The Federal officers in Richmond gave several public dancing parties, or “Hops” as they were called, at the different hotels, and desired that the Richmond ladies should attend them. There was, of course, too much feeling against the North at this time to permit anything of the sort, and the only Richmond women who attended these “Hops” were the wives and daughters of the present and prospective office holders under the United States Government. The newspapers were not invited to send reporters to the “Hops,” but the Examiner managed always to have a man there, and gave a highly colored report of them the morning after the occurrence, describing and naming the Richmond people who were there, and dressing up the whole account in a style of mingled bitterness and ridicule. J. Marshall Hanna, the principal local reporter for the Examiner, did most of the work on these reports, and it was he, by the way, who described the elopement of Miss Grant which had so tragical consequences. The Federal officers were indignant at the way in which their efforts at reconciliation were treated by the Examiner, but another “Hop” was announced. This was in March, 1866. We prepared ourselves for a report that should out-Herod Herod. Hanna, Mr. Fred. Daniel, and I were engaged on it, and we called into requisition every apt quotation we could find in French and Italian, as well as in English. The report being finished, I went to a ball to which I had been invited, and did not return to the office until near daylight. At the office door I found a sentry, who halted me and refused to allow me to pass into the building. To my astonishment I then learned that the Federal Commandant at Richmond had taken possession of the Examiner office, and had suspended its publication, on account of the malignant and disloyal reports of the famous Yankee “Hops.” It was with great difficulty that I induced the guard to allow me to go up to my room for more suitable attire. Riordan told me that he was at his desk working quietly on his exchanges, when he heard a dull tramp, tramp in the street, and then tramp, tramp on the stairs, and then tramp, tramp in the outer room, and the command “halt!” and the rattle of muskets on the floor. By this time he began to think that something unusual was happening, and was sure of it when an officer entered the room and told him that he had orders to seize the whole establishment, and that he and everyone else connected with the paper must leave the place at once. This arbitrary and lawless proceeding did not shock me as much as it ought to have done, inasmuch as it held out the promise of a holiday, which I knew I could pass delightfully with my fair friends in Richmond; but the very day that the Examiner was shut up the proprietors of the Richmond Dispatch sent for me, and offered me a salary of $25 a week if I would go on the staff of that paper. Mr. Pollard made no objection, and I went to work at once on the Dispatch. The Examiner remained in possession of the military authorities for about two weeks I think, and was only released when a peremptory order to that end was given by the President himself.

On the Dispatch I was legislative and local reporter, and was handsomely treated. One of my colleagues was Captain J. Innes Randolph, who had played that ’possum trick on me at Bunker Hill, on the retreat from Gettysburg. Randolph was a man of many accomplishments. He played the piano and violin charmingly, was a skillful engineer, a very capable lawyer, and wrote charmingly in both prose and verse. “The Good Old Rebel” is one of his productions, and his lines on the statue of Marshall, which now stands in the Capitol Square, are worth remembering. Randolph is the son of Lieutenant Randolph of the Navy, who tweaked President Jackson’s nose, and has something of his father’s temper. A more cranky and irritable fellow is rarely met with. He lives in Baltimore, and is now on the staff of the American. I have not seen him for several years.