advance in the direction of the gap. Colonel Miller, commanding Second Brigade, with the Twenty-ninth Indiana and Seventy-seventh Pennsylvania Volunteers, executed the movement with precision. As soon as he had changed front to the left, I advanced with my two reserve regiments through the gap without being further resisted. After having passed Liberty Meeting-House, where we found the deserted camps of two infantry and one cavalry companies, I halted, under orders from General Johnson, and the gallant Third Brigade advanced to form picket line, in doing which it became seriously engaged-probably with the enemy's re-enforcements coming up. I concentrated my brigade at Liberty Meeting House. During the above engagement there was not much occasion for the use of artillery. At the commencement of the attack on the gap, I ordered one section, under Lieutenant Belding, into position to watch his chance. He found one in shattering the rails of a fence, behind which the enemy's skirmishers were very thick; they were scattered with the rails. When I had my brigade in bivouac, General Johnson had still some pieces of Captain Goodspeed's battery working against some pieces the enemy had brought up.

The loss of the brigade, on this day, was as follows: Commissioned officers killed, 2; wounded, 1; enlisted men killed, 9; wounded, 29.

Early in the morning of the 25th of June, I received orders to picket the front with my brigade. Major-General McCook, commanding Twentieth Army Corps, had sent information that the enemy was in certain force before us, and we should guard against surprise.

I sent the Thirty-second Indiana Volunteers to the left and the Eighty-ninth Illinois Volunteers to the right of the picket line; the first with the Fifteenth Ohio Volunteers, and the latter with the Forty-ninth Ohio Volunteers, as reserves. The line of the Thirty-second Indiana Volunteers ran across a valley, through which the road to Bellbuckle leads, up to a wooded hill, where it connected with the line of the Eighty-ninth Illinois Volunteers, which stretched from this hill to another farther to the right. I did not form the picket line as a mere line of observation, as laid down in General Butterfield's work, but a sound skirmish line, with support companies and reserves. As the result shows, a line according to General Butterfield would have been run over, or would have had the effect to call forth all our forces, but his multiplied feints, while the enemy would have had his own way for selecting time and place for his main attack. As it was, the feint attacks of the enemy, which began already in the morning, were repulsed by the picket line without alarming the camp, though the fire at times grew very brisk. The enemy advanced continually, on different points within range, with from 30 to 50 skirmishers, supported by cavalry, that kept out of the reach of our guns.

At 2 p.m. the enemy advanced with strong skirmish lines, which were driven back. He repeated his attack, bringing up lines of battle, even columns, and planting one battery in front of our left and two small pieces in the center, but was not able to break our picket line, which was re-enforced by our support companies, who charged repeatedly against the forward pressing lines of the enemy, and drove him as often as he advanced.

At about 3 o'clock, the ammunition of the Thirty-second Indiana Volunteers and Eighty-ninth Illinois Volunteers began to give out; then the Fifteenth Ohio Volunteers was ordered to advance to their support, into the front line. The men of the Fifteenth Ohio Volunteers divided their ammunition with those of the Thirty-second Indiana Volunteers and Eighty-ninth Illinois Volunteers. This, with the am-