was ordered to retrace his steps before daylight by the Back road, which is parallel to and about three miles from the Valley pike, and attack the enemy at Tom’s Brook crossing, while Merritt’s instructions were to assail him on the Valley pike in concert with Custer.  About 7 in the morning, Custer’s division encountered Rosser himself with three brigades, and while the stirring sounds of the resulting artillery duel were reverberating through the valley Merritt moved briskly to the front and fell upon Generals Lomax and Johnson on the Valley pike.  Merritt, by extending his right, quickly established connection with Custer, and the two divisions moved forward together under Torbert’s direction, with a determination to inflict on the enemy the sharp and summary punishment his rashness had invited.

The engagement soon became general across the valley, both sides fighting mainly mounted.  For about two hours the contending lines struggled with each other along Tom’s Brook, the charges and counter charges at many points being plainly visible from the summit of Round Top, where I had my headquarters for the time.

The open country permitting a sabre fight, both sides seemed bent on using that arm.  In the centre the Confederates maintained their position with much stubbornness, and for a time seemed to have recovered their former spirit, but at last they began to give way on both flanks, and as these receded, Merritt and Custer went at the wavering ranks in a charge along the whole front.  The result was a general smash-up of the entire Confederate line, the retreat quickly degenerating into a rout the like of which was never before seen.  For twenty-six miles this wild stampede kept up, with our troopers close at the enemy’s heels; and the ludicrous incidents of the chase never ceased to be amusing topics around the camp-fires of Merritt and Custer.  In the fight and pursuit Torbert took eleven pieces of artillery, with their caissons, all the wagons and ambulances the enemy had on the ground, and three hundred prisoners.  Some of Rosser’s troopers fled to the mountains by way of Columbia Furnace, and some up the Valley pike and into the Massamitten Range, apparently not discovering that the chase had been discontinued till south of Mount Jackson they rallied on Early’s infantry.

After this catastrophe, Early reported to General Lee that his cavalry was so badly demoralized that it should be dismounted; and the citizens of the valley, intensely disgusted with the boasting and swaggering that had characterized the arrival of the “Laurel Brigade” in that section, baptized the action (known to us as Tom’s Brook) the “Woodstock Races,” and never tired of poking fun at General Rosser about his precipitate and inglorious flight. (When Rosser arrived from Richmond with his brigade he was proclaimed as the savior of the Valley, and his men came all bedecked with laurel branches.)