Benson J. Lossing, Pictorial Field Book of the Civil War. Volume 1.

[534] way of Huttonsville, as far as Monterey, in Highland County, and the re-enforcements that had been sent to Pegram, as we have observed, scattered over the Laurel Hill Range. Rosecrans entered Pegram's abandoned camp the next morning; while the latter, with about six hundred followers, weary, worn, and dispirited, were vainly seeking a way of escape. They had been without food for nearly two days. Seeing no hope of relief, Pegram offered to surrender to McClellan; and on Sunday morning, the 14th,

July, 1861.

he and his followers were escorted into the camp of the chief at Beverly by some Chicago cavalry.

When it was discovered that Garnett had fled, McClellan ordered a hot pursuit. He sent a detachment from his own column, under Captain H. W. Benham, his Chief Engineer, to join that of General Morris, and the united forces started eagerly after the fugitives, who had about twelve hours the start of them. The recent rains had made the roads very muddy, and swelled the mountain streams. The fugitives, in their anxiety to escape, left knapsacks, provisions, camp furniture, and every thing that might impede their flight, along the way, and these were continual clews to their route, which frequently deviated from the main road along rough mountain paths. Broken and abandoned wagons were found in many places, and in narrow gorges the insurgents had felled trees and cast down rocks to obstruct the pursuit.

Both parties rested on the night of the 12th, and resumed the race in the morning. The pursuers gradually gained on the fugitives; and at about noon, while a driving rain-storm was drenching them, the advance of the former, composed of the Seventh and Ninth Indiana, Fourteenth Ohio, and a section of Burnett's Ohio Battery, came in sight of the flying insurgents at Kahler's Ford of a branch of the Cheat River. They were evidently preparing to make a stand there. The pursuing infantry dashed into the stream, which was waist deep, and halted under shelter of the bank until the artillery came up. A single cannon-shot set the insurgents in motion, for they were only the rear-guard of Garnett's force, the main body of which was some distance in advance. The exciting chase was renewed, and its interest was hightened by a sort of running fight for about four miles to another ford of the same stream, known as Carrick's, where the banks were high and steep, and the land a rolling bottom about a mile in width between the mountains.

After crossing the stream Garnett made a stand. The Fourteenth Ohio (Colonel Steedman) of the advance was close upon him, and rushed down to the Ford in pursuit, when it was met by a volley of musketry and cannon-shot from a single heavy gun, under Colonel Taliaferro, of the Twenty-third Virginia Regiment. The Ohio troops stood their ground bravely. The Seventh and Ninth Indiana and Burnett's battery hastened to their aid; and Captain Benham, who was in command of the advance, ordered Colonel Dumont and a detachment of his regiment to cross the deep and rapid stream above the ford, and gain the rear of the foe. The opposite shore was too precipitous for them to scale, and they were ordered to wade down in the bed of the stream hidden by the bank, and, under cover of fire of cannon and musketry, charge the insurgents in front. The order was quickly executed, and while the Indianians were struggling up the bank among the