13. The Great Locomotive Chase
Chugging along in their stolen train, James J. Andrews and his men stopped along the way to cut telegraph lines and remove some railroad tracks. Back in Big Shanty, the conductor whose locomotive they had hijacked, a William Fuller, organized a pursuit. With a hue and cry raised behind them, the Union raiders led the Confederate pursuers on a 90-mile chase on locomotives and on foot.
The Confederates at Big Shanty first set off by foot, then by handcar, until Fuller and his posse reached an idle locomotive on a spur line. They fired it up, and began the chase in earnest. Switching locomotives along the way, Fuller and the pursuers steadily closed the distance with Andrews and his raiders. For some time, Andrews’ men managed to stay ahead of news of their raid because they had cut telegraph wires, thus preventing warnings and orders to block the raiders’ escape route from reaching Confederate forces ahead of the fleeing Union volunteers. For a while, things seemed to be going the daring raiders’ way. However, fortune is a fickle mistress, and she eventually turned her back on them.