line. A traveler who was a passenger on the railroad in 1855 was unhappy with his journey. He noted that rails and ties were sometimes missing, and that the iron straps on the rails were sometimes fastened only in the middle, so that both ends of the strap curled up. At one point a forest fire had set the ties on fire for a distance of , which the train nevertheless proceeded across. When the slave driving the train was asked why he did not try to fight the fire, he replied that he was not a fireman. The passenger train was delayed because a freight train had derailed, and the passengers had to help place the freight cars on the track again. As there was no way for the passenger train to pass the freight train, it was further delayed by the slow speed at which the freight train moved. The traveler noted that delays of this sort occurred almost every day. New owners In 1855, Richard Keith Call sold his majority interest in the Tallahassee Railroad to the Pensacola and Georgia Railroad. The following year, the line was completely rebuilt, with iron rails replacing the wood rails, and the introduction of two Baldwin 4-4-0 steam locomotives. In 1857, the president of the Pensacola and Georgia Railroad declared that the Tallahassee Railroad was "one of the best paying roads in the country". Battle of Natural Bridge The Union Army and Navy mounted a raid on the area around St. Marks in March 1865 as part of an attempt to cut off peninsular Florida from the rest of the Confederacy. Seamen and soldiers were landed at various points on Apalachee Bay in an attempt to capture or burn bridges over the Aucilla ("Ocilla" on the map), East, Ochlockonee ("Okloknee" on the map), and St. Marks rivers, to seize the towns of Newport and St. Marks, and to destroy the Tallahassee Railroad. The main force under Brigadier General John Newton arrived at Newport to find that the bridge across the St. Marks River had been burned. General Newton decided to cross the St. Marks on the natural bridge (where the river went briefly underground) a few miles upstream from Newport. News of the Federal landings at St. Marks had reached Tallahassee the night of March 4. Various Confederate troops were dispatched to bolster the defence of the area. Confederate reinforcements, including