Numbers 6. Report of Colonel Felix Prince Salm, Sixty-eight New York Infantry, commanding Reserve Brigade, District of the Etowah.

HDQRS. U. S. FORCES, Bridgeport, Ala., January 17, 1865.

CAPTAIN: I have the honor to submit the following report:

On the 6th instant I received the order to report to you for transportation at lighten, Ala. I started immediately for Decatur, Ala., which I reached on the 7th instant, having camped the night previous near Courtland, Ala. On the 8th my brigade was shipped on the cars, with exception of the Sixty-eight Regiment Indiana Volunteers, ordered as a guard with General J. B. Steedman's train, with orders to return to Bridgeport. At Larkinsville, Ala., the Reserve Brigade was unloaded, and marched early on the 9th instant to join Colonel J. G. Mitchell's brigade on their march toward Larkin's Landing, on the Tennessee River, leaving the Eighteenth Regiment Ohio Veteran Volunteers at Larkinsville, Ala. After a long march in bad, rainy weather, through mud water, we reached Colonel Mitchell early on the 10th, at Pendergrass' house, on the Gunter's Landing road. The joined brigades proceeded to Claysville, Ala. There I received the order to march forthwith to Deposit in pursuit of a force of rebel cavalry that had taken to the woods and mountains in that direction. Very soon the trail of 200 or 300 cavalry was found. I followed the same on the Deposit road up to a cross-road near Mrs. Johnson's house, where the larger part of the force took the road to Paint Rock, small parties following the Deposit and Woodville road. According to order i too the Deposit road after having followed the trail on the Paint Rock road for a while as long as daylight permitted to distinguish it.

I reached Deposit at daybreak 11th instant. No other sings of the enemy were found, and the inhabitants on the road assured me unanimously, and the had left in the direction of Paint Rock Creek, being unable to cross the river. I entered in communication with the gunboats General Grant and General Thomas about 10 a. m., when you arrived with the general's order to proceed immediately to paint Rock and the railroad, striking the latter at Woodville, in order to cut off or capture some of the enemy's force scattered in the Paint Rock Mountains. I marched without delay and reached late int he evening Thomas Manning's house, in the vicinity of which I bivouacked, and resumed the march toward Woodville at daybreak 12th instant. About a mile from Manning's, at Cochran's house, I found three rebel soldier, who skedaddle toward the mountains, joining a larger party of about 100. The whole took to flight, heavily pressed by a squad of our cavalry under your command. A number of shots were fired without effect, and one of the rebels-Davidson, Colonel Turner's regiment of mounted rifles-whose hours was wounded, taken prisoner and forwarded to Chattanooga, Tenn. C. H. Cochran, a number of Company E, Thirty first Regiment Tennessee Volunteers, the son of the proprietor of the farm where the rebels found refuge, was also arrested and sent to the same place.

I reached Woodville the same evening without further incident, too the cars to Bridgeport, Ala., where I did arrive on the 13th at 4 a. m.

FELIX PR. SALM,
Colonel Sixty-eight Regiment New York Veteran Vols.,

Commanding Reserve Brigade, District of the Etowah.

Captain JOHN A. WRIGHT. Asst. Adjt. General, Chattanooga, Tenn.

51 R R-VOL XLV, PT I