ward the brigade with great promptness and efficiency on all occasions. Not to be invidious, I think Major William S. Oliver, commanding the Seventh Missouri Volunteers, and Captain Edwin Wakefield, acting major, are worthy of special mention for their zeal and efficiency.

On my own staff, Captain Herman Lieb, Eighth Illinois Infantry, made on the march acting assistant adjutant-general for the division, and Lieutenant F. Whitehead are deserving of special mention for their individual efforts in pushing forward our skirmishers on each occasion where we encountered the enemy.

To the enlisted men of the command all praise is due for their subordination, perseverance, endurance, and soldierly conduct, making an unprecedented advance in the rear of a desperate and determined enemy without rest or supplies.

I must call your attention to a spacial instance of meritorious conduct upon the part of Sergeant Aldrich and a private of Company I, Seventh Missouri Infantry. Being in advance, they were captured near Ripley and taken by the enemy in their retreating column for 17 miles, when, boldly attacking the guard, they took his arms and came back to the command, capturing a rebel captain on their return.

All of which is respectfully submitted.

JOHN D. STEVENSON,

Colonel, Commanding Irish Brigade, General McPherson's Division.

Captain H. LIEB,

Acting Assistant Adjutant-General.

Numbers 103.

Report of Colonel Michael K. Lawler, Eighteenth Illinois Infantry, commanding Second Brigade, of operations October 3-12.

HDQRS. SECOND BRIGADE, ADVANCE DIVISION,
Corinth, Miss., October 12, 1862.

SIR: In obedience to instructions received from Headquarters Advance Division, of date October 9, 1862, I have the honor to report that I left Bethel, Tenn., under orders, at 4 p. m. of Friday, 3rd instant, with seven companies of the Twenty-ninth Regiment Illinois Volunteers, under command of Major Callicott (three companies of said regiment having been sent down the Mobile and Ohio Railroad to guard bridges, under Major Mayfield, of the Forty-eighth Regiment Illinois Volunteers, who was specially detailed for that purpose); five companies of the Thirty-first Regiment Illinois Volunteers, under command of Colonel Ozburn (the other five having likewise been sent down the Mobile and Ohio Railroad to guard bridges, under command of Lieutenant-Colonel McCook), and one company of the First Regiment West Tennessee Cavalry, under Colonel Fielding Hurst. I took with me Lieutenant W. Bedford, adjutant Forty-eighth Regiment Illinois Volunteers, and Lieutenant J. S. Hoover, Thirty-first Regiment Illinois Volunteers, the former to act as assistant adjutant-general and the latter as aide-de-camp. At Phar's Mill, some 4 miles south of Bethel, I was joined by Lieutenant-Colonel McCoolk and Major Mayfield, with their respective commands, and proceeded toward Chambers', a point on the railroad some 17 miles south of Bethel, to which place I had been ordered to drive away from there the enemy's cavalry. At Walker's, a point near the railroad 9 miles south of Bethel, I halted and encamped for the night. At this