a range to make our fire very effective. Occasionally we replied to a rifled battery on the opposite side of the river, but, under the orders we had received, we were obliged to husband our ammunition carefully, and engaged as little as possible with the artillery of the enemy. Several men were killed and wounded in the batteries near us, but we escaped without other loss than 1 man wounded and 2 horses.

On the next day I was ordered again to report to General Cleburne, and did so. I had asked to be relieved from duty as acting chief of artillery of our division before the engagement of the 31st, and Major Hotchkiss had bee appointed to act in my place, but, as he was wounded, General Cleburne again ordered me to act in that capacity.

On Friday, the 2nd, I was ordered by General Bragg to send two sections of the battery to report to him at a point on the Nashville pike near the river. I accordingly sent two sections, with First Lieutenant Fitzpatrick and Second Lieutenant Pollard, and they were put in position on the ground on our extreme right about 4 p.m., from which the enemy had just been driven by the attack of Hanson's, Preston's, and Adam's brigades. Lieutenant Fitzpatrick, who is now quite unwell, will soon make to you a report of the part taken by the two sections in that fierce and bloody conflict. Our infantry were finally driven back in great confusion, and all the cannoneers, but two, and two of the drivers of one of the pieces being shot down, and three of the horses from the limber, including both the wheel horses, our infantry finding them fleeing in rear of the piece, and the enemy rapidly advancing at not more then 150 yards, the last round of ammunition having been fired from it, the piece was left on the field, and, together with two guns of Wright's battery, in position near it, fell into their hands.

There were only 45 men, including the officers, drivers, and cannoneers, on the field, of whom 20, together with 14 horses, were killed or wounded in the space of thirty minutes.

The killed* and wounded were: Killed - privates,1. Wounded - commissioned officer, 1; non-commissioned officers, 4; privates, 14. Total 20.

Respectfully,

HENRY C. SEMPLE,

Captain, Comdg. Light Artillery, Wood's Brigade.

Brigadier-General [S. A. M.] WOOD.

TULLAHOMA, TENN., January 23, 1863.

SIR: My battery of six 12-pounder Napoleon guns was ordered to report to Major [R. E.] Graves, chief of artillery of General Breckinridge's division, and I requested to be relieved of the temporary appointment of chief of artillery of your staff in order that I might be with it.

On December 30, [1862,] we were put in position on an eminence just in front of General Hanson's brigade, but during the night I was ordered to examine the ground in front of the left of our right wing, and to attend at the construction of an earthwork with two faces in the field near the river, and somewhat to the left and in rear of another earthwork, in which Cobb's battery and a part of the whole of Lumsden's rifle battery were then in position. We went to our position about daylight, and early in the morning a section of my battery, under Lieutenant Pollard, was withdrawn and sent to another part of the field, by order of Major Graves. Although we were frequently under fire of the

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*Nominal list omitted.

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