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[370]

It was through the midnight observations with one of my war-balloons that I was enabled to discover that the fortifications at Yorktown were being evacuated, and at my request General Heintzelman made a trip with me that he might confirm the truth of my discovery. The entire great fortress was ablaze with bonfires, and the greatest activity prevailed, which was not visible except from the balloon. At first the general was puzzled on seeing more wagons entering the forts than were going out, but when I called his attention to the fact that the ingoing wagons were light and moved rapidly (the wheels being visible as they passed each camp-fire), while the outgoing wagons were heavily loaded and moved slowly, there was no longer any doubt as to the object of the Confederates. General Heintzelman then accompanied me to General McClellan's headquarters for a consultation, while I, with orderlies, aroused other quietly sleeping corps commanders in time to put our whole army in motion in the very early hours of the morning, so that we were enabled to overtake the Confederate army at Williamsburg, an easy day's march beyond Yorktown on the road to Richmond.

Firing the day before had started early in the morning and continued until dark, every gun in the fortification being turned on the balloon, and then the next morning they were still pointing upward in the hope of preventing us in some way from further annoying the Confederates by watching their

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