8 A.M. and took command of
Hurlburt's forces. The movement had hardly commenced when strong
resistance was met with. Ord pushed the enemy back for about three
miles with General Veatch's brigade, taking a ridge--Metamora--about
one mile from the Hatchie. Here a severe battle ensued, the enemy
was driven from the field across the bridge, and a portion of Ord's
command gained a position just east of the river, though not without
much loss. Ord was himself wounded at the bridge, and the command
again devolved on Hurlburt. The latter soon thereafter secured a
permanent lodgement on the east of the Hatchie, thus effectively
stopping the retreat of Van Dorn by that route and forcing him to
fall back and find another less desirable one. Under cover of
night Van Dorn retreated upon another road to the southward, and
crossed the Hatchie at Crum's Mill, six miles farther up the
river.(13)

The success of Ord and Hurlburt was so complete that Grant believed
Van Dorn's army should have been destroyed.(14)

Rosecrans did not move from Corinth until the morning of the 5th
of October, and then not fast or far enough to overtake Van Dorn
in the throes of battle with Ord and Hurlburt or in time to cut
off his retreat by another route. Rosecrans gave as an excuse the
exhausted condition of his troops after the battle of the 4th. At
2 P.M., the last day of the battle, he was certain the enemy had
decided to retreat, yet he directed the victorious troops to proceed
to their camps, provide five days' rations, take food and rest,
and be ready to move early the next morning.(15) McPherson, having
arrived with a fresh brigade, could have been at once pushed upon
the rear of Van Dorn's exhausted troops. Rosecrans' army went into
camp again in the afternoon of the 5th, while Ord and Hurlburt were
fighting their battle. Although the pursuit was resumed by Rosecrans
on the 6th, and thereafter continued to Ripley, it was after the
flying enemy had passed beyond reach. But while it is possible
that Rosecrans could have done better, it is certain that he and
his troops did well; Van Dorn's diversion in favor of Bragg's grand,
central invasion, at any rate, failed amid disaster.

But we must return to Bragg and Buell, the principal actors in the
march to Kentucky.

Bragg's army commenced to cross the Tennessee at Chattanooga August
26, 1862, and immediately set out to the northward, his cavalry,
under Wheeler, keeping well towards t