John G. Nicolay, The Outbreak of Rebellion

[149] directed him to take an advanced position within two miles of the enemy's works at Laurel Hill, to give an impression that he intended the main attack, and to be ready to pursue, should they retreat.

Meanwhile McClellan himself moved to Buckhannon with some seven regiments, with the design of turning the enemy's position on Rich Mountain. On the evening of July 9th he pushed forward to Roaring Creek, two miles from Pegram's entrenched camp. A reconnoissance on the 10th showed the enemy strongly posted in a mountain defile, where, with the large force he was supposed to have, a direct attack in front could only be made at great sacrifice. That evening Brigadier-General Rosecrans proposed a plan to turn the position, and McClellan (with some reluctance, it is said) permitted him to attempt it.

At daylight of July 11th, Rosecrans, with portions of four regiments — a total of nineteen hundred men-set out, and, amid a well-nigh continuous rain-storm, by eleven o'clock cut and climbed their way through a pathless forest and thicket to the very crest of Rich Mountain. Their ascent was made south of the turnpike, while Pegram was expecting the attempt on the north. To guard against either contingency, however, as his own camp and entrenchments were near the west base of the mountain, Pegram had sent a detachment of three hundred and ten men and two guns back to where the turnpike crosses the summit, two miles in his rear. There, at the farm of a man named Hart, they had scarcely had time to throw up some slight entrenchments for their guns, when Rosecrans' force, advancing toward the road from the south, encountered them. The rebels made a plucky resistance, but the Unionists had such advantage in numbers that the contest was quickly decided. “We formed at about three o'clock,” reports Rosecrans, “under cover of ”