 As late as 1863 many of the railroad cars were still being hauled away up the Shenandoah Valley to Staunton for service on Confederate rail lines all throughout the South.Eyewitnesses living along the Valley turnpike witnessed some locomotives being moved all the way to Staunton, Virginia about the same time that General Johnston was evacuating Manassas in the spring of 1862.Mounting any more of the locomotives at Strasburg for evacuation on the Manassas Gap Railroad had become too risky.