ed by it were grander and more important,
the conception of the plan which should regulate it, was more masterly,
and the skill with which it was conducted is unparalleled in the history
of such affairs. It was no ride across a country stripped of troops,
with a force larger than any it should chance to encounter.

It was not an expedition started from a point impregnably garrisoned, to
dash by a well marked path to another point occupied by a friendly army.
It differed from even the boldest of Confederate raids, not only in that
it was vastly more extended, but also in the nerve with which the great
natural obstacles were placed between the little band with which it was
undertaken and home, and the unshrinking audacity with which that slight
force penetrated into a populous and intensely hostile territory, and
confidently exposed itself to such tremendous odds, and such
overwhelming disadvantages. Over one hundred thousand men were in arms
to catch Morgan (although not all employed at one time and place), and
every advantage in the way of transporting troops, obtaining
information, and disposing forces to intercept or oppose him, was
possessed by his enemy, and yet his wily strategy enabled him to make
his way to the river, at the very point where he had contemplated
recrossing it when he started from, Tennessee; and he was prevented from
recrossing and effecting his escape (which would then have been
certain) only by the river having risen at a season at which it had not
risen for more than twenty years before.

[Illustration: MAP SHOWING ROUTE THROUGH VIRGINIA _Of those who made_
THEIR ESCAPE FROM OHIO, _July and August 1863_.]

The objects of the raid were accomplished. General Bragg's retreat was
unmolested by any flanking forces of the enemy, and I think that
military men, who will review all the facts, will pronounce that this
expedition delayed for weeks the fall of East Tennessee, and prevented
the timely reinforcement of Rosecrans by troops that would otherwise
have participated in the battle of Chickamauga. It destroyed Morgan's
division, however, and left but a remnant of the Morgan cavalry. The
companies in Kentucky became disintegrated--the men were either captured
or so dispersed that few were ever again available. Captain Davis
crossed into Indiana, with the two companies assigned him, but failed to
rejoin the division, and was surrounded by overwhelming numbers, and
himself and the greater part of his