Joseph T. Derry , A. M. , Author of School History of the United States; Story of the Confederate War, etc., Confederate Military History, a library of Confederate States Military History: Volume 6, Georgia
Clement Anselm Evans, Ed.

[70] was called to the east to take command of the army so disastrously defeated at Manassas. A large part of the Federal army in western Virginia followed McClellan to Washington. It therefore seemed a favorable time for the Confederates to recover what they had lost in that frontier of the Confederacy. Just before the defeat of Garnett, Henry R. Jackson, of Georgia, had been commissioned brigadier-general in the army of the Confederate States and assigned to command at Monterey. He had sent forward Col. Edward Johnson with the Twelfth Georgia to reinforce Garnett, when he received news of the loss of Rich mountain and the retreat of the force under Garnett. He now hastened to join the Twelfth, but encountering Scott's Forty-fourth Virginia in retreat, deemed it best to return to Monterey and organize a force to check the apprehended farther advance of the enemy.

General Jackson remained in command at this post, organizing the troops collected there; and under Generals Loring and Lee commanded the Monterey division, which included the two Georgia regiments brigaded under Col. Edward Johnson. Early in August, Henry R. Jackson moved his command to Camp Bartow, on the Greenbrier river, at the head of a little valley known as Traveler's Repose. General Loring had immediate command of all the troops in the vicinity of Huntersville. In August Gen. Robert E. Lee was sent to take command of the department of Western Virginia. He planned an expedition against the Federal garrison at Cheat mountain pass. About the middle of August it began to rain, and continued to do so without much intermission for six weeks, causing great sickness and suffering among the troops. The attack upon the Federal position at Cheat mountain was fixed for the morning of September 12th. Colonel Rust, with the Third Arkansas, from Jackson's command, was to lead his regiment to a point in the rear of the Federal position, and Gen. Samuel R. Anderson,