and was so dark that it was with difficulty that pickets could be
relieved. Just at daybreak the rebel advance struck the pickets of
the Union lines, and several musket shots rang out with great
distinctness, and in quick succession, it being the first rebel shot
that the boys had ever heard. Then all was quiet for a time. The
firing soon commenced again, nearer and more distinct than at first,
and thicker and faster as the rebel advance encountered the Union
pickets. The Second Minnesota had entered the woods and passing
through the Tenth Indiana, then out of ammunition and retiring and no
longer firing. The enemy, emboldened by the cessation and mistaking
its cause, assumed they had the Yanks on the run, advanced to the rail
fence separating the woods from the field just as the Second Minnesota
was doing the same, and while the rebels got there first, they were
also first to get away and make a run to their rear. But before
they ran their firing was resumed and Minnesotians got busy and the
Fifteenth Mississippi and the Sixteenth Alabama regiments were made
to feel that they had run up against something. To the right of the
Second were two of Kinney's cannon and to their right was the Ninth
Ohio. The mist and smoke which hung closely was too thick to see
through, but by lying down it was possible to look under the smoke and
to see the first rebel line, and that it was in bad shape, and back of
it and down on the low ground a second line, with their third line
on the high ground on the further side of the field. That the Second
Minnesota was in close contact with the enemy was evident all along
its line, blasts of fire and belching smoke coming across the fence
from Mississippi muskets. The contest was at times hand to hand--the
Second Minnesota and the rebels running their guns through the fence,
firing and using the bayonet when opportunity offered. The firing was
very brisk for some time when it was suddenly discovered that
the enemy had disappeared. The battle was over, the Johnnies had