"CAPTURE the National Capital, throw the city into confusion and terror by conflagration, seize the President and his Cabinet, and secure control of the Government." This was the first cry of the Confederacy. Thousands of volunteers were moving toward the city in answer to the call for men to save the Nation. Orders were issued to hold back the enemy from crossing the bridges that entered Washington. Two batteries were thrown up at the east end of the Upper, or Chain Bridge, and a heavy two-leaved gate covered with iron plates pierced for musketry, was constructed at the center of the bridge. Blockhouses at Arlington Heights and the battery at Georgetown Heights, guarded the Aqueduct Bridge. The largest approach to Washington was the famous Long Bridge, a mile in length, and connecting the National Capital with Alexandria, Virginia, the gateway to the Confederacy. Three earthen forts commanded its entrance. All soldiers of the Army of the Potomac remember Long Bridge. It was over this structure that a hundred thousand men passed in defense of their country, many of them never to recross it. This was one of the strategic points in the first days of the war and consequently one of the first pictures taken by Brady, with its sentinel on duty and the sergeant of the guard ready to examine the pass. No man ever crossed Long Bridge without this written oath: "It is understood that the within named and subscriber accepts this pass on his word of honor that he is and will be ever loyal to the United States; and if hereafter found in arms against the Union, or in any way aiding her enemies, the penalty will be death." [Illustration: PHOTOGRAPH TAKEN AT LONG BRIDGE ENTRANCE TO WASHINGTON]