. as possible, taking
Lieper's detachment with him; meanwhile I was ordered to keep the
remainder of my troops on the mountain in the position already
occupied. Benham was expected to reach Lieper's position by ten
o'clock that evening, but he did not reach there in fact till three
o'clock in the following afternoon (12th). [Footnote: Official
Records, vol. v. pp. 256, 273.] After some skirmishing with an
outpost of the enemy at Laurel Creek behind which Major Lieper had
been posted, nothing more was done till the evening of the 13th.
Floyd's report shows that he retired beyond Fayette C. H. on the
12th, having conceived the mistaken idea that Benham's column was a
new reinforcement of 5000 men from Ohio. [Footnote: _Id_., p. 287.]
Abandoning the hope of using Schenck's brigade in a movement from
Townsend's Ferry, Rosecrans now ordered him to march to Gauley
Bridge on the 13th, and joining Benham by a night march, assume
command of the moving column. Schenck did so, but Floyd was now
retreating upon Raleigh C. H. and a slight affair with his
rear-guard was the only result. Fayette C. H. was occupied and the
campaign ended. It would appear from official documents that Floyd
did not learn of Benham's presence at the mouth of Loup Creek till
the 12th, when he began his retreat, and that at any time during the
preceding week a single rapid march would have placed Benham's
brigade without resistance upon the line of the enemy's
communications. Rosecrans was indignant at the balking of his
elaborate plans, and ordered Benham before a court-martial for
misconduct; [Footnote: Official Records, vol. v. p. 669.] but I
believe that McClellan caused the proceedings to be quashed to avoid
scandal, and Benham was transferred to another department. It is
very improbable that Schenck's contemplated movement across New
River at Townsend's Ferry could have been made successfully; for his
boats were few and small, and the ferrying would have been slow and
tedious. Floyd would pretty surely learn of it soon after it began,
and would hasten his retreat instead of waiting to be surrounded. It
would have been better to join Schenck to Benham by a forced march
as soon as the latter was at the mouth of Loup Creek, and then to
push the whole to the Fayette and Raleigh road, Rosecrans leading
the column in person. As Floyd seems to have been ignorant of what
was going on in Loup Creek valley, decisive results might have
followed from anticipatin