Near Manassas, where Johnston and Beauregard had been ordered to form a junction, a railroad branched off from the main line and traversed the famous Shenandoah Valley, then and afterward known as the granary of the South. To have supplied the armies with provisions by the use of that line whose rolling stock was then comparatively idle would have been one of the easiest of military problems; but instead of following that course, breadstuffs were transported first from the Valley to Richmond and thence over the sadly overtaxed main line to the army at Manassas. But one result was possible which, of course, was the almost complete failure of the commissary department. Most of the Southern troops went hungry into the battle of Bull Run, and not until ten o'clock at night could meager rations be procured for the exhausted army. This fact was the real reason why General Johnston did not pursue the routed army of McDowell. Johnston, Beauregard and President Davis all concurred in the necessity of following up the victory, and the latter actually dictated the order to Colonel Jordan, but as the commissary department had completely gone to pieces, no forward movement was possible then, or, indeed, for months afterward. XVIII. The Quarrel with Johnston A greater calamity than this, which practically nullified the fruits of the victory, soon occurred in the beginning of that unnecessary and calamitous quarrel between the President and General Johnston. Much that is untrue has been written about its origin, but the facts as learned from the principals themselves, and all the records in the case, refer it to a single cause which may be stated in few words. [Illustration: General Joseph E. Johnston] In March, 1861, the Confederate Congress enacted that the relative rank of officers should be determined in the new army by that which they held in that of the United States. General Johnston alone of those who resigned from the old army held the rank of Brigadier-General and therefore, it would seem, should have become the senior general in the Confederate armies. In fact, he was recognized as such by the government until after the battle of Bull Run.