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[512] indication of this purpose instantly developed very menacing demonstrations on the part of the enemy, the movement to the railroad was suspended, and General Birney, who at this time commanded the Second Corps, during a temporary disability of General Hancock,1 was ordered to swing forward the left of the Second Corps, so as to envelop the right flank of the enemy's works. This movement, made by the divisions of Mott and Barlow (pivoting on the right division under Gibbon, which was already in close contact with the enemy), was executed without reference to the Sixth Corps, and, of course, carried the Second away from that corps, leaving, as the former advanced, a wide and widening gap between the two. The operation had nearly been completed, Mott's division had secured its position on the left of Gibbon, and was intrenching itself, and Barlow's division was coming into place on the left of Mott, when a force of the enemy, composed of part of Hill's corps, advancing in column by brigades, penetrated the interval between the left of the Second and the right of the Sixth corps. The shock was soon felt on the flanks of both these corps, but especially on the left of the Second. Barlow's division, rolled up like a scroll, recoiled in disorder, losing several hundred prisoners. Mott, on his right, fell back, but not without a like loss; and the enemy, still pressing diagonally across the front of the corps, struck Gibbon's now exposed left flank and rear, swept off and captured several entire regiments and a battery, and carried Gibbon's intrenchments — the rest of the original line of the Second Corps remaining intact.

The shattered corps was reformed on its original line, when the enemy made a brisk attack on Miles' brigade, but was easily repulsed. The Confederates, however, held the intrenchments taken from Gibbon until they had removed the captured guns, only a feeble effort being made to retake them. They then withdrew as suddenly as they had made their swoop, carrying with them twenty-five hundred prisoners, and many standards. The disaster was due no less to the lack of spirit displayed by the troops than to the unwise order for

1 Caused by the outbreaking of a wound received at Gettysburg.

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John Gibbon (5)
G. Mott (4)
F. C. Barlow (3)
N. A. Miles (1)
A. P. Hill (1)
Winfield Scott Hancock (1)
D. B. Birney (1)
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