had been sent back to the turnpike road; General Gary
taking advantage of the present quiet sent Colonel Haskell to get them
together--rather a difficult task, as it afterwards proved.

General Gary's great object was to draw off the guns, if possible, now
night had set in, from the depot, and get them back with the rest of
the train in the line of retreat. So the order was given to limber
them up, which was done, and the guns moved off at once, it being but
a few hundred yards to the main road.

Our brigade in line faced to the rear, the guns behind them, and
covered the movement. The silence of the guns soon told our friends
over yonder what was going on, and they were not long in following
after; our men, facing to the rear, delivered their fire steadily,
moving in retreat, facing and firing every few steps, effectually
keeping off a rush; they pressed us, but cautiously--the darkness
concealed our numbers.

We were going through an open old field, and came now to a road
through a narrow piece of woods, where we broke from line into column,
and double-quicked through the woods so as to get to the road beyond.
Before we got to the turnpike we heard the bugles of the enemy down
it, and as the head of our column came into the road their cavalry
charged the train some two or three hundred yards below us. Sixty
pieces of cannon, at the point where we came into the road, the
drivers were attempting to turn back toward the Court House, had got
entangled with one another and presented a scene of utter confusion.

As our regiment got into the road some thirty or forty men were thrown
out from the last squadron and faced to the rear on the right and
left, opening a fire directly upon those of the dismounted men who
were pressing us from that quarter. I had but little fear of the
enemy's cavalry riding into us on the road, so blocked up as it was
with the routed artillery train, and there were woods on both sides
just here.

In passing from the old field, where the guns had been at work, into
the woods that separated it from the turnpike, two men were walking
just in front of me, following their gun, which was on before. I heard
one say, "_Tout perdu_." I asked at once, "What battery do you belong
to?" "Donaldsonville." It was the creole company; and they might well
have added the other words of the great Francis, after the battle of
Pavia, "_Tout perdu fors l'honneur_" all lost but honor; for well had
they done their wor