No. 149. reports of Cot. Morton C. Hunter, Eighty-second Indiana Infantry.
Hdqrs. Eighty-Second Regt. Indiana Vol. Infty., August 17, 1864.
Captain: In pursuance to orders, I herewith transmit to you a general statement of the part taken by my regiment, Eighty-second Indiana, being one of the regiments in said brigade, in the campaign from Ringgold, Ga., to our present position before Atlanta.
On the 7th day of May last we started out with the grand army of the Division of the Mississippi, composed of three departments, to wit, the Department of the Cumberland, the Department of the Tennessee, and the Department of the Ohio, to attack the rebel army under command of General Joseph E. Johnston, then occupying the town of Dalton, Ga., strongly intrenched.
After some circuitous marches and slight skirmishing with the enemy, on the evening of the 9th of May we arrived in front of Buzzard Roost Gap, some six miles distant from Dalton, which was so strongly fortified that it was deemed imprudent to attempt to take it by storm.
On the morning of the 12th we moved with the residue of our corps to a position near Resaca, Ga., by the way of Snake Creek Gap.
On the 13th we moved and took position in line of battle to the left of General Johnson's division, of our corps.
On the 14th we advanced our lines under a heavy skirmish fire until we reached a point about threequarters of a mile from the rebel fortifications, which were some two miles north of Resaca.
While here General Judah's division, of the Twenty-third Army Corps, which was to the left and partly in our rear, advanced in two lines to attack and storm the rebel works.
As the brigade of that division which was in our rear advanced over our lines, our brigade was ordered to follow and support it. The rebel fortifications were in a level valley under a hill, some 150 feet in height and about 400 yards from its base.
In our advance we had to pass over the hill and through a dense undergrowth, which entirely obscured from view the rebel works, until we reached the brow of the hill.
From there they could be plainly seen.
In front of my regiment I had two companies as skirmishers, to wit, A and B, under command of Captain Whedon.
As General Judah's troops advanced in front of my regiment, my skirmish line went forward and drove the rebel skirmishers into their works.
When General Judah's first line reached a small ravine, some 200 yards from the rebel works, it stopped, and the men took shelter in it from a most murderous fire that was then being poured in upon them from the rebel lines, and commenced returning the fire.
The second line being also similarly situated, advanced rapidly, and took shelter in the same ravine as best they could.
My regiment, still advancing, had then just arrived at the foot of the hill, where it was exposed to the most terrific fire of shell, grape, canister, and musketry that I have ever experienced.
The troops which we were supporting having stopped and taken shelter, I was placed in a most critical condition, as I could not advance to the ravine for shelter, the same being, already full, and having no orders to fall back I ordered my regiment behind a low fence, which was a short distance in our front, as the best protection that presented itself, but the artillery range was so short and the firing so accurate that the fence seemed no shield whatever, as the rails were knocked and scattered over the men by the bursting 