the lack of method and the apparently inextricable
confusion of these camps, their inmates could be gotten under arms and
formed in line of battle, with a celerity that would have appeared
marvelous to the uninitiated.

Colonel Chenault was ordered, in the latter part of January, to Clinton
county, Kentucky, to picket against a dash of the enemy from that
direction. On the 23rd of January, Colonel Breckinridge was ordered to
move to Liberty, eleven miles from Smithville and about thirty from
McMinnville, with three regiments--the Third Kentucky, under Lieutenant
Colonel Huffman, the Ninth Kentucky, under Lieutenant Colonel Stoner,
and the Ninth Tennessee, under Colonel Ward, who had come to the command
of it after Colonel Bennett's death, Colonel Adam R. Johnson was already
in the vicinity of that place with his regiment, the Tenth Kentucky.
Captain Quirk preceded these regiments with his company, and shortly
after his arrival at Liberty and before he could be supported, he, was
driven away by the enemy. He returned next morning, the enemy having
retreated. The three regiments, under Colonel Breckinridge, occupied the
country immediately in front of Liberty, picketing all of the roads
thoroughly. The enemy were in the habit of sending out strong foraging
parties from Readyville toward Woodbury, and frequent skirmishes
occurred between them and Hutchinson's scouts.

Upon one occasion, Hutchinson, with less than one hundred men, attacked
one of these parties, defeating it with smart loss, and taking nearly
two hundred prisoners and forty or fifty wagons. For this he was
complimented in general orders from army headquarters. It led, however,
in all probability, to disastrous consequences, by inducing the enemy to
employ many more troops in that quarter than he would otherwise have
sent there. This affair occurred a short time previously to the
occupation of Liberty by the force under Colonel Breckinridge, and a
much brisker condition of affairs began to prevail all along the line.
Rosecrans was determined to make his superior numbers tell, at least, in
the immediate vicinity of his army. He inaugurated a system, about this
time, which resulted in the decided improvement of his cavalry. He would
send out a body of cavalry, stronger than any thing it was likely to
encounter, and that it might never be demoralized by a complete
whipping, he would back it by an infantry force, never far in the rear,
and always ready to finish