hed with blood. The Yankee loss
was five thousand killed, wounded and captured. Butler fell back to
Bermuda Hundreds, under cover of his gunboats. General Hoke took his old
brigade, Clingman's North Carolina, Barton's, Kemper's and Corse's
Virginia brigades and hastened to General Lee at Cold Harbor, leaving
Ransom's North Carolina, Grace's Alabama, Walker's South Carolina, and
Wise's Virginia brigades to look after Butler. These were put in command
of Gen. Bushrod Johnson, and remained as Johnson's Division until the
close of the war.

Next day we followed Butler and fortified a position close to him and
where we were shelled from his gunboats. We extended our picket line to
within a few hundred yards of Butler's. On the morning of the 20th of May
we got orders to wash our shirts. We had left our knapsacks at Weldon,
N. C., on the 14th of April, and had had four weeks of strenuous campaign
in North Carolina and two weeks in Virginia. Six weeks without a chance to
wash or change our shirts, and now we had no vessels to warm water, so the
only chance was to wash in a small creek. Our shirts from sweat and grime
had gotten so dirty and stiff they would almost stand upright. Shirts were
washed and hung on bushes to dry, but before all got dry, or at 1 p. m.,
we were ordered to fall into line for another battle. We wanted Butler's
picket line for our line to crowd him closer and fortify our picket line.
Both picket lines had rifle pits and were hard to take at best. The
Thirty-fifth and Fifty-sixth were ordered to take the picket line in front
of our brigade. The Thirty-fifth deployed and charged forward, followed by
Fifty-sixth in line of battle. The Thirty-fifth was driven back, and
Fifty-sixth charged up and found a strong line of battle in the rifle
pits. When we got in forty or fifty yards of them we were ordered to fire,
lay down, load, shoot. When we had fired five rounds under a terrible hail
of bullets at so close range, some one said, "They are flanking us." Then
the order to retreat. We were in an old pine field with some undergrowth
of oak bushes, while the Yankee line was on the edge of a dense wood. We
fell back and rallied when some regiments of Walker's South Carolina
Brigade came in on our right and with a yell charged on the Yankees, who
were advancing on us. The Twenty-sixth lined up with them and helped to
drive the Yankees back to their line of rifle pits. Our line lay down and
kept up our fire on them u