The Annals of the Civil War Written by Leading Participants North and South
Alexander Kelly McClure, Ed.

[157] were not guarded, we concluded our course was not known at that time, and traveled rather slowly the succeeding day, and went into camp, early in the evening before we were captured, with the understanding from Mr. Davis that he, Mr. Harrison, his staff officers and myself would probably go on after supper and leave his family, then supposed to be out of reach of. danger, which caused us to leave our course and join them. I state all this to show our feeling of temporary security, and the reasons why we felt and acted as we did. The first warning we had of present danger was the firing just across the little creek we were camped on, which took place between the Wisconsin and Michigan cavalry, between day-dawn and full light. Colonel Pritchard, as I afterward learned from him, had some time before posted one part of his command across the road in front of us, and the other part across the road in the rear of us, and behind the little creek on which we were encamped. The firing was between these troops in, rear of us and the Wisconsin troops, who were pursuing us on the road we had traveled. When this firing occurred, as Mr.Davis and Mrs. Davis both told me afterward, Mr. Davis started out of his tent, saying to his wife, “those people have attacked us at last.” (Meaning the men whom we had heard intended to rob Mr. Davis' train the night we quit our course, and went across the country to the north of the Ogeechee river.) “I will go and see if I can stop the firing; surely I will have some authority with Confederates yet.” His staff officers and myself were camped about one hundred yards in the direction of the firing from him, and he supposed we were being fired on, as he told us afterward. As he stepped out of his tent, as he told me that day, he saw the troops which had been posted in front of us, and which were under the immediate command of Colonel Pritchard, in full gallop toward him, and within some sixty yards of his tent. He turned to his wife and said: “It is the Federal cavalry, and they are on us.” As he turned to go out again, I understood his wife threw a waterproof cloak around his shoulders; he stepped out, and was immediately put under arrest. Directly afterward, Lubbock and myself went to him, where he was surrounded by the soldiers. He then had no cloak or other wrapping on him; was dressed in a suit of Confederate gray, with hat and boots on just as usual. Directly after this, and about the time the firing ceased between Colonel Pritchard's and Colonel Harnden's troops across the creek (I say Colonel Harnden because General Wilson says they were his, for I did not before know what officer commanded them), it was that the conversation above alluded to took place between Mr. Davis and Colonel Pritchard.