were suffering for, he suddenly threw the wight of half his army upon the one corps, drove it back a mile, killing 918 men and wounding some 5,000.

There are circumstances attending this brief but bloody engagement which baffle comprehension. General Buell, who had approached Perryville conscious of the presence there of the enemy in force, retired to headquarters, 2 1/2 miles in the rear of his left wing, and, surrounded by a large and well-organized staff, was ignorant of the struggle until too late to render aid, although he heard the furious cannonade that gave token of a combat about 2 o'clock, pronouncing it a waste of ammunition and demanding that it should stop, took no steps, either through the signal corps then in operation or by his staff, to investigate the cause, or,if necessary, to apply a remedy.

What a golden opportunity to annihilate the rebel army then presented itself we now learn. Had the right wing of our army been swung around, the rebel force would have been captured or destroyed. General Mitchell, without orders, marched his brigade through Perryville, and, coming in the rear of the rebels, then attacking McCook's corps, actually took prisoners and captured the ammunition train of the battery playing upon the left wing. All this while Gilber's corps remained idle spectators of the unequal contest, and not only failed to tender re-enforcements, but when such aid was solicited by subordinate officers and men positively refused.

At 4.30 General Buell learned of the battle and sent an aide to General Thomas ordering the forces under his command to re-enforce McCook. The aide lost two hours in the search of General Thomas, who was found at the front after night when the battle had ceased.

This blow seems to have paralyzed the Army of the Ohio. No further effort was made to find and attack the enemy from the 8th till the 12th. No advance was even ordered, for an army of 70,000 men that is confined in its maneuvers to a space of 10 miles cannot be said to advance. In the mean time the rebels retreated through Harrodsburg past our forces to Camp Dick Robinson. This was a third time a march of this kind was successful. A pursuit was then ordered that resulted in nothing.

After the fight before Perryville had our army been pushed through Danville to Camp Dick Robinson the retreat of Bragg and Smith would have been intercepted. The defense claims that other roads were open to them on which to escape. It is a singular fact that in the opinion of defense a road is always open to the rebels, who need no transportation and are not dependent upon the ordinary laws of subsistence; while to us there seems to be but one road, and that is through disaster to our base.

The fact is the route through Camp Dick Robinson to Cumberland Gap was the only available one to Bragg. On this their supplies were collected, and from the nature of the country at Crab Orchard the pursuit would have to cease. Had Bragg been forced back to the country for supplies, the move must have been fatal to him. already disheartened by the reception given them by the people of the State, had he been forced to open plunder of that people for support the effect in both a political and military point of view must have been disastrous. But as the road into Kentucky had been strangely left open to him, so was the road out of Kentucky made easy.