terrific peals of thunder seemed
to the men the presage of deadly work to come. The advance was very
difficult, the woods being marshy and filled with tangles and briars.
The men were scratched and bleeding. The long line of battle presently
emerged from the woods and occupied a clearing, in the center of which
was a mansion, the late residence of a rebel officer. Some scouts
brought from the house a couple of negresses whom they led to General
Keyes. They communicated their information with an earnestness that
proved their sympathies were not with their late master. It was a
picturesque scene; those tall negresses with their bright red turbans
and long white woolen gowns, telling with earnest gestures what they
knew of the position of the enemy, while the generals and their staffs
listened eagerly to their words. They said that when we passed over the
little hill just in front, we should be under fire from the batteries of
the rebels, who were in large force; "but laws a massa, noting like all
dese yer," said they, pointing to the troops of our division.

Cautiously the clearing was crossed, the long line of battle moving in
beautiful order--Kennedy's, Ayres' and Wheeler's batteries each
accompanying a brigade.

Again we entered a heavy pine wood in which the swamp was deeper than
ever, and advancing through it we came face to face with the enemy.
Warwick creek, a marshy stream which had been dammed by the rebels,
raising its waters into ponds and deep morasses, was between us and
their works, and the accessible points were guarded by artillery. Two
regiments were at once deployed as skirmishers and sent in advance, and
our batteries were planted along the edge of the wood with the line of
the infantry. Only Smith's division was in line, the others were waiting
on the road for orders to come up.

Along the road, for more than half the distance back to Young's Mills,
the brigades of Couch's and Kearney's divisions were resting on their
arms, while cannon by scores waited to be called into action.

The enemy was not slow to acknowledge our presence, and as a token of
greeting sent some twelve-pound shells crashing among the trees about
us. The firing now became brisk on our side, and the rebels replied
spiritedly with their twelve-pounders. Hundreds of men were now called
up from the rear brigades and detailed to build corduroy roads. Trees
were cut down and trimmed of their branches, and laid side by side so as
to