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[214]
he bounded forward like the wind.
His clear vision was not at fault, for as I flew by, I saw two men leap up in front of me from the edge of the roadway and jump into the shadows of the woods and undergrowth at one side.
They said something to me, and I replied, but my excitement was so intense, expecting every moment the crack of their rifles, that no part of the picture which flashed through my mind remains clearly registered except the forms of two men and the swift scurry of the horse.
Fortunately they did not fire.
It may be that they felt something of the excitement and fright I was experiencing, but more than likely they were drowsy or asleep, and the soft, sandy road enabled me to approach them so closely without being heard (for in the darkness they could not have seen farther than a few feet), that they were taken by surprise, and more-over, they may have thought I was a Federal picket, since I was riding into their lines.
In any event, in less time than it takes to tell it, I had scurried away beyond their vision and out of range of their guns.
Although I believed a large body of Federals was on either side of the road, I was riding along at such a rapid gait, that in the darkness I saw no sign of troops.
I cannot even now estimate how far I went at the speed I was making-probably two or three miles. I know I had slowed up, and was riding again at a canter when daylight came, and with it I noticed in the valley below a cloud of dust not more than half a mile away.
This told me of the moving cavalry, and in a few minutes more I had the great good fortune of riding into the column I was sent to intercept.
A few days after the battle of Chickamauga, all of the good mounts in the cavalry were organized to cross the Tennessee River and break up General Rosecrans' communications, and I went with this flying column.
We took the great wagon train in the Sequatchie valley on the 2d of October, and on the 4th I was captured and taken to the military prison at Camp Morton, Indiana, where I remained until the latter part of February, 1865.
Review of Reviews. New York. 1912.
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