Who's good at tracking obscure details?

[L Verge]

Hi Laurie. As usual, we differ.
The Potomac flows PAST Montgomery County, 15 miles from Frederick, where Edward Fitzgerald lived. I can't see him capable of walking to the river and then paddle across and back, and get home, at 10 or 12 years old. The closest point for him is called "POINT OF ROCKS" . At that point the river narrows and picks up speed, with high rocks on both sides Today, Rt. 15 crosses right there. Would you trust a 10 year old to get you across the Potomac? He may have helped Jones by sending travelers down river - to cross where Rt. 301 -crosses and Mr. Jones will put you across, cheap!
Your notes don't say he helped Jones before 1865. They might have met later. For example: Edward was a student at Georgetown University (in D.C.) in the 1870's. They could have met in that era.
Maybe when Jones was "visiting" the jails up there.

I'm going to disagree again, SSlater. I believe that the Potomac River forms the western boundary of Montgomery County, Maryland, and divides it from Loudoun County, Virginia. That's a big reason why the Feds sent about 20,000 troops into Montgomery to guard both the river and the C&O Canal. There were several places to ford the river, including one where a ferry still plods across every day. Its name today is White's Ferry, but I think it had a different name then. The modern American Legion Bridge may be where another Civil War crossing was. There might have been another around Seneca. Again, Jim Garrett and Rick Smith are natives of that area and can comment further.

I traveled nearly the length of Maryland for four years en route from Southern Maryland to college in the mountains of Maryland near Cumberland -- and I drove them before the days of the Interstates. 4-5 hours one way each time. Montgomery County was largely farmland, forests, and little villages back then (the 1960s, not the 1860s). Sometimes I took the train, and it was really the boondocks that it ran through.