THE BATTLE OF CORINTH.

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a six-gun battery. Our batteries, replying, soon silenced it, but I had no timefor breakfast. The troops got very little. They had not been allowed to buildtires during the night, and were too tired to intrench.

The morning opened clear and soon grew to be hot. It must have beenninety-four degrees in the shade. The enemy began to extend his infantryline across the north of the town. I visited the lines and gave orders to ourskirmishers to fall back the moment it was seen that the enemy was develop-ing a line of battle. About 8 o’clock his left, having crossed the Mobile andOhio railroad, got into position behind a spur of table land, to reach whichthey had moved by the flank for about half a mile. When they began toadvance in line of battle they were not over three hundred yards distant.

I told McKean on the left to be very watchful of his front lest the enemyshould turn his left, and directed General Stanley to hold the reserve ofhis command ready either to help north of the town or to aid McKean ifrequired. I visited Battery Robinett and directed the chief of artillery,Colonel Lothrop, to see to the reserve artillery, some batteries of which wereparked in the public square of the town ; then the line of Davies’s division,which was in nearly open ground, with a few logs, here and there, for breast-works, and then on his extreme right Sweeny’s brigade, which had no coversave a slight ridge, on the south-west slope of which, near the crest, the menwere lying down. Riding along this line, I observed the Confederate forcesemerging from the woods west of the railroad and crossing the open groundtoward the Purdy road. Our troops lying on the ground could see the flagsof the enemy and the glint of the sunlight on their bayonets. It was about9 o’clock in the morning. The air was still and fiercely hot. Yan Dorn says

the Confederate preparations for the morning were:

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“ That Hebert, on the left, should mask part of his own division on the left, placing Cabell’s bri-gade en echelon on the left — Cabell having been detached from Maury’s division for that purpose,move Armstrong’s cavalry brigade across the Mobile and Ohio road, and, if possible, to get someof his artillery in position across the road. In this order of battle, Hebert was to attack, swing-ing his left flank toward Corinth , and advance down the Purdy ridge. On the right, Lovell,with two brigades in line of battle and one in reserve, with Jackson’s cavalry to the right,was ordered to await the attack on his left, feeling his way with sharp-shooters until Hubertwas heavily engaged with the enemy. Maury was to move at the same time quickly to the frontdirectly at Corinth ; Jackson to burn the railroad bridge over the Tuscumbia during the night.”

The left of General Yan Dorn’s attack was to have begun earlier, but theaccident of Hebert’s sickness prevented. The Confederates, from behind a spurof the Purdy ridge, advanced splendidly to the attack. The unfavorable lineoccupied by Davies’s division made the resistance on that front inadequate.The troops gave way; the enemy pursued; but the cross-fire from the Unionbatteries on our right soon thinned their ranks. Their front line was broken,and the heads of their columns melted away. Some of the enemy’s scatteredline got into the edge of the town; a few into the reserve artillery, which ledto the impression that they had captured forty pieces of artillery. But theywere soon driven out by Stanley’s reserve, and fled, taking nothing away.

At this time, while going to order Hamilton’s division into action on theenemy’s left, I saw the L-shaped porch of a large cottage packed full of