[Illustration: COMBAT AT RICH MOUNTAIN.]

Garnett thought the pass over Rich Mountain much the stronger and
more easily held, and he therefore intrenched there about 1300 of
his men and four cannon, under command of Lieutenant-Colonel Pegram.
[Footnote: Official Records, vol. ii. p. 268.] The position chosen
was on a spur of the mountain near its western base, and it was
rudely fortified with breastworks of logs covered with an abatis of
slashed timber along its front. The remainder of his force he placed
in a similar fortified position on the road at Laurel Mountain,
where he also had four guns, of which one was rifled. Here he
commanded in person. His depot of supplies was at Beverly, which was
sixteen miles from the Laurel Mountain position and five from that
at Rich Mountain. He was pretty accurately informed of McClellan's
forces and movements, and his preparations had barely been completed
by the 9th of July, when the Union general appeared in his front.
[Footnote: _Id_., pp. 241, 248.]

McClellan entered West Virginia in person on the 21st of June, and
on the 23d issued from Grafton a proclamation to the inhabitants.
[Footnote: _Id_., pp. 194, 196.] He had gradually collected his
forces along the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, and these, at the time
of the affair at Rich Mountain, consisted of sixteen Ohio regiments,
nine from Indiana, and two from West Virginia; in all, twenty-seven
regiments with four batteries of artillery of six guns each, two
troops of cavalry, and an independent company of riflemen. Of his
batteries, one was of the regular army, and another, a company of
regulars (Company I, Fourth U. S. Artillery), was with him awaiting
mountain howitzers, which arrived a little later. [Footnote: As part
of the troops were State troops not mustered into the United States