Colonel Collect suffering from the effects of excessive fatigue and sunstroke, ordered his men to the rear, where the main body of his regiment had at this time assembled.

The loss to the regiment in the affair here reported was, in killed, wounded, and missing, 152.*

The regiment marched on the night of the 27th with the force referred to via Fairfax Station and the Braddock road to Annandale, thence by the Little River pike, arriving at their camp near Cloud's Mill at 12 m. the day following, August 28.

Very respectfully,

WM. HENRY, JR.,

Major, First New Jersey Volunteers.

Colonel A. T. A. TORBERT,

First New Jersey Volunteers, Commanding Brigade.

Numbers 120. Report of Colonel Samuel L. Buck, Second New Jersey Infantry, of action at Bull Run Bridge.

HEADQUARTERS SECOND NEW JERSEY VOLUNTEERS,
Camp near Fairfax Court-House, August 31, 1862.

SIR: I would respectfully report the following movements of my command in the engagement at Manassas Junction on Wednesday, the 27th instant:

Pursuant to orders received from headquarters of the brigade the regiment left camp about 4 o'clock a. m. and proceeded to California Station, on the Orange and Alexandria Railroad, and took the cars for Union Mills, with orders from General Hancock to hold the bridge over Bull Run at all hazards. Arrived at the bridge, the regiment crossed and took position on the hills commanding it. In a few minutes General Taylor arrived and immediately ordered an advance. Skirmishers were thrown forward, and when the regiment reached the top of the hill overlooking the plain, the general ordered the men to leave their blankets, shelter-tents, and haversacks, containing three days' rations, and, as it was impossible to obtain them when we fell back, these articles were lost. We then advanced in column of division some three-quarters of a mile, when we discovered a force of artillery and cavalry on our right and cavalry on the left, but for the want of a proper field glass could not distinguish whether they were friends or foes.

We, however, had barely deployed into line and advanced a short distance when the enemy on the right (as the force proved to be) opened upon us with shell and shrapnel and a moment later from the left and center, thus placing us within the concentrated fire of three batteries. We, however, advanced until within some 300 yards of the earthworks, when the fire was so heavy and our force so manifestly inferior and the cavalry of the enemy evidently endeavoring to cut off our retreat at the bridge, that the order was given to retreat, which was done in good order under a very heavy fire, and succeeded in crossing the bridge. Here we found the Eleventh and Twelfth Ohio Regiments, and with them made a stand at the bridge until the superior numbers of the enemy forced us to retire, and about 6 o'clock reached Fairfax Station, at

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*But see p. 260.

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