This preoccupation with more fundamental problems precluded legislative action
dealing with the Board of Public Works and with internal improvements generally
for the next three years. The board, however, soon found itself in a stalemate, and at
a most difficult time. Sanderlin notes, with respect to the C&O Canal:

As a result of the secession of Virginia, the canal found itself on the border between the
Union and the Confederacy, in the path of the contending armies. Consequently during
the first two or three years of the conflict, its trade was greatly reduced and its works
alternately occupied and/or destroyed by the opposing forces. The condition of the company
and its properties materially deteriorated from even the gloomy pre-war status. Only to-
ward the end of the war when interference with navigation declined did its trade and
financial status improve.⁵³

The B & O, it is reported, also suffered from the various military incursions, and
its trade was disrupted and equipment stolen or destroyed. These depredations did
not, however, keep the board from continuing to play politics. Again, as Sanderlin
reports in terms of the canal:

Meanwhile the older problems of the canal continued to interfere with its success. Political
influence brought about the wholesale turnover of employees in 1860 and 1862. Although
these appointments were the last during the war years, the men who were appointed in
1862 were not particularly attentive to their duties, according to the testimony of canal
officials as well as others. And the top officials continued to intrigue in state politics
throughout the war.⁵⁴

At the first meeting held after the election of Lincoln, on 2 December 1861, the
board adopted a resolution permitting any one member to call a special meeting but
requiring the presence of three members to constitute a quorum. The affairs of the
board proceeded smoothly for about six months; in December 1861 and January and
March 1862 the commissioners elected directors of the B & 0, three other railroads,
and the C&O, without apparent division.⁵⁵ Then, in May of 1862 a conflict erupted
between the two Unionist commissioners—Fickey and Shriver—and their senior col-
leagues—Duke and Roberts—who had been elected in 1859.

The immediate issue dividing the commissioners seemed to be the filling of a single
vacancy on the B & O board of directors arising from the resignation of Albert Schu-
macker, but it soon turned into a wider political and legal controversy. The four com-
missioners were evenly divided as to the replacement (or perhaps whether there should
be a replacement). Based upon what ultimately unfolded, Fickey and Shriver must
have sensed that, in the event of a tie vote, the state treasurer, Robert Fowler (who
had previously been a state—appointed director in the B & O) would side with Duke
and Roberts. In order to prevent that, they simply boycotted the meetings of the board,
thereby attempting to stymie any board action by precluding a quorum.

This tactic initially worked; the meetings of the board called for 20, 21, and 22
May 1862 were adjourned for lack of a quorum. Duke and Roberts thereupon reacted
with a stratagem of their own. On 3 June 1862 they met, nominated not just one
person to fill the existing vacancy but an entire slate of new state directors to replace
the incumbents, declared that the "votes of all absentees be reckoned against the ticket
nominated [by them]," concluded that there was therefore a tie vote as to that ticket,

52. Acts of 1862, res. 15, 13, 3.

53. Sanderlin, Great National Project, p. 212.

54. Hungerford, Story of the Baltimore & Ohio, 2:19; Sanderlin, Great National Project, p. 220.

55. BPW Minutes, 2, 16 December 1861, 29 January, 30 March 1862, vol. 1851-83, pp. 113, 115, 117, 118.
On 30 January 1862 the board unanimously adopted a slate of candidates for president and directors of the
C&O Canal Company to be presented at the stockholders' meetings. They noted that "the interests of the
[company] demand that a change be made in the direction and management of the said company." See ibid.,
30 January 1862, p. 118. Compare Sanderlin's observation, note 54 above.