comrades I expected to see his rashness punished at any moment by death or capture.  He finally got quite near the retreating Confederates, when suddenly they made a dash at him, but he was fully alive to such a move, and ran back, apparently uninjured, to his friends.  About this time a small squad of men reached the top of Lookout and planted the Stars and Stripes on its very crest.  Just then a cloud settled down on the mountain, and a heavy bank of fog obscured its whole face.

After the view was lost the sharp rattle of musketry continued some time, but practically the fight had been already won by Hooker’s men, the enemy only holding on with a rear-guard to assure his retreat across Chattanooga Valley to Missionary Ridge.  Later we heard very heavy cannonading, and fearing that Hooker was in trouble I sent a staff-officer to find out whether he needed assistance, which I thought could be given by a demonstration toward Rossville.  The officer soon returned with the report that Hooker was all right, that the cannonading was only a part of a little rear-guard fight, two sections of artillery making all the noise, the reverberations from point to point in the adjacent mountains echoing and reechoing till it seemed that at least fifty guns were engaged.

On the morning of the 25th of November Bragg’s entire army was holding only the line of Missionary Ridge, and our troops, being now practically connected from Sherman to Hooker, confronted it with the Army of the Cumberland in the centre—­bowed out along the front of Wood’s division and mine.  Early in the day Sherman, with great determination and persistence, made an attempt to carry the high ground near the tunnel, first gaining and then losing advantage, but his attack was not crowned with the success anticipated.  Meanwhile Hooker and Palmer were swinging across Chattanooga Valley, using me as a pivot for the purpose of crossing Missionary Ridge in the neighborhood of Rossville.  In the early part of the day I had driven in the Confederate pickets in my front, so as to prolong my line of battle on that of Wood, the necessity of continuing to refuse my right having been obviated by the capture of Lookout Mountain and the advance of Palmer.

About 2 o’clock orders came to carry the line at the foot of the ridge, attacking at a signal of six guns.  I had few changes or new dispositions to make.  Wagner’s brigade, which was next to Wood’s division, was formed in double lines, and Harker’s brigade took the same formation on Wagner’s right.  Colonel F. T. Sherman’s brigade came on Harker’s right, formed in a column of attack, with a front of three regiments, he having nine.  My whole front was covered with a heavy line of skirmishers.  These dispositions made, my right rested a little distance south of Moore’s road, my left joined Wood over toward Orchard Knob, while my centre was opposite Thurman’s house —­the headquarters of General Bragg—­on Missionary Ridge.  A small stream of water ran parallel to my front, as far as which the ground was covered by a thin patch of timber, and beyond the edge of the timber was an open plain to the foot of Missionary Ridge, varying in width from four to nine hundred yards.  At the foot of the ridge was the enemy’s first line of rifle-pits; at a point midway up its face, another line, incomplete; and on the crest was a third line, in which Bragg had massed his artillery.