st week or two was most depressing. On
account, probably, of the bad weather and exposure, the soldiers' worst
enemy, diarrhoea, took possession of our camps, and for a week or ten
days we literally had no stomachs for fighting. But after a little the
rain let up, the sun came out warm, our spirits revived, the roads, and
consequently the supplies improved; and on the whole, we thought it
rather jolly.

If you had been there of a warm, sunny day you would have noticed every
log and stump serving as a seat for a soldier, who had taken off his
shirt and was diligently hunting it all over. It was not safe to ask
him what he was looking for.

Troops were continually arriving, some of them freshly recruited, and
not yet familiar with their arms, or the simplest elements of
regimental maneuvers. It was said there were some regiments who had
just received their guns, and had never fired them. Badeau says they
came on the field without cartridges. I know that improved rifles were
scarce, for my own regiment at that time did not have rifles, but old
smooth bore muskets with buck-and-ball ammunition--that is, the
cartridge had next to the powder a large ball, and then next to it
three buck shot. Of course, we should have had no show against rifles
at long range, but at short range, in woods and brush, these weapons
were fearfully destructive, as we shall presently see.

Strange to say, these freshly recruited regiments were assigned to
Sherman's division and to Prentiss' division, whose camps were
scattered in the woods farthest out towards Corinth. As might have been
expected, these new soldiers did not stand on the order of their going,
when they suddenly discovered a hostile army on top of them.

A map of the place selected for the concentration of our army shows
that with proper precautions and such defensive works as, later in the
war, would have been constructed within a few hours, the place was
impregnable. The river which ran in the rear was controlled by our
gunboats, and furnished us the means of obtaining abundant supplies.
Creeks with marshy banks protected either flank. The only possible
avenue of attack upon this position was directly in front, and across
that ran little creeks and ravines, with here and there open fields
affording fine vantage-ground. A general anticipating the possibility
of attack, would not have scattered his divisions so widely, and would
have marked a line of defense upon which the troops