which Colonel Ruff's command (Wofford's brigade) was passing assembling by regiments for the assault. I have since heard that the enemy were informed, and that during the night of the 28th they had been employed in pouring buckets of water over the parapets to render it difficult to ascend, the night being very cold. The commands being in position and in readiness, and the sharpshooters having been directed to open fire all along their lines as soon as it was light enough to aim, I distributed my staff officers along the line, and rode over to Major Leyden awaiting until it was light enough to see his elevators, and Kershaw's line ready, I gave Major Leyden orders to open fire while I was there and rode toward the assaulting columns. As I went they could be seen advancing in fine style. I rode straight to Wofford's brigade, on the left, and as I approached the work found the parapet, and that the brigade commander (Colonel Ruff) and his next in command (Colonel Thomas) had been killed and the next in command wounded. I rallied the brigade about 400 yards from the work, reformed the regiments in the order they went to the assault, notified them who was their brigade commander, and the regiments who commanded them, and then consulting with General Humphreys and Bryan; and finding it was useless to attempt to take the work, I reported to General Longstreet, and asked authority to withdraw my command. Permission was given and the main body was withdrawn, but the advanced line of pits was still held by sharpshooters. When it was seen that Wofford's brigade could not mount the parapet, General G. T. Anderson's brigade, of Hood's division, came rushing to the assault in the same place where my command had attempted it, but was repulsed at once and retired.

I will remark here that I saw no panic among either officers or men, and I am assured by the different commanders that there was none; but, on the contrary, there was evidence of mortification only at their failure to take the work. The companies and regiments reformed readily within a short distance of the work and awaited orders. Concerning the assault, I am satisfied-

1. That my line of sharpshooters was advanced to within easy range of the enemy's works, and that their fire was most efficient along the entire line; that they prevented the enemy from using their cannon upon the assaulting columns, and that but few men were shot by musketry even in front of my line, and many of those by the enemy holding their guns over their heads and firing without aim; that most of the men were killed by a fire from the left of my line, over which I had no control, and that if I had had straw wherewith to fill up the ditch, as General Longstreet testified he expected me to have, it would have been set on fire by the hand grenades thrown over the parapet by the enemy, and my wounded in the ditch, would have been burned to death.

2. That the heads of my assaulting column did all that men could do to enter the work, showing that, in selecting bodies of men to lead in the assault who were already organized and distinguished for their gallantry and dash, I had acted more prudently than would have been the case had I called for volunteers and organized them into companies and battalions and appointed officers for the occasion over men with whom they were not acquainted and to whom they would not perhaps be known.