logs suitable for a trestle bridge.  Flooring had been shipped to me in advance by rail, but the quantity was insufficient, and the lack had to be supplied by utilizing planking and weather-boarding taken from barns and houses in the surrounding country.  The next day Innis’s engineers, with the assistance of the detail that had felled the timber, cut and half-notched the logs, and put the bridge across; spanning the main channel, which was swimming deep, with four or five pontoons that had been sent me for this purpose.  On the 2d and 3d of September my division crossed on the bridge in safety, though we were delayed somewhat because of its giving way once where the pontoons joined the trestles.  We were followed by a few detachments from other commands, and by nearly all the transportation of McCook’s corps.

After getting to the south side of the Tennessee River I was ordered to Valley Head, where McCook’s corps was to concentrate.  On the 4th of September I ascended Sand Mountain, but had got only half way across the plateau, on top, when night came, the march having been a most toilsome one.  The next day we descended to the base, and encamped near Trenton.  On the 10th I arrived at Valley Head, and climbing Lookout Mountain, encamped on the plateau at Indian Falls.  The following day I went down into Broomtown Valley to Alpine.  The march of McCook’s corps from Valley Head to Alpine was in pursuance of orders directing it to advance on Summerville, the possession of which place would further threaten the enemy’s communications, it being assumed that Bragg was in full retreat south, as he had abandoned Chattanooga on the 8th.  This assumption soon proved erroneous, however, and as we, while in Broomtown Valley, could not communicate directly with Thomas’s corps, the scattered condition of the army began to alarm us all, and McCook abandoned the advance to Summerville, ordering back to the summit of Lookout Mountain such of the corps trains as had got down into Broomtown Valley.

But before this I had grown uneasy in regard to the disjointed situation of our army, and, to inform myself of what was going on, determined to send a spy into the enemy’s lines.  In passing Valley Head on the 10th my scout Card, who had been on the lookout for some one capable to undertake the task, brought me a Union man with whom he was acquainted, who lived on Sand Mountain, and had been much persecuted by guerrillas on account of his loyal sentiments.  He knew the country well, and as his loyalty was vouched for I asked him to go into the enemy’s camp, which I believed to be near Lafayette, and, bring me such information as he could gather.  He said such a journey would be at the risk of his life, and that at best he could not expect to remain in that section of country if he undertook it, but that he would run all the chances if I would enable him to emigrate to the West at the end c f the “job,” which I could do by purchasing the small “bunch”