Smith, and ordered it to be executed. The boats were completed by
the end of a week, and on the night of the 26th of October the
expedition started under the command of General Smith in person.
Brigadier-Generals Hazen and Turchin and Colonel T. R. Stanley of
the Eighteenth Ohio [Footnote: Colonel Stanley had been one of my
associates in the Ohio Senate in the winter of 1860-61. On the
origin and development of the plan and its complete execution, see
Reports of General Smith and others, Official Records, vol. xxxi.
pt. i. pp. 77-137.] were assigned to command the three detachments
of troops and boats assigned to the duty, and reported to Smith.
Covered by the darkness and in absolute silence, they were to float
down the stream which flowed around Moccasin Point in a great curve
under the base of Lookout, on which batteries commanded long reaches
of the river both above and below. Reaching the ferry on the enemy's
side, they would land and carry the picket posts with a rush, Hazen
to move to the left and seize the ridge facing the mountain, and
Turchin to do the like toward the right, facing down stream. Colonel
Stanley's detachment had the charge of the boats, which were fitted
with row-locks and oars, and these were to do the ferrying when the
proper place was reached. Each boat contained a corporal and four
men as a crew, and twenty-five armed soldiers. They were fifty in
number, besides two flatboats to be used as a ferry to cross the
artillery. The whole force consisted of 5000 men and three batteries
of artillery. The boats carried about a third of the whole, and the
principal columns marched by the road on the north bank to the
places assigned and were concealed in the forest. The plan worked
beautifully. Starting at three o'clock in the morning of the 27th,
the darkness of the night and a slight fog hid the boats from the
Confederate pickets. The oars were only used to keep the boats in
proper position in the current, and great care was taken to move