The time was fixed for the ceremony, for they had such things in those days. Failure would be ruin to the great work as well as himself, so the courageous superintendent had his misgivings. But the night before he and a few of his aids secretly removed the key, and in this way tested its safety. The day came, and the launch was made in safety and to the satisfaction of the assembled multitude.
Notwithstanding the large sums of money appropriated for and expended on the old National road, the year 1830 found it in a worn-out and almost useless condition. Traffic and travel on it had increased heavily. Little of it was left except the rough stone bed. The old patching system of repairing here and there with a few broken stone would not answer. It would wear and wash away suddenly. It was seen that a new plan had to be adopted. Macadamizing was decided upon, and carried into effect.
This great national enterprise was commenced about the year 1832, and was accomplished under the supervision of the War Department. Some of the most prominent and talented young men of the army were especially selected as engineers, such as Lieut. Mansfield, and Capts. Delafield, McKee, Bliss, Hetzell, Williams, Colquit, and Cass, all West Pointers. A word as to the fate of these young men: Mansfield fell at the battle of Antietam, a major-general in the United States army; Williams fell at the storming of Monterey, in Mexico, along with Lieut.-Col. William H. Watson, of Maryland; and Col. McKee at Buena Vista, in the same country; Maj. Hetzell died on his return from the Mexican war, at Louisville; Gen. Delafield and Col. Bliss died but recently; Gen. Colquit, of South Carolina, followed the fortunes of his State during the civil war, and died' before its conclusion. George M. Cass, a nephew of the great statesman of that name, still survives, and is, or was not long since, president of the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Chicago Railroad Company.
During this reconstruction of the road its route by way of Green Street, Cumberland, and Sandy Gap was changed to Mechanic Street and through the narrows, and on to the " Old Burnt House," where it again connected with the former route. This change was made in 1834, and was a great improvement. Limestone was quarried wherever it could be obtained, and in some instances was hauled as much as ten miles by teams of four and six horses. When the stone was properly broken it was spread with a horse-rake over the bed of the road to a depth of about nine inches. The hardships of heavily-laden wagons in passing over such a bottom can be readily imagined. All sorts of stratagems were resorted to compel vehicles to pass over these compact stones. No doubt there was as much swearing done in those days by the teamsters as the Dutch soldiers did in Flanders. However, in time the road became packed and solidified, and as smooth as some avenues in Washington City. From about 1834 to 1845 it was the finest road in America, and in all probability in the world, considering its length, reaching from Baltimore to or near St. Louis.
The line of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad reached Cumberland from the east in the fall of 1842, and here it rested until 1849. During this interval the National road was a substitute for the present railroad to the Ohio River. The many warehouses in Cumberland in the spring and fall seasons would be choked with freight for the West. Sometimes weeks would elapse before it could be moved, on account of a deficiency in transportation. Many people in those days made wagoning a distinct and profitable business, and in the busy seasons a number of small teams called sharpshooters made their appearance on the pike, to the disgust of the regular carriers. No toll was charged upon this road until the act of the General Assembly of 1831, which authorized not more than two toll-gates in Maryland. This act also authorized the government to appoint a superintendent, with a salary of five hundred dollars, an office of great influence. The act of 1835 further regulated the tolls. The canal and the railway have superseded the old National pike, and it is not often now that a traveler disturbs the dust that has accumulated on it.
The dust, indeed, has settled and given root to grass and shrubbery, which in many places show how complete the decadence is. The black-snakes, moccasins, and copperheads, that were always plentiful in the mountains, have become so unused to the intrusion of man that they sun themselves in the center of the highway. Many of the villages which were prosperous in the coaching days have fallen asleep, and the wagon of a peddler or farmer is alone seen where once the travel was enormous.
The men who were actively engaged on the road as drivers, station-agents, and mail-contractors are nearly all dead. The few that remain are very old and decrepit. But the taverns, with their hospitable and picturesque fronts, the old smithies, and the toll-gates have not entirely been swept away. Enough has been left to sustain the interest and individuality of the highway, which from Frederick to Cumberland is rich by dower of Nature, independently of its past.
A correspondent of Harper's Monthly, who made a journey over the road in 1879, writes: "We made Frederick our starting-point and entered it from the fertile meadows basined in the Blue Ridge, which are as sunny and ns tranquil ns the description of them in Whittier's poem. We hired a team to Cumberland. The driver's whip cracked, and Frederick was soon invisible by reason of the foliage which engirths it. Placid meadows were on both sides of us; the Blue Ridge was like a cloud in the south, and ahead of us was the famous highway, dipping and rising by many alternations towards a hazy line of hills in the west, like a thread of white drawn through the verdant meadows. The chestnuts made arches over it, and divided its borders with tulip poplars and the blossoming locusts, which filled the air with fragrance. A Roman highway buried under the farm-lands of England could not be more in contrast with the activity of its past than this. The winding undulations revealed no travelers; some of the old taverns with windows out gaped vacantly, while a few others were occupied; a part of the toll-houses were abandoned, and those which do double duty find so little business that the keeper combines his occupation with that of the cobbler or blacksmith. Reaching the crest of the hill, we found the Middletown Valley below us,— as fair a prospect and as fertile and beautiful a reach of country as the world contains, and it was through here that Lee came ' marching down, horse and foot, into Frederick Town.' South Mountain was purple in the west; and the gap of Harper's Ferry gave an inlet to the valley on the southwest. Up here the Union artillery swept the meadows, reaping a different harvest from that which is now ripening: and every acre has known the anguish and fierce heat of war's arbitrament. Midway in the valley, and bordering the highway, which courses in a straight line, stands the sleepy little village off Middletown. embowered in the chestnuts, oaks, and locusts. All the visible inhabitants wore loafing and yawning under the foliage at the doors of the shops, on the porch of the tavern, or under the wide eaves of the cottages. Then we toiled up the South Mountain, upon which the prolific growth of the chestnut forms endless zigzag lines, dotted with occasional pines: the grade is very heavy, but the coaches went up at a gallop, and came down without brakes. On the farther side is Boonsboro", and between Boonsboro' and Hagerstown the first macadam pavement used in the United States was laid. Hagerstown has suffered little by the withdrawal of the coaches; it is the busy and crowded seat of a Maryland county; but its old citizens lament the change, and cherish their reminiscences of the day when the 'pike' was in its glory.
'' ' From here to Boonsboro',' said Mr. Eli Mobley, an old coach-maker, to us, ' the road was the finest in the United States, and I have seen the mail-coaches travel from Hagerstown to Frederick, twenty-six miles, in two hours. That was not an unusual thing either, and there were through freight-wagons from Baltimore to Wheeling, which carried ten ton, and made nearly as good time as the coaches. They were drawn by ten horses, and the rear wheels were ten feet high. Although there was so much traffic. the mountains were very wild, and sometimes you would find a bear or deer on the road. The snakes were powerful abundant. South Mountain was full of 'em, — black-snakes, copperheads, moccasins, and rattlesnakes, I've seen Clay and Jackson often; neither of them was handsome, and one thing that strikes me is the fidelity of all the likenesses I've seen of 'em. Jackson and his family came along quite often, the family in a private carriage and the general on horseback, which he changed now and then for a seat in the vehicle. He was very fond of horses, and his own were something to look at. Once T was in Wheeling when the general was expected to arrive, and a friend of mine, Daniel Steinrode, had purchased a team which he intended to present to him. Steinrode had a speech prepared, and the horses beautifully groomed. The arrival of the general was announced, and he went forth to meet him with the speech and the team, but when he reached the Ohio