ptains Samuel Taylor and H.C. Meriwether of the 10th Kentucky had been
sent forward the day before, with their companies, to capture
steamboats. We found them in possession of two large craft. One had been
surprised at the wharf, and steaming out on her, they had captured the
other. Preparations for crossing were begun; but, just as the first boat
was about to push off, an unexpected musketry fire was opened from the
Indiana side by a party of home-guards collected behind some houses and
haystacks. They were in pursuit of Captain Thomas H. Hines, who had that
morning returned from Indiana to Kentucky, after having undertaken a
brief expedition of his own. This fire did no harm, the river here being
eight hundred or a thousand yards wide. But in a few minutes the bright
gleam of a field-piece spouted through the low-hanging mist on the
farther bank. Its shell pitched into a group near the wharf, severely
wounding Captain W.H. Wilson, acting quartermaster of the First Brigade.
Several shots from this piece followed in quick succession, but it was
silenced by Lieutenant Lawrence with his Parrotts. The 2d Kentucky and
9th Tennessee were speedily ferried over without their horses, and
forming under the bluff they advanced upon the militia, which had
retired to a wooded ridge some six hundred yards from the river-bank,
abandoning the gun. The two regiments were moving across some open
ground, toward the ridge, sustaining no loss from the volleys fired at
them, and the boats had scarcely returned for further service when a
more formidable enemy appeared. A gunboat, the _Elk_, steamed rapidly
round the bend, and began firing alternately upon the troops in the town
and those already across. The situation was now extremely critical. We
could not continue the ferriage while this little vixen remained, for
one well-directed shot would have sent either of the boats to the
bottom. Delay was exceedingly hazardous, affording the enemy opportunity
to cut off the regiments we had already sent over, and giving the
cavalry in pursuit of us time to come up. If forced to give up the
attempt to cross the river, we must also abandon our comrades on the
other side. So every piece of artillery was planted and opened on the
gunboat, and after an hour or two of vigorous cannonading she was driven
off. By midnight all our troops were over.

[Illustration]

About noon of the 9th the column reached the little town of Corydon,
Indiana, which proved n