f the brigade or about 175 in all. Company E
was made the detail from the 26th and we were exempt from picket or
skirmish duty. We were required to each carry either a pick, shovel or ax
in addition to that required of each soldier. Our place was with our
regiment, but subject to call to any point, to build fortification rifle
pits or to open or repair roads. We might justly compare our industry to
that of the honey bee. During that campaign we stopped work only long
enough to take part in the fighting and some of the time were using tools
when the shell and minnie were adding impetus to our mental and muscular
skill. About the close of the Atlanta campaign Captain Clark became the
commander of the regiment and was soon afterward promoted to Lieutenant
Colonel and continued in command until mustered out with the regiment.

About September 25th Hood's flank movement around Atlanta had advanced so
that Sherman divined his intentions and ordered our division north by rail
to Chattanooga. The 26th Ohio was thrown in the lead (advance guard) on
two passenger coaches, each man with loaded gun ready for immediate
action. The division followed by freight trains in sections. On arriving
at Chattanooga we were kept on trains much of the time and moving from
place to place between Dalton and Bridgeport, many times nearly smothered
with smoke as we rode on top of the cars through the tunnel under
Missionary Ridge. After Hood moved west into Alabama we started to join
the main army west of Rome, Ga., where orders met us by which we crossed
Lookout and Sand Mountains to Stevason, Ala., where we were mustered for
pay October 31, going from there by rail to Athens, Ala., thence marched
to Pulaski, Tenn., thus placing ourselves between Hood, now at Florence,
Ala., and Nashville, Tenn. We held this position until Hood advanced via
Columbia. We moved October 21 to Lineville and to Columbia on the 23rd
formed line of battle, each flank reaching Duck River, one above the
other, below the town. This position we held, skirmishing lightly, until
the night of the 27th when we crossed to the north bank. Early in the
morning of the 29th, Thomas at Nashville ordered General Schofield (in
direct command at Columbia) to fall back to Franklin. The trains, over
eight hundred wagons, were started on the Nashville pike. When the head
of this train reached Spring Hill, eleven miles away, they were stopped by
the enemy's cavalry. Our division, General Wagne