John D. Billings, The history of the Tenth Massachusetts battery of light artillery in the war of the rebellion

While this skirmishing was in progress a battery opened to our left rear, which we knew from the sound to be one of the enemy's. The right section of-our own was detached to oppose it, and after a lively contest, in a warm position (made more so by the ground which had recently been burned over), it succeeded in silencing the Rebel guns, and returned to its old position victorious.¹

Lieut. Granger's bridle-rein was cut by a piece of shell during this little encounter.

About noon, as we were preparing dinner, a crash of small arms broke out in front, and directly our cavalry pickets (First Maine) came dashing furiously back over the Dinwiddie road into the line, raising a great dust, and riding as recklessly as if the whole Rebel army was at their heels. Nevertheless our skirmishers maintained their ground, and we sent a few shells down the road, after which affairs were quieter for a while. But we felt a crisis to be approaching. Our troops seemed to have been concentrated in a small space, and the enemy were drawing their lines closer about us. We spent a part of our leisure in anathematizing the powers that kept us here liable to be gobbled up, when the object of our coming was simply to take part in rendering the railroad still further useless, which object we understood had been accomplished. The idea generally obtained among the men that General Hancock remained of his own volition, expecting a triumph of his arms if attacked, but the subjoined synopsis of his report sets him right in this respect.

At the right of the Battery, where the road to