President Lincoln was very troubled by the recent attempt by troops from Massachusetts who had been attacked in April while marching through Baltimore. He ordered Pennsylvania units to guard the railroad north of town to prevent further problems. His additional order was to have future troops to come into Washington through Annapolis, Maryland instead of Baltimore.
He had been aware since his train trip through Baltimore in February of this year o the way to his Inauguration that southern sympathies were rampant in Maryland's largest city. The president was alsso aware that he could not let Maryland join the new Confederacy because then Washington City would be surrounded by the secessionists. He used Fort McHenry, where the Star Spangled Banner had been written by Francis Scott Key, as a prison, and herded Maryland and Baltimore officials as well as sympathetic members of the press into the prison for what he called "safe keeping."
Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Roger B. Taney, appointed in 1837 by Andrew Jackson, was furious at the president's decision to suspend habeas corpus.
W. H. Lamon
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