is not destroyed, but slightly damaged. The enemy have works on the other side, and opened with guns and musketry. Colonel Proudfit distinguished three embrasures, but thinks six guns were used. Negroes report the force from 300 to 3,000. No one was hurt. A mounted man brought in a private of the First Tennessee Cavalry (rebel); he reports that he belongs to Ashby's brigade of four Tennessee cavalry regiments; that the brigade left Wheeler's command and crossed into South Carolina on the 7th of December; have since been doing duty near Grahamville; the command left that point yesterday to go, he does now know where, but their course brought them about four miles this point, out from the railroad.

I am, captain, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

M. F. FORCE,

Brigadier-General.

Captain C. CADLE, Jr.,

Assistant Adjutant-General.

HDQRS. THIRD DIVISION, SEVENTEENTH ARMY CORPS,
River's Bridge, S. C., February 3, 1865.

CAPTAIN: I have the honor to report that, receiving orders yesterday morning to march to Angley's Post-Office and there await orders, I took the road to the left of Whippy Swamp and crossed several minor swamps, besides Corkers, the most formidable we had yet encountered. White getting the wagons through this I sent Captain Munson forward with Captain King's mounted Twentieth Illinois, who pushed the rebel cavalry back to and over the bridge across Whippy Swamp at Barker's Mill, nineteen miles from our previous camp. When the greater part of the train was over I rode forward to the bridge, ordering the advance guard to follow with all the speed they could make, left two regiments (Twelfth Wisconsin and Forty-fifth Illinois) to bring on the rest of the train, and directed the division to move forward with all practicable dispatch. I found the Twentieth Illinois covering with their fire the bridge which the enemy had not time to destroy. The advance guard coming up, was deployed as sharpshooters under cover along the stream above and below the bridge. When the Second Brigade, Colonel Wiles, came up a line was ordered to cross the stream by wading, but the men were soon up to their necks, and the stream was found to be not fordable. I placed two guns of the Fifteenth Ohio Battery, Lieutenant L. Bailey, on a rise of ground near the bridge, where they could fire over the heads of the infantry, and though it was now quite dark and the enemy appeared in some force on the farther side, partly on a rise and partly in a grove, a small column under cover of the sharpshooters and the two guns dashed across the bridge, followed closely by the Second Brigade, and the rebels fled, leaving some rations and camp equipage in their bivouac in the woods. As it was now night, and no one in the country had heard of Angley's Post-Office, though the maps showed it to be near, and as I knew the Fifteenth Corps were to cross this brigade, and the rebel cavalry were in my rear on one road as well as in front I went into camp, placing one brigade on each side of the stream. An officer of General Howard's staff arriving in the night told me this was correct, the object of the detour being to secure the bridge for the Fifteenth Corps. Marching to this place to-day, in obedience to orders received in the night, I left one regiment to hold