ant all doubt, if any
remained, was set at rest. The horseman, after circling about a time or
two, brought his horse to a standstill facing in the direction from
which we were approaching. There was a puff of smoke from the muzzle of
his revolver or carbine, and a bullet whizzed by and buried itself in
the breast of one of the horses in the first set of fours.

"There,--it," exclaimed Lovell. "Now you know it is a rebel, don't you?"

The information was too reliable not to be convincing, and the regiment
was promptly brought front into line, which had hardly been
accomplished, when shots began to come from other points in the woods,
and no further demonstration was needed that they were full of
confederates.

The fence was close at hand, and the command to dismount to fight on
foot was given. The Sixth deployed along the fence and the Spencers
began to bark. The horses were sent back a short distance, under cover
of a reverse slope. The acting adjutant was dispatched to overtake
Custer and report to him that we were confronted by a large force of
confederates and had been attacked. Before he had started, the
confederates displayed a line of dismounted skirmishers that extended
far beyond both flanks of the regiment and a swarm of them in front. A
Michigan regiment, behind a fence, and armed with Spencer carbines, was
a dangerous antagonist to grapple with by a direct front assault, and
Fitzhugh Lee's men were not eager to advance across the open field, but
hugged the woods, waiting for their friends on the right and left to get
around our flanks, which there was imminent danger of their doing,
before relief could come. It did not, however, take Custer long to act.
Putting the Fifth Michigan in on the right of the Sixth, he brought back
Pennington's battery, and stationed the First Vermont mounted to protect
the left flank, holding the First Michigan mounted in reserve to support
the battery and to reinforce any weak point, and proceeded to put up one
of the gamiest fights against odds, seen in the war. Opposed to Custer's
five regiments and one battery, Fitzhugh Lee had twelve regiments of
cavalry, three brigades under Lomax, Owen and Chambliss and as good a
battery--Breathed's--as was in the confederate service.

Before the dispositions described in the foregoing had been completed,
Breathed's battery, which had been masked in the woods to the right and
front of the position occupied by the Sixth Michigan, opened fi