washington. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xii. pt. iii. pp. 619, 629.] These were the Thirty-sixth Ohio, Colonel Crook, and the Thirtieth Ohio, Colonel Ewing. They passed through Washington to Alexandria, and thence, without stopping, to Warrenton, Virginia, where they reported at General Pope's headquarters. [Footnote: _Id_., pp. 636, 637, 668, 676.] The Eleventh Ohio (Lieutenant-Colonel Coleman) and Twelfth (Colonel White), with Colonel Scammon commanding brigade, left Parkersburg on the 22d, reaching Washington on the 24th. One of them passed on to Alexandria, but the other (Eleventh Ohio) was stopped in Washington by reason of a break in Long Bridge across the Potomac, and marched to Alexandria the next day. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xii. pt. iii. pp. 650, 677.] The last of the regiments (Twenty-eighth Ohio, Colonel Moor, and Twenty-third, Lieutenant-Colonel Hayes), with the artillery and cavalry followed, and on the 26th all the men had reached Washington, though the wagons and animals were a day or two later in arriving. [Footnote: _Id_., p. 698.]