For months it was "drill, drill." Public opinion grew restless at the cry "All's Quiet Along the Potomac." At last, on March 17th, McClellan moved. On April 5th the Union army was advancing toward Richmond up the Peninsula, but was stopped at Yorktown by the Confederate General Magruder. Not until May 3rd were McClellan's siege guns in place. That night the Confederates evacuated. In hot pursuit the Union army followed. At Williamsburg the lines in Gray stood again. "Jeb" Stuart, D. H. Hill, and Jubal Early fought nobly. They gained their object--more time for their retreating comrades. But McClellan's fighting leaders, Hooker, Kearny and Hancock, were not to be denied. Williamsburg was occupied by the Federal army. With Yorktown and Williamsburg inscribed upon its victorious banners, the Army of the Potomac took up again its toilsome march from Cumberland Landing toward the Confederate capital on the James. It was the 16th of May, 1862, when the advanced corps reached White House, the ancestral home of the Lees. On every side were fields of wheat, and, were it not for the presence of one hundred thousand men, there was the promise of a full harvest. It was here that General McClellan took up his headquarters, a distance of twenty-four miles from Richmond. In the Confederate capital a panic had seized the people. As the retreating army of Johnston sought the environs of Richmond and news of the invading hosts was brought in, fear took possession of the inhabitants and many wild rumors were afloat as to the probable capture of the city. But it was not a fear that Johnston would not fight. The strategic policy of the Southern general had been to delay the advance of the Northern army. Fortunately for him, the rainy weather proved a powerful ally. The time had now come when he should change his position from the defensive to the offensive. The Army of Northern Virginia had been brought to bay, and it now turned to beat off the invaders and save its capital. On the historic Peninsula lay two of the greatest and most splendid armies that had ever confronted each other on the field of battle. The engagement, now imminent, was to be the first in that series of contests, between the Army of the Potomac and the Army of Northern Virginia, ending three years thereafter, at Appomattox, when the war-worn veterans of gray should lay down their arms, in honor, to the war-worn veterans of blue.