But Wallace had delayed him long enough to enable Grant to send a part of the Sixth and Nineteenth corps, and Washington was saved.
Meanwhile, work on the public buildings went steadily forward. During the war the dome of the Capitol was raised, and the Treasury and Patent Office buildings were almost completed. In 1863, the statue of Freedom was placed upon the dome with imposing ceremony, accompanied by the salutes of guns of the surrounding forts. The enormous military population during the war brought greatly increased responsibilities to the city, and a better realization of its importance to the nation. From 1860 to 1870, more noteworthy and substantial improvements were made than had been before undertaken in the whole history of the city, and the population in this single decade increased from seventy thousand to 120,000.
With the return of peace the habitual slothfulness returned, and the old do-nothing policy seemed about to be resumed. But there were a few energetic citizens in whom the short period of progressiveness had instilled an unquenchable desire for a better order of things,
