General commanding division, halted and the troops put in camp. My skirmish line, however, under direction of two officers of my staff, Captain A. E. Lee, acting assistant adjutant-General, and Captain Cyrus Hearrick, acting aide-de-camp, steadily advanced, and without hesitation and without loss drove the enemy from a commanding position from which he had charged our cavalry half an hour previously. Not content with this my skirmish line pursued the enemy and drove him through woods and open fields one mile farther, when it was, by my order, halted and withdrawn.

On the ensuing day, the 26th, my brigade resumed the march at 6. 15 a. m., following the Second Brigade, which was in advance of the division and corps. This brigade at 7 a. m. commenced skirmishing with the enemy's cavalry at the point where it had been left by my skirmishers on the evening previous. Soon afterward a detachment of rebels having been discovered observing our movements on a side road leading to our right, I was directed to send a regiment to drive them off. I immediately dispatched the One hundred and first Illinois Volunteers, Lieutenant-Colonel Le Sage. This regiment charged the enemy and drove him precipitately to the woods, capturing one prisoner, and discovering about 100 bales of cotton, which were burned, including the cotton gin. The regiment then rejoined the brigade, which had by this time resumed its march toward Sandersville. My column reached that village without any further opposition at 11 a. m. Here the trains being left in charge of the Third Division, the troops of the First Division, including my brigade, marched unencumbered toward the Georgia Central Railroad, three miles distant. My command struck the road at Tennille Station at 3. 30 p. m. and immediately began the destruction of the track. About one mile was thoroughly destroyed by my brigade by sundown. My troops were then encamped near the station. The entire distance marched on this day was nine miles. On the 27th my brigade marched in the center of the division at 7 a. m. The route from Tennille pursued a secluded, untraveled road on the south side of the railroad. The troops being unencumbered, marched rapidly and made Jackson's Church by 11 a. m. At 4. 30 p. m. my command crossed Williamson's Swamp Creek and arrived at Davisborough. Here the troops were encamped for the night, having marched about seventeen miles. At daylight the next morning, November 28, my brigade marched down the railroad track three miles and commenced its destruction. Inasmuch as the track bed for the most part ran through a difficult swamp much of it was composed of trestle-work and bridges, all of which were effectually destroyed. When the track was laid upon a road bed the rail upon one side, with the stringer attached, was unfastened by means of levers and lifted over against the rail on the other side. Rails and dry wood were then piled on top and the whole set on fire. The heat would soon spring the rails, still attached to the wooden stringers, into a variety of contortions, and the work of destruction was completed. Thus my brigade, in connection with the other brigades of the division and alternating with them, proceeded down the track, destroying mile after mile. At night-fall my command reached Spiers Turnout, and there encamped, having marched eleven miles and destroyed four miles of track during the day.

At 7 a. m. on the 29th my brigade returned about two miles up the track and completed its destruction down as far as Spiers. The station house and other railroad fixtures were then burned or otherwise effectually destroyed. At 11 a. m. my command marched singly on the wagon road from Spiers. The corps and division headquarters trains