ndon, to explain to him how
all-important it was that notice of our approach should reach
General Burnside within twenty-four hours, ordering him to select
the best materials of his command, to start at once, ford the
Little Tennessee, and push into Knoxville at whatever cost of life
and horse-flesh. Major Audenried was ordered to go along. The
distance to be traveled was about forty miles, and the roads
villainous. Before day they were off, and at daylight the
Fifteenth Corps was turned from Philadelphia for the Little
Tennessee at Morgantown, where my maps represented the river as
being very shallow; but it was found too deep for fording, and the
water was freezing cold--width two hundred and forty yards, depth
from two to five feet; horses could ford, but artillery and men
could not. A bridge was indispensable. General Wilson (who
accompanied me) undertook to superintend the bridge, and I am under
many obligations to him, as I was without an engineer, having sent
Captain Jenny back from Graysville to survey our field of battle.
We had our pioneers, but only such tools as axes, picks, and
spades. General Wilson, working partly with cut wood and partly
with square trestles (made of the houses of the late town of
Morgantown), progressed apace, and by dark of December 4th troops
and animals passed over the bridge, and by daybreak of the 5th the
Fifteenth Corps (General Blair's) was over, and Generals-Granger's
and Davis's divisions were ready to pass; but the diagonal bracing
was imperfect for, want of spikes, and the bridge broke, causing
delay. I had ordered General Blair to move out on the Marysville
road five miles, there to await notice that General Granger was on
a parallel road abreast of him, and in person I was at a house
where the roads parted, when a messenger rode up, bringing me a few
words from General Burnside, to the effect that Colonel Long had
arrived at Knoxville with his cavalry, and that all was well with
him there; Longstreet still lay before the place, but there were
symptoms of his speedy departure.

I felt that I had accomplished the first great step in the problem
for the relief of General Burnside's army, but still urged on the
work. As soon as the bridge was mended, all the troops moved
forward. General Howard had marched from Loudon, had found a
pretty good ford for his horses and wagons at Davis's, seven miles
below Morgantown, and had made an ingenious bridge of the wagons
left