were very wide awake and busy on that October night. At about four o'clock in the morning, a large division of confederates made ready for a surprise attack upon the Union left wing.
The men even removed their canteens, that they might make no noise. Not a shot was to be fired. The attack was to be with cold steel. One by one, they silently overpowered the pickets on the Union left and the first knowledge the sleeping corps had of the attack was when the confederates charged into their camp with set bayonets. Union soldiers awoke from their pleasant dreams of security to be bayoneted in their blankets, while others were clubbed to earth with the butts of muskets. In less time than it takes to tell it, where a moment before there had been peaceful tents and the green trees in the quiet woods, was a terrific, ghastly hand to hand struggle. The Confederates swept through the woods like a cyclone, and in half an hour's time, were in full possession of the camp.
Meanwhile, twenty miles away at the
