Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 08.djvu/238

226 successful in tearing up the track in several places before daylight the next morning, but the others, owing to the greater distance they had to travel, were not able to damage the road so as to prevent the passage of the trains on the next morning. After dark the whole command moved out twelve miles towards Byhalia, and halted for a few hours. I ordered Colonel Richardson to move at 4 A. M. the next day with his brigade and the First and Third Mississippi regiments to attack Colliersville, while the other command would follow and support him, but for some reasons he did not move until two hours later than the time ordered.

When once in motion, however, our advance was pushed forward so rapidly by Colonel Richardson that they completely surprised the enemy's pickets, capturing the officers in command and almost the entire picket. The alarm, however, had reached the garrison, and when we arrived in sight of the place we found them under arms and in the trenches. The garrison proper was composed of the Sixty-sixth Indiana infantry and detachments of the Sixth and Ninth Illinois cavalry, but they had been unexpectedly reinforced a few moments before our arrival by a train from Memphis containing Major-General Sherman and Brigadier-General Smith, with their staffs, escorts and the Thirteenth regiment United States regulars, on their way to Corinth, who were compelled to stop by the injuries to the road. There were also a few men from other regiments there who served to strengthen the garrison.

The place was protected by a strong earth-work near the railroad depot, which is itself of brick-work loopholed, and by a line of rifle-pits which cover all approaches.

East and west of the fort there are open woods which offered some protection to an attacking party. On the east and south of it, and not more than six hundred yards distant, is a ridge which overlooks it, while upon the north the hill upon which the town stands also overlooks it, and the houses afforded a protection from its fire.

The Ninth and Thirteenth Tennessee and Second Mississippi regiments were ordered to attack on the left (or west), Colonel Richardson's brigade on the right (or east), and the artillery, supported by the Eighteenth Mississippi battalion, was placed on the ridge in the centre and within six hundred (600) yards of the fort and depot, and Colonel McQuirk, with his own and First Mississippi partisans, was sent to gain possession of the town and attack the fort from the rear.