irection
of the movement.

Having given these orders, Banks embarked on one of the river
steamboats on the evening of the 15th and transferred his headquarters
to Simmes's plantation on the east bank of the Atchafalaya opposite
Simmesport. Thence he proceeded down the Atchafalaya to Brashear,
and so by rail to New Orleans.

Grover broke camp at Stafford's plantation on the 14th of May, and
marched seventeen miles to Cheneyville; on the 15th, fourteen miles
to Enterprise; on the 16th, sixteen miles to the Bayou de Glaise;
and, on the morning of the 17th, twelve miles to Simmesport, and
immediately began to cross on large flatboats rowed by negro boatmen.
To these were presently added a little, old, slow, and very frail
stern-wheel steamboat, named the _Bee_, which, a short time
afterwards, quietly turned upside down, without any observable
cause, while lying alongside the levee; then the _Laurel Hill_,
one of the best boats in the service of the quartermaster; afterward
gradually but very slowly the other steamers began to come in.
Grover finished crossing on the morning of the 18th, and went into
camp near the Corps headquarters.

Paine, with the 6th New York added to his command for the few
remaining days of its service, followed in the footsteps of Grover.
Leaving Alexandria on the morning of the 15th, Paine marched twenty
miles and halted at Lecompte. On the 16th, he marched twenty-five
miles to the Bayou Rouge; on the 17th, twenty miles to the Bayou
de Glaise, where the Marksville road crosses it; on the 18th, seven
miles to Simmesport, and on the following morning began to cross.

Before leaving Alexandria, Weitzel, on the 14th May, sent two
companies of cavalry to reconnoitre a small force of the enemy said
to be near Boyce's Bridge on Bayou Cotile. The Confederates were
found in some force. A slight skirmish followed, with trifling
loss on either side, and when, the next day, Weitzel sent the main
body of the cavalry with one piece of Nims's battery, accompanied
by the ram _Switzerland_ with a detachment of 200 men of the 75th
New York, the Confederates once more retired beyond Cane River.

Weitzel moved out of Alexandria at four o'clock on the morning of
the 17th of May, and, lengthening his march to thirty-eight miles
during the night, encamped on Murdock's plantation on the following
morning. The gunboats _Estrella_ and _Arizona_ and the ram
_Switzerland_ stayed in the river off Alexandria until no