atham's order had to be
repeated. When the second order reached Bate he was still loitering
where he had encountered the 26th Ohio. He had wasted more than an hour
of precious time in doing nothing, for he had not only disobeyed Hood's
order to sweep down the pike, but he had not even made a lodgement on
the pike. It was then about 6:30 o'clock, after dark, and Ruger's
advance was just coming along. First leaving orders for the other
divisions to follow after dark, about 4:30 o'clock, Schofield had
started with Ruger to reinforce Stanley. Ruger skirmished with Bate at
the place and time indicated, but as Bate was off to the east side,
instead of astride the pike, where, by Hood's order he should have been,
Ruger had no difficulty in pushing past Bate. Granbury's brigade was
still lying behind the fence, close to the pike, and after passing Bate,
Ruger had to run the gantlet of Granbury's line. Granbury had been
notified that Bate was coming from the left, and hearing Ruger marching
along the pike in the darkness, he mistook him for Bate, so that
Schofield himself, with Ruger, rode along right under the muzzles of the
muskets of Granbury's line, in blissful ignorance of the danger they
were passing. Captain English, Granbury's assistant adjutant-general,
advanced towards the pike to investigate, but was captured by the
flankers covering the march of Ruger's column, belonging to the 23d
Michigan. Elias Bartlett of the 36th Illinois, was on picket on the pike
at the bridge across the creek a half mile south of Spring Hill, and he
informed me that when Schofield came to his post he began eagerly to
inquire what had happened, saying that he had feared everything at
Spring Hill had been captured; that while they were talking, a
Confederate picket, near enough to hear the sound of their voices, fired
on them, and Schofield then rode on. A little later Bate came up through
the fields, Granbury fell back from the fence and Cleburne and Bate then
connected and adjusted a new line with Bate's left brigade refused so as
to face the pike and all the rest of their line running across the
country away from the pike.

Bate had utterly failed to grasp the significance of Ruger's passage,
claiming that his flank was in danger, and his representations to that
effect were so urgent that Johnson's division was brought up between 9
and 10 o'clock and posted on Bate's left, Johnson's line and the line of
Bate's refused brigade paralleling the