I do not think it best to send a brigade of infantry away without first reporting so to you. I can add the District of Columbia cavalry to that of Gregg's division as well as not.

Respectfully,

G. K. WARREN,

Major-General.

HEADQUARTERS ARMY OF THE POTOMAC,
August 20, 1864 - 11.30 a. m.

Major-General WARREN,

Commanding Fifth Corps:

Your dispatch dated 10 a. m. is received. You need not send the infantry with the cavalry to Reams' Station. Gregg's brigade, strengthened by such other cavalry as you can add to it, will be sufficient. Have the working party of 200 men from the quartermaster's department at City Point to be used in destroying the railroad reached you yet? They should accompany the cavalry.

A. A. HUMPHREYS,

Major-General and Chief of Staff.

HEADQUARTERS FIFTH ARMY CORPS,
August 20, 1864 - 11.35 a. m.

General HUMPHREYS:

Colonel Spear says he thinks the enemy, up to last night at least, had only a small brigade of cavalry on our left. He thinks there were none at Reams' Station last night. I can send Colonel Spear out at once and he is anxious; he can go with 700 men. He ranks Colonel Stedman. Colonel Stedman's command, I understand, though tired, is ready to march.

Respectfully,

G. K. WARREN,

Major-General.

HEADQUARTERS FIFTH ARMY CORPS,
August 20, 1864 - 11.20 a. m.

General HUMPHREYS:

I have just received the dispatch you sent here to General Parke.* He is not here yet. The dispatch I sent you gives our picket-line quite nearly. It runs nearly east and west from the Strong house. I relieve it there rejoins the old line. General Potter's command now holds it, and he is reconnoitering to the front. The enemy's pickets are in the same place on the railroad. My cavalry on the Vaughan road, as we call it, near Flowers', see nothing but the enemy's cavalry. There are no cavalry movements south of us visible. A rebel ambulance man was captured, who said he had heard said their cavalry in some force moved out of Petersburg this morning, but he did not see them. The enemy must have lost considerably in killed and wounded yesterday, but the woods prevent our getting any estimate of their dead. Colonel Spear reports to me that from his own reconnaissance he has found the position of the enemy's cavalry, and that he has now enough force to attack and rout them. Expecting General Gregg's cavalry for some

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* See 11 a. m., p.346.

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