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155 Series I Volume XLIV- Serial 92 - Savannah

Page 155 Chapter LVI. THE Savannah CAMPAIGN.

The health and condition of the men at the close of the campaign was excellent.

The following is the amount of stock captured: Horses, 165; mules, 291; total, 456.

The following is the list of casualties during the campaign: Commissioned officers wounded, 2; enlisted men killed, 5; wounded, 12.

Very respectfully, your obedient servant,

GILES A. SMITH,

Brigadier-General.

Captain C. CADLE, Jr.,

Assistant Adjutant-General, Seventeenth Army Corps.


Numbers 48. Report of Captain Henry Duncan, Fifty-third Indiana Infantry, First Brigade. HDQRS. FIFTY-THIRD INDIANA VET. VOL. INFANTRY, Savannah, Ga., January 1, 1865.

LIEUTENANT: In obedience to orders, I hereby submit the following report of the part taken by the Fifty-third Indiana Veteran Volunteer Infantry in the late campaign:

We left camp at Marietta, Ga., with the other regiments composing the First Brigade, Fourth Division, Seventeenth Army corps, on the 13th day of November, 1864, at 8 a. m., and reached Gordon, the junction of the Milledgeville and Georgia Central railroads, November 21, 1864, where, by order of Colonel B. F. Potts, the regiment performed provost guard duty. Left Gordon November 22, 1864, and reached the railroad bridge across the Oconee River November 23, 1864, about 4 p. m., where the enemy were found in position on the opposite side of the river with artillery. On the morning of the 24th I was ordered to relieve the Twenty-third Indiana at the bridge, which I did by deploying three companies as skirmishers or pickets, holding the remainder of the regiment in reserve. The pickets kept up a brisk fire during the day, and at dark were ordered to attempt the destruction of the bridge by fire, but the enemy opened such a terrific fire of canister and musketry that they were compelled to desist. The trestle-work connecting with the bridge, however, had been set on fire in several places and was partially destroyed. The casualty during the affair was one man wounded so as to make amputation of his right leg necessary. November 25, 1864, at 7 a. m., we moved, via Station Numbers 15, to the Oconee River, which was crossed on pontoons.

We arrived at the Ogeechee River December 1, 1864, which was also crossed on pontoons, and the regiment assisted in destroying railroad track. Again, on the 7th, the regiment was engaged in destroying track at Station Numbers 7, which, with a few hours' work before crossing the Oconee River, comprised all the work done on railroad, and will, in my opinion, amount to two miles of railroad destroyed by the regiment. On the 10th of December the regiment was the advance of the Seventeenth Army Corps, and encountered the enemy's pickets and drove them within their works three miles from the city. We threw up barricades about 500 yards from the rebel lines, and held them until relieved by a regiment from the Fourteenth Army Corps and moved to a position on the right. December 13, were ordered to escort a forage


Page 155 Chapter LVI. THE Savannah CAMPAIGN.