ment by way of Cincinnati to Catlettsburg, Kentucky, a
town at the junction of the Big Sandy and the Ohio, and was enabled to
report to his commander on the 19th of December.

Then, for the first time, he learned what was the nature of the duty
that was assigned to him. It was no less than to save Kentucky to the
Union. A border State, with an interest in slavery, public opinion was
divided, and it was uncertain to which side it would incline. The
Confederates understood the value of the prize, and they had taken
measures, which promised to be successful, to wrest it from the Union.
The task had been committed to Gen. Humphrey Marshall, who had invaded
Eastern Kentucky from the Virginia border, and had already advanced as
far north as Prestonburg.

Gen. Marshall fortified a strong natural position near Paintville, and
overran the whole Piedmont region. This region contained few slaves--but
one in twenty-five of the whole population. It was inhabited by a brave
rural population, more closely resembling their Northern than their
Southern neighbors. Among these people Marshall sent stump orators to
fire them with enthusiasm for the Confederate cause. Such men would make
valuable soldiers and must be won over if possible.

So all that portion of the State was in a ferment. It looked as if it
would be lost to the Union. Marshall was daily increasing the number of
his forces, preparing either to intercept Buell, and prevent his advance
into Tennessee, or, cutting off his communications, with the assistance
of Beauregard, to crush him between them.

To Colonel Garfield, an inexperienced civilian, who had only studied
military tactics by the aid of wooden blocks, and who had never been
under fire, it was proposed to meet Marshall, a trained soldier, to
check his advance, and drive him from the State. This would have been
formidable enough if he had been provided with an equal number of
soldiers; but this was far from being the case. He had but twenty-five
hundred men to aid him in his difficult work, and of these eleven
hundred, under Colonel Craven, were a hundred miles away, at Paris,
Kentucky, and this hundred miles was no level plain, but a rough,
mountainous country, infested with guerrillas and occupied by a disloyal
people.

Of course, the first thing to be done was to connect with Colonel
Craven, but, considering the distance and the nature of the country to
be traversed, it was a most difficult problem. The chance