to occupy with the Army of the Ohio to intercept the rebel army in its movement, the Army of the Ohio moving from Perryville?

I should have posted it at Stanford, or even in advance at Lancaster would have been better; but I regard that as an impossibility. I think it would have been possible to have intercepted it and cut it off had the Army of the Ohio been posted at Stanford or 2 miles in advance to the east, where there is some water.

Question. Could it not still have crossed over from the Lancaster to the Richmond and Cumberland Gap road?

It could. I do not know what communications there are between these roads or what means there are of getting on this road from Stanford; my recollection is that there is a country road only. Supposing there is a good road from Stanford to Big Hill or some point above it, I think the distance the two armies would have had to march about that time would have been about equal, and a battle must have ensued for the road. If, however, there is no communication such as an army could move on, the rebel army retreating directly on the pike would be safe. I doubt however, if the Army of the Ohio had been at Stanford or in advance of it whether Bragg would have attempted to retreat in that direction.

Question. Supposing the Army of the Ohio had taken a position at Stamford, so as to intercept the rebel army in its retreat through Landcaster and thence on to Crab Orchard and so on to Cumberland Gap, what would it still be at the opinion of the rebel army to do?

Cut off its communications and isolate it from its base.

Question. Could it also have retreated by the route through Central Kentucky and on the Lexington and Richmond road?

Yes, sir. The routes were still open.

Question. Have you had occasion in your official position to study the problem of throwing a force into East Tennessee from Central Kentucky?

Yes, sir. It is a matter to which I have given a good deal of study and reflection and abandoned it as impracticable.

Question. In the course of your investigations what have you learned to be the character of the country and its agricultural resources between Somerset and East Tennessee directly across the mountains?

The character of the country is altogether mountainous.

By General TYLER:

Question. Do you speak from personal observation?

No, sir.

Question. You have no personal knowledge?

No, sir. I speak from such information as I have obtained from officers who have been there and citizens who have resided there and from such facts as I gather from the geographical maps furnished us by the War Department. I have not explored or reconnoitered it in person. I learn the nature of the country to be altogether mountainous, rugged, broken, and generally, producing but little. My knowledge of the roads is that they are almost impracticable for an army, and altogether so for four or five months of the year, owing to the high water of the Cumberland and its tributaries and to the soft, miry, clayey soil. I had occasion to examine it and study it very closely, as it was General Wright's wish to push in a force of some 15,000 men after the cavalry raid was made, in case the winter was open and it was found possible. General Carter (after his return from East Tennessee), Major-General Wright, and myself examined the subject with great care, and without a dissenting voice the project was abandoned as not being feasible. The reasons were that it was impossible, even if we could reach there with a force, to subsist it, and it was deemed very hazardous to place it on the other side of the Tennessee and Kentucky Rivers at that season of the year, when those streams were swollen. I do not think there are any pikes between, say, the point in Tennessee about Clinton (I think this is the first point at which we strike anything like a pike, and that, I am told, is only a dirt road thrown up and drained on either side) from Somerset, Barboursville,