Just beyond Bolton there was a small hewn-log house, standing back in a yard, in which was a well; at this some of our soldiers were drawing water.  I rode in to get a drink, and, seeing a book on the ground, asked some soldier to hand it to me.  It was a volume of the Constitution of the United States, and on the title-page was written the name of Jefferson Davis.  On inquiry of a negro, I learned that the place belonged to the then President of the Southern Confederation.  His brother Joe Davis’s plantation was not far off; one of my staff-officers went there, with a few soldiers, and took a pair of carriage-horses, without my knowledge at the time.  He found Joe Davis at home, an old man, attended by a young and affectionate niece; but they were overwhelmed with grief to see their country overran and swarming with Federal troops.

We pushed on, and reached the Big Black early, Blair’s troops having preceded us by an hour or so.  I found General Blair in person, and he reported that there was no bridge across the Big Black; that it was swimming-deep; and that there was a rebel force on the opposite side, intrenched.  He had ordered a detachment of the Thirteenth United States Regulars, under Captain Charles Ewing, to strip some artillery-horses, mount the men, and swim the river above the ferry, to attack and drive away the party on the opposite bank.  I did not approve of this risky attempt, but crept down close to the brink of the river-bank, behind a corn-crib belonging to a plantation house near by, and saw the parapet on the opposite bank.  Ordering a section of guns to be brought forward by hand behind this corn-crib, a few well-directed shells brought out of their holes the little party that was covering the crossing, viz., a lieutenant and ten men, who came down to the river-bank and surrendered.  Blair’s pon-toon-train was brought up, consisting of India-rubber boats, one of which was inflated, used as a boat, and brought over the prisoners.  A pontoon-bridge was at once begun, finished by night, and the troops began the passage.  After dark, the whole scene was lit up with fires of pitch-pine.  General Grant joined me there, and we sat on a log, looking at the passage of the troops by the light of those fires; the bridge swayed to and fro under the passing feet, and made a fine war-picture.  At daybreak we moved on, ascending the ridge, and by 10 a.m. the head of my column, long drawn out, reached the Benton road, and gave us command of the peninsula between the Yazoo and Big Black.  I dispatched Colonel Swan, of the Fourth Iowa Cavalry, to Haines’s Bluff, to capture that battery from the rear, and he afterward reported that he found it abandoned, its garrison having hastily retreated into Vicksburg, leaving their guns partially disabled, a magazine full of ammunition, and a hospital full of wounded and sick men.  Colonel Swan saw one of our gunboats lying about two miles below in the Yazoo, to which