Numbers 213.

Report of Colonel Francis C. Deimling, Tenth Missouri Infantry.

HDQRS. TENTH REGIMENT MISSOURI INFANTRY, Camp near Chattanooga, Tennessee, November 29, 1863.

SIR: I have the honor to report the part taken by my regiment in the recent movement of the Fifteenth Army Corps in an engagement at Missionary Ridge.

At 12.30 of the morning of the 24th instant, in pursuance of orders from division headquarters, the Tenth Regiment Missouri Infantry, as a part of the Second Brigade, Third Division, Fifteenth Army Corps, moved from the present camp to the Tennessee River, near the mouth of West Chickamauga Creek. About 4.30 a. m. the regiment commenced crossing the river in pontoon-boats, and finished about dawn, and took position in line in rear of the other regiments of the brigade on the river bottom. About 7 a. m., by order of Colonel G. B. Raum, commanding brigade, I moved the regiment by the right flank to the right, and formed along the line of rifle-pits, facing down the river, and commenced deploying three companies as skirmishers to the front of said position. Before this movement was completed it was countermanded by same authority, and the regiment was marched by the left flank and formed in front of the brigade it being ployed into column of regiments, and held as reserve to the First Brigade deployed in rear of a line of rifle-pits facing toward the Missionary Ridge).

At noon the regiment, in common with the other regiments of the division, was ployed into close column by division, and marched to the front toward Missionary Ridge. On arriving at the crossing of the railroad, and at the foot of the ridge, it marched by the left flank and took position in line of battle in rear of the Third Brigade. About sundown the regiment (and brigade) was ordered down the ridge and took position in a piece of woods on the left of the road to the river, and about half a mile from the foot of the ridge, where it bivouacked for the night.

Between 10 and 11 o'clock of the 25th instant, the regiment, by order of Colonel G. B. Raum, marched from the last-mentioned position and formed on the left of the brigade, in front of a line of earthworks, occupied by a part of the Fourth Division, Fifteenth Army Corps, at the foot of Missionary Ridge, and at right angles to the same, facing toward Chattanooga. About 1 p. m. the brigade was ployed into close column by division, in two lines, the Tenth Missouri Infantry being on the left of the second line, and in that formation advanced about 500 yards, when it was moved by the left flank around the rocky base of a ridge (under an extremely heavy fire of shell and spherical case-shot from a rebel battery on Tunnel Hill), and along a road near the foot of a hill parallel with and to the left of Tunnel Hill, it there being formed on the left of the Fifty-sixth Regiment Illinois Infantry, as a part of the reserve to the Third Brigade, where it was exposed to a heavy fire from the crest of the ridge. The Third Brigade, and the Seventeenth Iowa and Eightieth Ohio Regiments, of the Second Brigade (the last named regiments forming the first reserve line), being pressed by the enemy in heavy force, were compelled to retire down the hill upon the Tenth Missouri Infantry, which advanced across a fence and took position to cover their retreat and check the pursuing enemy. About this time I was