the Western and Atlantic Railroad, being generally good, and the weather favorable, no work of any consequence was required, the Etowah being crossed on pontoons laid by the army in front. At Etowah bridge, on the 7th, I accompanied Captains Poe and Reese, chief engineer officers of the Military Division of the Mississippi and of the Department of the Tennessee, respectively, on an inspection of the evacuated rebel works at that point, in which, by order of the major-general commanding, Lieutenant-Colonel Sealy, of the Forty-fifth Illinois, with two regiments, was left in command. Having left with Colonel Sealy a sufficient supply of intrenching tools and instructions to make certain specified changes in those works, required for the protection of the pontoon bridges and the railroad bridge then being rebuilt, I, on the arrival of the corps the following morning at Allatoona, again accompanied Captains Poe and Reese on a reconnaissance, with a view of locating works for the defense of that important pass, the immediate location and execution of which I was charged with by the chief engineer of the department. Owing to heavy rains and a very limited supply of intrenching implements, and, in fact, also to want of men (there being less than 800 effective men in the three regiments stationed at or near Allatoona, and one of them, the Fourteenth Illinois, having but one commissioned officer present), three days were consumed in staking out and fairly starting the work on the five redoubts decided upon as the result of the reconnaissance referred to. Having given to Colonel Rogers, commanding the post, and the regimental commanders under him, the necessary instructions for the further prosecution of the work, I rejoined the corps and reported to the commanding general at Big Shanty Station in the evening of the 11th. On the 16th I again visited Allatoona, and returned the following day, having found the works so far advanced as to be in a defensible condition, notwithstanding the continual bad weather and the non-arrival of the intrenching tools ordered a week previous. The five redoubts are located on commanding spurs of the Allatoona Mountains, at an average distance of about 500 yards apart, with the exception of Numbers 5, which is about 1,200 yards from Numbers 4, and about one mile and a half from post headquarters. Nos. 1, 3, and 4 are surrounded by dense woods, which are being cut down and will form excellent abatis. Taken altogether they will accommodate 800 infantry and 10 field pieces. Nos. 3 and 4 have each two embrasures; the others are intended for guns en barbette, but I have directed that from fifty to eighty sand-bags be kept in readiness in each to answer contingencies.

On my return to the front in the evening of the 11th, I found the corps in line of battle, facing southeast, and intrenching along the edge of woods, about one mile and a half from Big Shanty, the right resting on the main road to Marietta and the left on another road leading in an easterly direction, both diverging from Big Shanty. A belt of mostly open land intervened between our and the rebel line of from 1,000 to 2,000 yards across, and intersected longitudinally by the Noonday Creek. Immediately in our front, extending from right to left and traversed only at two points by ravines, extended a ridge of moderate height, offering several advantageous positions for batteries, which were erected and armed during that night, and by the 15th, the day of our successful demonstration against the enemy, a second line of works, from 400 to 600 yards in