ichigan to be
added to my command, and gave general directions that the current
business of the department headquarters should pass through my
hands. As General Parke, his chief of staff, had gone to Vicksburg
in command of the Ninth Corps, Burnside made informal use of me to
supply in some measure his place. Our relations therefore became
closer than ever. He hoped his troops would soon come back to him,
as was promised, and in resuming business at the Cincinnati
headquarters, he tried to keep it all in such shape that he could
drop it at a moment's notice.

To keep the enemy occupied he organized two expeditions, one under
Brigadier-General Julius White into West Virginia, and the other
under Colonel W. P. Sanders into East Tennessee. The latter was one
of the boldest and longest raids made during the war, and besides
keeping the enemy on the alert, destroying considerable military
stores and a number of important railway bridges, it was a
preliminary reconnoissance of East Tennessee and the approaches to
it through the mountains, which was of great value a little later.
The force consisted of 1500 mounted men, being detachments from
different regiments of cavalry and mounted infantry, among which
were some of the loyal men of East Tennessee under Colonel R. K.
Byrd. Sanders was a young officer of the regular army who was now
colonel of the Fifth Kentucky Cavalry. He rapidly made a first-class
reputation as a bold leader of mounted troops, but was unfortunately
killed in the defence of Knoxville in November of this same year.
His expedition started from Mount Vernon, Kentucky, on the 14th of
June, marched rapidly southward sixty miles to Williamsburg, where
the Cumberland River was fordable. Thence he moved southwest about
the same distance by the Marsh Creek route to the vicinity of
Huntsville in Tennessee. Continuing this route southward some fifty
miles more, he struck the Big Emory River, and following this
through Emory Gap, he reached the vicinity of Kingston on the Clinch
River in East Tennessee, having marched in all rather more than two
hundred miles. Avoiding Kingston, which was occupied by a superior
force of Confederates, he marched rapidly on Knoxville, destroying
all the more important railway bridges. Demonstrating boldly in
front of Knoxville, and finding that it was strongly held and its
streets barricaded for defence, he passed around the town and
advanced upon Strawberry Plains, where a great brid