“Oh! no, master, dey is gone two days ago; you could have played cards on der coat-tails, dey was in sich a hurry!” I was on my Lexington horse, who was very handsome and restive, so I made signal to my staff to follow, as I proposed to go without escort.  I turned my horse down the road, and the rest of the staff followed.  General Barry took up the questions about the road, and asked the same negro what he was doing there.  He answered, “Dey say Massa Sherman will be along soon!” “Why,” said General Barry, “that was General Sherman you were talking to.”  The poor negro, almost in the attitude of prayer, exclaimed:  “De great God! just look at his horse!” He ran up and trotted by my side for a mile or so, and gave me all the information he possessed, but he seemed to admire the horse more than the rider.

We reached Cheraw in a couple of hours in a drizzling rain, and, while waiting for our wagons to come up, I staid with General Blair in a large house, the property of a blockade-runner, whose family remained.  General Howard occupied another house farther down-town.  He had already ordered his pontoon-bridge to be laid across the Pedee, there a large, deep, navigable stream, and Mower’s division was already across, skirmishing with the enemy about two miles out.  Cheraw was found to be full of stores which had been sent up from Charleston prior to its evacuation, and which could not be removed.  I was satisfied, from inquiries, that General Hardee had with him only the Charleston garrison, that the enemy had not divined our movements, and that consequently they were still scattered from Charlotte around to Florence, then behind us.  Having thus secured the passage of the Pedee, I felt no uneasiness about the future, because there remained no further great impediment between us and Cape Fear River, which I felt assured was by that time in possession of our friends.  The day was so wet that we all kept in-doors; and about noon General Blair invited us to take lunch with him.  We passed down into the basement dining-room, where the regular family table was spread with an excellent meal; and during its progress I was asked to take some wine, which stood upon the table in venerable bottles.  It was so very good that I inquired where it came from.  General Blair simply asked, “Do you like it?” but I insisted upon knowing where he had got it; he only replied by asking if I liked it, and wanted some.  He afterward sent to my bivouac a case containing a dozen bottles of the finest madeira I ever tasted; and I learned that he had captured, in Cheraw, the wine of some of the old aristocratic families of Charleston, who had sent it up to Cheraw for safety, and heard afterward that Blair had found about eight wagon-loads of this wine, which he distributed to the army generally, in very fair proportions.