Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 30.djvu/231

 Johnson's Ride Aroiuxl Baltimore in 1864. 223

and Green were killed and their riders wounded and captured. As soon as this loss was discovered, I made another charge and re- captured Green, but was unable to retake Nicholas, whom they had mounted on a spare horse and run off the field.

Dtiring the rest of the i3th our pursuers treated us with more respect. All night long we marched and stopped, and stopped and marched, with that terrible, tedious delay and iteration so wearing to men and horses, and it was not until Thursday, the I4th, we reached Poolesville. Here we were obliged to stand and keep back the pursuit, while the infantry and artillery were passing over the Potomac. I got my artillery in position and deployed a strong skirmish line in front of Poolesville, and checked the enemy for sev- eral hours. At last, in the afternoon, a wide line of skirmishers could be seen stretching far beyond each flank of those we had been engaged with and which moved forward with a steady alignment, very unusual for dismounted cavalry. I sent word to General Ran- som to come to my position, that the infantry had arrived, and that it was about time for cavalry to leave.

He soon joined me, and while we were looking through our glasses at the advancing line, where their cartridge boxes and can- teens plainly showed puff! puff! puff! went their fire all along the line. There was no mistaking the sound. The swish of the minie ball was so clear and so evident that it could not possibly come from carbines. We held on, nevertheless, making a great show with our artillery and repeatedly attempted to charge with cavalry, so that we delayed them until their supports could deploy. By this time, however, the enemy had become far advanced, and having been notified that everything, including my own baggage and ordnance train, had crossed, I withdrew comfortably and got into Virginia about sundown.

We had been marching, fighting and working, from daylight July gth, until sundown July i4th, four days and a half, or about one hundred and eight hours.

We had unsaddled only twice during that time, with a halt of from four to five hours each time, making nearly one hundred hours of marching. We had isolated Baltimore from the North, and cut off Washington from the United States, having made a circuit from Frederick to Cockeysville on the east, to Beltsviileon the south, and through Rockville and Poolesville on the west. We had failed in the main object of our expedition, which was to release the prisoners at Point Lookout, convert them into a new army, capture Washing-