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liquor, of which there were large quantities in Gettysburg, many of them were drunk,” and caused Early’s staffers “much trouble to make them keep up with the column.”
    Those who weren’t drunk in Gettysburg soon had the opportunity elsewhere.Elijah White’s“Comanches” passed through McSherrystown, on the Hanover Road, and emptied a dry goods store of $400 worth of clothing and ten gallons ofwhiskey, then torched “therailroad buildings” atHanover Junction “and a bridge or two south of it on the Northern Central.” As they continued eastward, the wide fan of looters and foragers discovered that advanceparties of swindlers had been at work ahead of them. As soon as theArmy of Northern Virginia crossed into Pennsylvania, “agents” of the shadowy underground Knights of the Golden Circle began circulating through Adams and York counties, offering “for von tollar” to induct farmers into the Knights, and show them the secret order’s “signs and grips” to ward off Southern plunderers. These “agents” were, of course, con men, and when farmers tried out “de grip, de passwords and everytings” on mystified Confederate soldiers, the rebels fell all over themselves with laughter—and took everything they could lay hands on. 20
    Early’s infantry struck eastward, John Gordon’s brigade on theYork Pike, and two other brigades (under Harry Hays and Extra Billy Smith) moving north of Gordon and parallel to the pike. So much had gone so easily that Early was growing apprehensive that the Yankees were concentrating their forces to defend York and finally pick a real fight. But by the time Early caught up with Gordon outside York, the latter was already able to report that “there was no force in York” to speak of. If so, Early said, then Gordon should move past York as quickly as possible and secure the great railroad bridge on the Susquehanna that linked Wrightsville on the west bank with Columbia on the east. 21
    It was no ordinary bridge. A mile and a quarter long and built on twenty-eight piers, the railroad bridge at Wrightsville was the longest roofed bridge in North America, and seizing it would give Early a vital lodgment on the east side of the Susquehanna. He could then “march upon Lancaster, lay that town under contribution, and then attack Harrisburg in the rear while it should be attacked in front by the rest of [Ewell’s] corps.” In Early’s and Gordon’s way, however, Darius Couch planted another hastily contrived militia regiment, the 27th Pennsylvania Emergency Militia. This regiment was commanded by the forty-five-year-oldJacob Gellert Frick, whom Couch also put in charge “of all bridges and fords on the line of the Susquehanna, in Lancaster County.” Unlike his militiamen, Frick was not a stranger to war or politics. He had served in Mexico and in the 11th U.S. Infantry, and in 1860 had been a delegate to the Republican national convention, which had nominated Abraham Lincoln. In 1862, Frick took command of the 129th Pennsylvania, a nine-months’ regiment raised for the Antietam emergency, and won distinction for leading his regiment, colors in hand, at Fredericksburg, and then saving the same colors when they nearly fell into rebel hands at Chancellorsville. Frick’s problem was his prickly sense of rectitude about his own judgment. He had held one commission in the volunteer service already, in the 96th Pennsylvania, and resigned in 1862 because he couldn’t get along with the regiment’s colonel. Then, he was nearly booted from the army in January 1863 for “insubordination,” stemming from his refusal to make a requisitionfor “frock coats” so that the 129th Pennsylvania could appear on parade in full dress. As a soldier, Frick was perfectly willing to fight; he simply couldn’t distinguish friend from foe. 22
    No one, however, had ever put Frick’s competence in dispute. He managed to enlist three companies of home guards to construct earthworks around the