Lee felt just as certain of holding his own here as in the position opposite Kelly's Ford, for here as well as there night fell and no definite result had been reached by Meade. Nevertheless, the conclusion was delusive, for then ensued a coup de main which has not its superior in the history of the war.

It was after dusk, but from right and left the artillery-fire of Sedgwick poured scathingly by well-known ranges into the enemy's works, while amidst the dimness of the fitful illumination General Russell, in temporary command of the First Division of the Sixth Corps, conducted the assault with the Second and Third Brigades led by Colonels Upton and Ellmaker. The works, defended by as many men as those who assaulted, were carried, with the loss to the enemy of artillery, small-arms, many killed and wounded, and numerous prisoners. The enemy had been so completely taken by surprise that at first those on the other side of the river could not credit the statement of the event. Holding the southern end of the bridge in force, they soon learned the whole truth of the disaster; that Hoke's brigade, commanded that day by Colonel Godwin, had been cut off, that Colonel Ellmaker was in possession of the northern end of the bridge, and that the few who had escaped over it represented all that would be recovered of the force which had defended the northern bank of the river. The bridge was immediately fired by the Confederates, and so consumed as to prevent any attempt on the part of General Meade to cross the river at that point. This serious encounter caused General Lee to loosen his hold on the Rappahannock. Instead of attempting to push French back from the lodgment which he had made on his right, and running the risk of Sedgwick's speedy reinforcement of the column there, when he would have been obliged to fight a pitched battle, Lee began his retreat during the night to a position near the mouth of

Mountain Creek, but afterwards continued it to the entrenchments which he had previously occupied along the southern bank of the Rapidan.

The following morning, the 8th of October, opened with so dense a fog that Sedgwick could not at first discover whether or not the enemy was still in position opposite to him on the south bank of the Rappahannock. A column to the left moved up from Kelly's Ford, five miles below, on the opposite side of the Rappahannock, to clear Sedgwick's front by holding the southern bank of the river while he was engaged in constructing a pontoon-bridge across it. The Fifth Corps moved before daylight and crossed at Kelly's Ford, leaving only the Sixth Corps in position at Rappahannock Station, on the north side of the river. The railroad bridge there being destroyed, a pontoon-bridge had to be laid to supply its absence. The pontoon-bridge was finished by the time that the sun had in the early morning dispersed the fog that had lain densely over the river-bottom. The Federal army, now released, swept forward towards Brandy Station, and took up a position from Willford's Creek, on Hazel River, to the right, to Kelly's Ford, on the Rappahannock, to the left, Lee lying perdu opposite to it behind the woods and hills south of the Rapidan. Thus the two armies found themselves once again in substantially the same positions which they had occupied at the beginning of their late active campaign, in the fruits of which the Confederates had nothing to equal in comparison with the brilliant affairs of Bristoe and Rappahannock Stations, and the increased prestige of the Federal commander and his army.

During the time when the region between Centreville and the Rappahannock had been reoccupied by General Meade, the repairing of the railroad destroyed by the enemy had been pushed forward vigorously, and had now reached

Had

completion, thus making the army in its present position secure as to its supplies. The supervening condition of security and ease by no means, however, satisfied the everactive and enterprising mind of General Meade, always anxious, if the balance inclined to chance of success, to take the initiative, but constantly hampered by the sluggish Halleck, whose military views and plans would have best fitted in with the years of Methuselah and an unmilitary people of some bygone age. The plan of action which General Meade now adopted, known as the Mine Run Campaign, had in it all possible elements of success. not one of the instruments with which it was to be carried out proved wholly unequal to the enterprise, it would in all human probability have succeeded. It is true that the plan could not have involved, as intended, a surprise, for it was not easy to surprise Lee. It was, however, sufficiently of the nature of a surprise to make it impossible that Lee could concentrate to advantage; that is to say, the plan, if it had been executed in accordance with design, involved a severe blow which, despite Lee's seeing it to be inevitable, it would have been impossible completely to ward off.

The army of Lee lay seemingly secure in its position south of the Rapidan, from a little beyond Barnett's Ford, on his left, to a little beyond Morton's Ford, on his right, a stretch of some eighteen miles. Above and below his continuous entrenchments along the Rapidan, commanding the fords there, other fords were well watched by his cavalry. From Barnett's Ford above, to Morton's Ford below, the Rapidan runs, with but slight windings in its course, about northeast, and for some distance below Morton's Ford a little south of east, its course thus making at the latter point an obtuse angle looking north. On its course below Morton's Ford, about five miles below the Ford, the Rapidan is entered from the south by two small affluents having