was not so very difficult for a strong man to cross in this way.

The Confederates could not come down to the Bluff without breaking up
their organization, being unable to see, owing to the trees and
darkness, what was in their front, and the firing by our men retarded
them for some hours. They kept up, however, a continued firing,
especially on the boats and the many swimmers. The scow, which had
already carried over many wounded, now started on her last trip, but
when starting, a number of uninjured men rushed forward, disturbing the
trim of the boat, so that half way across the river she rolled over,
and all were thrown out. Only one man is known to have escaped
drowning. The scow floated down the stream and was lost. The small
boats were riddled by bullets and disappeared, and all those who had
not escaped were taken prisoners during the night.

Colonel Lee of the Twentieth Regiment was a man over middle age,
therefore much beyond the rest of us in years, and could not swim the
river. He was urged to go in one of the boats, but refused to do so
while a single wounded man remained on the Virginia shore. Therefore,
some of us whose duty, as we saw it, lay in that direction, accompanied
him up the river, hoping if unmolested to reach some Union forces in
that quarter. Finding after a while a boat, for which we gave a colored
man our only ten dollar gold piece, we endeavored to use it, but a hole
in the bottom of it seemed, in the presence of hostile bullets, to make
it undesirable, so we proceeded along the bank to a more secure
position, where we made a raft of fence rails bound together with our
sword belts. It was successfully launched, but before we could use it
we were dismayed to see it slowly disappear to rest on the bottom of
the river.

Proceeding again, our party at this time being Major Revere, Doctor
Revere and Lieutenant Perry, besides Colonel Lee and myself, we came to
what we thought might be an outpost. While endeavoring to avoid it, we
found ourselves on the top of a farmer's gate, and at that moment we
were hailed with the remark, "Who goes there?" from a company of
Cavalry, whose carbines were pointed at us, and unpleasantly near our
faces. Replying that we would explain if the fire was delayed for a
moment, we completed our movement and surrendered to the inevitable.

Our captors politely accepted our pistols and swords, I being obliged
to give up the sword of Lieutenant William Putnam of the 20t