and bridges up to the Santee River. The rebels who were defending the railroad bridge set it on fire on their approach. Meanwhile General Logan marched in two columns, one on the right and the other on the left of Caw Caw Swamp, reaching Sandy Run Post-Office on the evening of the 14th. General Blair closed up to the same point during the 14th. One division having gone on to improve the destruction of the road toward Fort Motte, marched toward Sandy Run Post-Office by the river road, along the Congaree.

On the evening of the 15th I wrote to the general-in-chief as follows:

NEAR CONGAREE CREEK, S. C.,

February 15, 1865.

Major General W. T. SHERMAN,

Commanding Military Division of the Mississippi:

GENERAL: General Logan advanced at 7 a.m. to-day, his First Division, Major-General Woods, leading. He came upon the enemy's a short distance from camp and skirmished with them (the rebels), driving them from different lines of rail piles till they reached the Congaree Creek. Here the enemy opened with artillery upon our advance. General Woods confronted the enemy's line with his skirmishers and first worked to the right in order to ascertain the character of the position, and to turn the enemy's left. Failing to dislodge him, I directed General Logan to develop his line farther to the (our) left. He deployed one brigade of General Woods' division about half a mile to the left of the State road, and pushed it on until the skirmish line had a mile to the left of the State road, and pushed it on until the skirmish line had waded through a large swamp and come upon the bank of the Congaree Creek. A section of De Gress' battery opened on the enemy's front just as this movement was going on the flank. The rebels gave way, crossed the bridge, set it on fire, and fired on our skirmishes with artillery and musketry from their works on the other side. Soon the skirmishers crossed the creek about half a mile north of the bridge when the enemy gave way and retreated to a new line about two miles nearer Columbia. The bridge partially burned was made passable for infantry and artillery in about ten minutes; the column commenced crossing and followed up the enemy, skirmishing most of the way. At dark General Logan placed two divisions in position on the high ground beyond the Congaree Creek. General Blair moved his command to the vicinity of Taylor's Mill. The enemy has abandoned his front, and he will repair the bridge across Congaree and be ready to cross in the morning. The casualties of to-day in General Logan's corps are 6 killed and 18 wounded. Major Perkins, picket officer of General Woods, was wounded, but not seriously. During the above operations General J. E. Smith made a diversion by threatening to cross the Congaree River at Bates' Ferry. The same vigor and boldness that have characterized our men during the hardships of this campaign were again exhibited to-day. You yourself understand the difficulties of the ground, the mud, the water, swamps, he deep creeks, and ditches that they had to overcome in order to get at the enemy.

Very respectfully,

O. O. HOWARD,

Major-General.

Just at dark on the evening of the 15th the enemy appeared to have taken up a new position, thoroughly intrenched, some two or three miles south of the Columbia bridge. During the night he fired from a battery just south of Columbia, near the city, upon General Hazen's sleeping camp, but no return shots were fired. On the morning of the 16th the works in our front were abandoned and the enemy's force had crossed the bridges and they were burned. The two corps soon concentrated opposite Columbia, and the Left Wing met us at the same point. It should be remembered that the Saluda and Broad unite just above Columbia and form the Congaree. The Congaree is very wide, and we feared that it would be difficult to bridge it safely with the material we had, particularly as the river was high and very swift. The general-in-chief directed me to cross the Saluda at the factory in position to silence those, before described, on the other side of the river, and a section was directed to fire upon some rebel troops in the