Today in History:

764 Series I Volume XL-I Serial 80 - Richmond, Petersburg Part I

Page 764 OPERATIONS IN SE. VA. AND N. C. Chapter LII.

I lost 1 man wounded in this charge; established my picket-line as far as was wished; captured 37 privates and non-commissioned officers, 1 captain and 1 lieutenant.

I have the honor to be, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

GEO. K. GRIGGS,

Commanding Thirty-eighth Virginia Regiment.

Colonel W. H. TAYLOR.


Numbers 298. Report of Captain Benjamin L. Farinholt, Fifty-third Virginia Infantry, of operations June 25.

[JUNE --, 1864.]

GENERAL: I have the honor to make the following report of the engagement which took place Saturday, 25th of June:

I have regularly assigned to duty at this post [Staunton River bridge] six companies of reserves, numbering in all 296 men.

On Thursday, the 23rd instant, 10 p. m., I received a dispatch from General Lee, through you, that a large body of the enemy's cavalry were moving in this direction; to make every possible preparation immediately. By the trains at 12 o'clock that night I sent off orderlies with circulars, urging the citizens of Halifax, Charlotte, and Mecklenburg to assemble for the defense of this bridge, and ordering all local companies to report immediately.

On Friday, 24th, I had, in addition to my usual details for fatigue, nearly my entire battalion, together with what citizens and negroes I could collect and impress, busily at work on the intrenchments, and on Saturday morning, 25th, about 10 o'clock I had received, citizens and soldiers inclusive, 642 re-enforcements. Of these about 150 were regulars, organized from different commands, my whole command numbering, from the above statement, 938 men. My scouts and pickets, citizens mounted as cavalry, reported the enemy close in this vicinity at 12 m., and I was at this time and up to the hour of their arrival busily engaged in constructing rifle-pits on the north side of the river. My cavalry, numbering seventy-five, I had thrown out at the fords above and below, guarding against and to warn me of a flank movement. The enemy appeared in my front at 3.45 p. m., and immediately on their approaching to place their artillery in position I opened on them with a 3-inch rifled gun (my artillery consisting of this gun, together with two smooth-bore 12-pounders and three iron 6-pounders), but the shot, from some inexplicable defect in the gun, fell far short of the mark. The enemy, then approaching to within a mile of my main redoubt and taking possession of a very commanding hill, immediately opened with rifled Parrotts and 12-pounder Napoleons, and very soon getting exact range of my battery threw their shell and canister into my artillerymen and their supports with great precision. At the same time they formed two regiments of dismounted cavalry on each side of the railroad in line of battle, with a thick line of skirmishers in front, and advanced over the flat toward the mouth of the bridge, my artillery playing vigorously on them all them all the while. At this juncture I had but four small companies on the north side of the river (one each side of the bridge). I immediately


Page 764 OPERATIONS IN SE. VA. AND N. C. Chapter LII.