manding division, and upon my representing the condition of things to him he directed me to change direction to the right. I represented to him that the ground was covered with troops lying down, and was again peremptorily ordered to move forward. I immediately put the regiment in motion, changed front to the right, then leaving the brigade and advanced up the hill, passing over several lines of men lying down, the left of the regiment getting entangled with troops moving in other directions and separated from the balance of the regiment. As the regiment reached the top of the hill and began to descend on the other side we received the fire of the enemy, and at that point a regiment of some other command (the Nineteenth Michigan, as I learn), which was within a few yards following us, as they received the enemy's fire, opened fire directly in our backs, severely wounding numbers of my men. I moved the regiment forward as rapidly as possible out of their fire and advanced down the slope across the main road, and in an open field of some 200 [yards] in width, overtaking and mingling with a confused line representing several regiments of the Third Division, Twentieth Army Corps, and advanced with them at a run, taking the front line, receiving as we passed across the road and field a terrible fire of grape and canister from guns on the summit of a hill toward which we were moving. The regiment pressed steadily and rapidly forward into woods and up the hill (receiving all the time the fire of the guns and the infantry of the enemy) up to and over the enemy's guns driving them before us out of a redoubt on the summit of the hill and into a line of breast-works some 100 yards beyond and nearly reaching the breast-works, when, having passed forward far beyond our line, we received an enfilading fire of musketry from our left. We then fell back to the crest of the hill and front of the redoubt and laid down. We found the redoubt occupied by four brass 12-pounder guns, two of them pointing to our right and two to our left. The regiment took position as follows: The colors planted in the earth thrown u[p to from the redoubt the guns pointing to the right, the right wing running diagonally to the right and front along the crest of the hill, the portion of the left wing which remained with the regiment extending to the left and rear in a ravine. We held our position, keeping the enemy from tho guns, but not being able to move them ourselves. We were impeded and hindered in all our operations by the great number of men of other commands, several times as many as could be of any service, and all totally disorganized and nuder no command. Some twenty minutes or half an hour after we had taken this position the One hundred and eleventh Pennsylvania Volunteers, Colonel Cobham, came forward and took position at our left, having one company of the regiment, which he had picked up on the route, his right overlapping and in front of my left. Upon his arrival the fire upon us from the left almost entirely ceased, and we held our position with ease. Soon after taking position, finding my regiment detached from brigade, I reported our position and the condition of things, and was directed to remain there. There was slight firing along the line, but no strong attack on either side during the afternoon and evening until after the regiment was withdrawn, except a slight flurry about dusk, when nearly everything in our vicinity, except my command, which steadily maintained its position, retired to the foot of the hill. About 9 p. m., by direction of

20 R R-VOL XXXVIII, PT II