ry and Dickey's colored brigade, and put his army
into position at Pleasant Hill to cover the movement.

Churchill with Tappan and Parsons had accomplished the march of
twenty miles from Keachie to Mansfield too late in the evening of
the 8th to take any part in the battle of Sabine Cross-Roads. At
two o'clock the next morning he marched toward the front in order
to arrive on the ground in time to renew the fight. By the earliest
light of morning Taylor saw that his adversary had already left
the field. Then he promptly advanced his whole force, feeling his
way as he went. Green led with the cavalry; next came Churchill
with his own division, under Tappan; then Parsons, Walker, and
Polignac. The morning was wellnigh spent, when Taylor with the
head of his column drew near Pleasant Hill and discovered his
adversary in position. The last of his infantry did not come up
until after noon. Churchill's men were so fagged by their early
start and their long march of forty-five miles since the morning
of the 8th that Taylor thought it best to give them two hours' rest
before attempting anything more.

Two miles to the southward, across the main road, stood Emory,
firmly holding the right of the Union lines. Dwight's brigade
formed the extreme right flank, thrown back and resting on a wooded
ravine that runs almost parallel with the road. Squarely across
the road and somewhat more advanced, in the skirt of the wood before
the village, commanding an open approach, was posted Shaw's brigade,
detached from Mower's Third division, to strengthen the exposed
front of Emory. Benedict occupied a ditch traversing a slight
hollow, the course of which was nearly perpendicular to the Logansport
road, on which his right rested in echelon behind the left of Shaw.
Benedict's front was generally hidden by a light growth of reed
and willow, but his left was in the open and was completely exposed.
Grow's battery, under Southworth, held the hill between Dwight and
Shaw, and Closson's battery, under Franck Taylor, was planted so
as to fire over the heads of Benedict's men. McMillan's brigade
was in reserve behind Dwight and Shaw. The position thus occupied
by Emory was a short distance north of the village in front of the
fork of the roads that lead to Mansfield and to Logansport.

About four hundred yards behind Benedict, and slightly overlapping
his left, the line was prolonged by A. J. Smith, with the two
divisions of Mower, stro