to proceed without waiting longer for the cavalry, and moved forward with the men of your company in advance and waded through the swamp above referred to, and halted at the residence of William H. Wilder, esq., to get water and information necessary to our further progress. Here I waited for some time, wondering what detained the rear guard, consisting of Lieutenant Carpenter's command, when the cavalry came plunging through and informed me that they were not advancing. Having procured much information from Mr. Wilder, I resolved, as the infantry, were much exhausted, to leave them and proceed with the cavalry. I therefore instructed Sergt. William Duncan to take command and return to a safe camping ground, and procure a small beef, sufficient to do the men and to afford a sufficiently for our return to camp.

On my return from the parish of Ascension I took Sergeant Kinchen and 2 men from your company, and having procured four horses, we mounted and started for the French settlement on the Amite River, where we arrived about 1 p.m. I called upon Alexander Sevique, who agreed to act as my guide, and from whom I procured a mutton for the men and 5 1/2 pounds of corn for the horses. Having sufficiently refreshed both man and horse, I started at sundown with a force of 28 men, including myself and the guides, for the parish of Ascension, to arrest a notorious desperado named Adolph Dies, who had proclaimed himself a Lincolnite and threatened to burn the property of a number of the citizens this parish and was understood to have a party of some 15 men under his command. On my way to the residence of this man I learned that he had 12 armed men in his house at sundown, and several admonished me to be watchful of an ambush, as a party of Captain Wilson's cavalry had been on the Amite that evening and they were prepared for resistance, &c.

On my arrival at Port Vincent I detailed a guard for the horses, and with Lieutenants Evans and B. B. Starns, of Captain Bredow's cavalry, and 20 men I crossed the river and proceeded on foot to the house of Dies, and after surrounding it summoned him in the name of the Confederate States to surrender himself and the men under his charge as prisoners, at the same time assuring him that if he did so no violence would be used, but that if he offered resistance, I would arrest him dead or alive. He refused to submit to the authority of the Confederate States and defied me. I then summoned all who might be in the house to come forth and surrender, assuring them at the same time that if they done so no harm should be done them, but that if they refused I should be compelled to burn the house to get them out, when a voice came forth within to "Burn and be damned." I then ordered a portion of the men to fire the house. While they were preparing to do so several attempts were made to leave the house by the inmates and an attempt to shoot through one of the windows, but it was slammed to by one of the men, and the assurance given that if he stuck his head out again it would be blown off. At this crisis, when the torch was being got ready to fire the house, I again demanded a surrender in the name of the Confederate States, but again came the refusal to do so, and the party making it came out on the front porch to fire on our men, when I immediately fired upon him, inflicting a mortal wound. The rest now offered to surrender-came out and done so. Lieutenant Evans with a party now entered the house and searched for arms, &c., and after securing four guns, all of which were loaded and cocked and some ammunition, we took the prisoners-three in number-and brought them to the ferry, where I found one of them to be a youth of sixteen years, who said that he was a son of