with shell. This disagreeable awakening sounded in the ears of the rebels as the death-knell of their hopes. This was the reason why so many of them concluded not to risk their lives for a cause henceforth hopeless.

CHAPTER XXXI.

OCTOBER VINTAGE.

General Butler's success north of the James-Line advanced to the Peeble's house- Return to Fort Hell-Misfortunes of a Virginian family - General Birney's death- Arrival of recruits at the army Dearth of officers - Political prejudices - Too free talk - Expedition to Hatcher's Run How the break was repaired — Cavalry on foot — Night retreat — The wounded - General Hancock leaves the army.

Battle of October 27 - Line broken

THE latter days of September were marked by different movements, whose meaning could not be doubtful. The Tenth Corps was replaced in the trenches by the First and Second Divisions of the Second Corps, which thus found itself occupying alone the line from the Appomattox to the Jerusalem plank road. The line of our works was like a second line of skirmishers, the regiments occupying in force only the forts, whose cross fire was thought sufficient to stop any attempt which might be made by the enemy. My front was extended to the right as far as a new redoubt, to which the name of Fort Meikel was given. To the left, a division of the Ninth Corps and one of the Fifth filled the interval between the Jerusalem road and the Weldon railroad. So that we had four divisions free on that part of the line.

We were not long in learning where the Tenth Corps had gone. On the evening of the 28th, a telegram from General Grant informed the army that in the morning General Ord, commanding the Eighteenth Corps, had carried, by assault, Fort Harrison and the whole line of

fortifications in front of Chapin's Bluff. At the same time, General Birney, at the head of the Tenth Corps, had carried the New Market road, near Bailey's Creek. General Butler had succeeded where General Hancock had twice failed. He captured the position, with fifteen guns and several hundred prisoners. This step forward was a most menacing one for Richmond. Butler received orders to establish himself there solidly, and no effort of the enemy could dislodge him.

It was time to try again the plan which had given us possession of the Weldon railroad, and push our lines towards Hatcher's Run. While the reënforcements sent by Lee to the north of the James were being worn out in costly and useless assaults against Butler, General Meade sent his four disposable divisions to his left. September 30, they met the enemy intrenched at Peeble's house, near the Poplar Grove Church. Griffin charged, and carried the redoubt, with the rifle-pits covering it; Ayres, in like manner, carried a less important work on a neighboring road. The two divisions of the Ninth Corps, now commanded by General Parke, were less fortunate. While continuing the movement further towards the left, they were attacked by a force of the enemy, which drove them back in disorder on the Fifth Corps. The position taken by the latter was held, however. To better assure the position at all events, Mott's division was called in. A part of Gibbon's division relieved us in the trenches, and the City Point military railroad, the extension of which followed parallel to our lines, rapidly transported us to General Warren's headquarters. Arriving by the first train, I met General Meade, who ordered a staff officer to guide me to Peeble's house, where the two other brigades soon joined The weather was bad; rain fell in torrents; it was a most disagreeable night.

me.

The next morning, October 2, three divisions were ordered to carry the advanced works, whose line was prolonged beyond Peeble's house. The movement was made in good order, but without a battle, the enemy having evacuated the positions where we expected to find him. The whole line then advanced across some difficult and very wooded ground.

The general movement pivoted on the right, and, as our division held the left, my brigade, forming the extremity of the turning flank, had much trouble to keep in line. We had to get through the thickets after the style of wild-boars; but, by breaking the branches to make way, we arrived, without delaying the line, in front of a farmhouse, where the enemy's skirmishers awaited us. Easily dislodged, they continued to fall back, firing, as far as a second line of fortifications. This line, armed with cannon, and well built on a hill, the approach to which was across open ground, extended much further than we had supposed. So that, instead of being able to turn it, we were ourselves rather exposed to being struck on our flank. Four of my regiments were promptly formed in a refused line to prepare for any movement. But the enemy was probably not strong enough to try that experiment. Besides, his attention was occupied by Pierce's brigade, which was feeling of his line to find out its strength.

The object of the reconnoissance being fully accomplished, operations were not pushed further. The fol lowing days were employed in extending our intrenchments, and in constructing a number of redoubts, the work on which was well advanced when, on the 5th, we were relieved by the colored division of General FerWe took up our march for Fort Hell again; but now only four of my regiments were put in the first line. The six others camped in reserve in the woods in

rero.

front of the Chevers house, where I was happy to find a shelter more substantial than a tent.

The house had been abandoned by its owner, who lived in Petersburg. He had carried off all the furniture, and left only one old white-haired negro with his wife, hardly less aged than himself.

The division headquarters were close by, in a more imposing house than the one which was still occupied by the family of the owner. The owner was a well preserved old man, whose son, an officer in the Confederate army, had been captured, and was then in the prison at Point Lookout, on the Chesapeake. The wife and two daughters of the prisoner had remained at the Jones house, with the grandfather.

I made the acquaintance of the old planter at the time when a temporary absence of General Mott gave me the command of the division.

The family was in a most pitiful condition. Mr. William Jones owned seven hundred and forty acres of land around his dwelling, and four houses in Petersburg. So that a few months before he had been a rich man. He had numerous slaves, and flocks still more numerous; his crops were ripening. in the sun, and promised an abundant harvest, when, at the end of the month of June, the war brought the armies to the Jerusalem plank road. Everything was swallowed up at once before his eyes. Wheat, oats, corn, were cut to pieces under the horses' hoofs; cattle, sheep, hogs, fowls were carried off; negro men and women ran away; and between one day and the next the planter found himself without servants, almost without provisions, and without money; for, as to his Petersburg houses, it would be a long time before they would be of any avail to him.

When I took General Mott's place at headquarters