1861.] OF THE SENATE. 145

A gentleman was appointed to return with your Commissioner,
and institute inquiries into the nature and extent of any injuries
incurred by citizens of Maryland.

On their return to Maryland, they made a legal investigation
of the seizure of the boat and grain of C. F. Wenner, which, he
is happy to state, resulted in the satisfactory adjustment of the
claim of Mr. Wenner, whose receipt upon his petition to the
Executive, accompanies this report. The case of Mr. Wenner
was the only one of which the undersigned was apprised at the
time, and he believes it is the only instance of the interruption of
the Canal.

On his return to Maryland, your Commissioner received from
the Clerk of the Honorable House of Delegates the memorial of
certain citizens of Montgomery county, and the letter of Mr.
Biggs, of Washington county, with instructions to obtain accu-
rate information in regard to the subjects thereof, and report the
same to that Honorable Body, with the result of any negotiations
relating thereto with the authorities of Virginia.

Your Commissioner visited at once Montgomery county, and
some of the petitioners, and ascertained that the apprehensions of
molestation from the roops of Virginia were entirely groundless.
He was informed by Mr. Darby, one of the petitioners, a respect-
able citizen, and owner of a large and important mill on Seneca
Creek, neaf the Canal, that the petition had grown out of what
they then considered well founded apprehensions of his neighbors,
of injury to his mill property, in the continued security and oper-
ation of which they were all interested, arising from the fact of
his supplying the Government with flour; but that he was now
satisfied their apprehensions had been groundless, and his trade
on the Canal, and his other branches of business, had not been
threatened or molested by the troops of Virginia.

The undersigned made as thorough an examination of the con-
dition of things on the Maryland mountain, opposite Harper's
Ferry, as the pressure of circumstances, and the almost inacces-
sible nature of its approaches, would admit of.

Its top was occupied by four or five hundred Virginia troops,
who had cut down four or five acres of the indifferent timber
which clothes its summit, for the apparent purpose of construct-
ing huts for their temporary shelter; and about the same space of
land had been burnt over by the accidental contact of the dried
leaves with their camp fires, as your Commissioner supposes.

That as soon as he had investigated all the complaints he
returned to Richmond, and reached there on Wednesday, the
29th ultimo, when the authorities were engaged with the pressing
duties arising from their reception of the President and Govern-
ment of the Confederate States of America. That, on the even-