To General Howard and his command, to General Jeff.  C. Davis and his, I am more than usually indebted for the intelligence of commanders and fidelity of commands.  The brigade of Colonel Bushbeck, belonging to the Eleventh Corps, which was the first to come out of Chattanooga to my flank, fought at the Tunnel Hill, in connection with General Ewing’s division, and displayed a courage almost amounting to rashness.  Following the enemy almost to the tunnel-gorge, it lost many valuable lives, prominent among them Lieutenant-Colonel Taft, spoken of as a most gallant soldier.

In General Howard throughout I found a polished and Christian gentleman, exhibiting the highest and most chivalric traits of the soldier.  General Davis handled his division with artistic skill, more especially at the moment we encountered the enemy’s rear-guard, near Graysville, at nightfall.  I must award to this division the credit of the best order during our movement through East Tennessee, when long marches and the necessity of foraging to the right and left gave some reason for disordered ranks: 

Inasmuch as exception may be taken to my explanation of the temporary confusion, during the battle of Chattanooga, of the two brigades of General Matthias and Colonel Raum, I will here state that I saw the whole; and attach no blame to any one.  Accidents will happen in battle, as elsewhere; and at the point where they so manfully went to relieve the pressure on other parts of our assaulting line, they exposed themselves unconsciously to an enemy vastly superior in force, and favored by the shape of the ground.  Had that enemy come out on equal terms, those brigades would have shown their mettle, which has been tried more than once before and stood the test of fire.  They reformed their ranks, and were ready to support General Ewing’s division in a very few minutes; and the circumstance would have hardly called for notice on my part, had not others reported what was seen from Chattanooga, a distance of nearly five miles, from where could only be seen the troops in the open field in which this affair occurred.

I now subjoin the best report of casualties I am able to compile from the records thus far received: 

Killed; Wounded; and Missing...............  1949

No report from General Davis’s division, but loss is small.

Among the killed were some of our most valuable officers:  Colonels Putnam, Ninety-third Illinois; O’Meara, Ninetieth Illinois; and Torrence, Thirtieth Iowa; Lieutenant-Colonel-Taft, of the Eleventh Corps; and Major Bushnell, Thirteenth Illinois.

Among the wounded are Brigadier-Generals Giles A. Smith, Corse, and Matthias; Colonel Raum; Colonel Waugelin, Twelfth Missouri; Lieutenant-Colonel Partridge, Thirteenth Illinois; Major P. I. Welsh, Fifty-sixth Illinois; and Major Nathan McAlla, Tenth Iowa.

Among the missing is Lieutenant-Colonel Archer, Seventeenth Iowa.