As my lines were being rearranged, it was suggested to me to put
Crook into the battle, but so strongly had I set my heart on using
him to take possession of the Valley pike and cut off the enemy, that
I resisted this advice, hoping that the necessity for putting him in
would be obviated by the attack near Stephenson's depot that
Torbert's cavalry was to make, and from which I was momentarily
expecting to hear. No news of Torbert's progress came, however, so,
yielding at last, I directed Crook to take post on the right of the
Nineteenth Corps and, when the action was renewed, to push his
command forward as a turning-column in conjunction with Emory. After
some delay in the annoying defile, Crook got his men up, and posting
Colonel Thoburn's division on the prolongation of the Nineteenth
Corps, he formed Colonel Duval's division to the right of Thoburn.
Here I joined Crook, informing him that I had just got word that
Torbert was driving the enemy in confusion along the Martinsburg pike
toward Winchester; at the same time I directed him to attack the
moment all of Duval's men were in line. Wright was instructed to
advance in concert with Crook, by swinging Emory and the right of the
Sixth Corps to the left together in a half-wheel. Then leaving
Crook, I rode along the Sixth and Nineteenth corps, the open ground
over which they were passing affording a rare opportunity to witness
the precision with which the attack was taken up from right to left.
Crook's success began the moment he started to turn the enemy's left;
and assured by the fact that Torbert had stampeded the Confederate
cavalry and thrown Breckenridge's infantry into such disorder that it
could do little to prevent the envelopment of Gordon's left, Crook
pressed forward without even a halt.

Both Emory and Wright took up the fight as ordered, and as they did