No. 19. Report of Lieutenant Col. Volney S. Fullam, Seventh Vermont Infantry.

HEADQUARTERS SEVENTH VERMONT INFANTRY,
Baton Rouge, La., August 8, 1862.

SIR: In obedience to Special Orders, No. 2, I have the honor to submit the following report, viz:

On account of the regiment having received no definite orders for its operations, as I understood, and owing to the fact of Colonel Roberts having been mortally wounded in the action, I am not able to give a connected account of the participated of this regiment, having been sent forward to reconnoiter, and for other purposes, and was absent when Colonel Roberts fell, but assumed command immediately after, and can only say that the regiment had not far from 250 officers and men in action; that it was several times under sharp fire; that several men in camp and some from hospital, who were not fit for duty, were in the ranks, and that both officers and men, so far as I know, behaved with coolness and courage. The following list show the names and rank of the wounded and missing in action so far as ascertained to this date.*

Respectfully submitted.

V. S. FULLAM,

Lieutenant Col., Comdg. Seventh Regiment Vermont Volunteers.

No. 20. Report of Col. Frank S. Nickerson, Fourteenth Maine Infantry, commanding left wing Second Brigade.

HEADQUARTERS FOURTEENTH MAINE VOLUNTEERS,
Baton Rouge, La., August 8, 1862.

In accordance with Orders, No. 2, I herewith submit a report of the part borne by my regiment in the affair of the 5th instant:

We were encamped at the forks of the Bayou Sara and Clinton Cross-Roads, in advance and on the left.

At 4 o'clock on the morning of the 5th our pickets (Companies B and H) were attacked and driven in, reporting four regiments advancing, two in front an two on the left flank. Our line of battle was formed to the front of our encampment. Finding their skirmishers approaching through the corn field on our left flank, we changed front to the rear on the right company, and then moved cautiously forward through the timber to meet them. The fog was so dense that it was impossible to see twenty-five yards in advance. They were well advised of the exact location of our camps, but, misjudging their distance in the fog, fired over us. We received some five or six rounds from them without replying (still out of sight of them), until they arrived within less than 100 yards of us. We then gave them a volley by battalion. After about five rounds they broke, and their fire entirely ceased at this point. We then rested in place for about ten minutes, being completely concealed from them by a fence in front and the morning fog. I sent skirmishers

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*Embodied in revised statement, p. 51.

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