37. XXXVII.
THE FLANK MOVEMENT.
I HAD arrived at the crisis. Patterson was extending his left
to cut Johnston off from Ashby's Gap, and in twelve hours the
Confederate General would have found it impossible to evacuate
the Valley without a battle, if at all.
Those twelve hours I had gained by killing my horse.
Rapid arrangements were made to move through Ashby's Gap,
and in a very few hours the whole army was in motion.
Stuart picketed the rear so admirably from toward Bunker
Hill, by Smithfield, to Rippon and the Shenandoah, that a mouse
could not get through; and, safely moving within this magic cordon,
which kept off all intruders, Johnston's column left Winchester,
passed through Millwood, forded the Shenandoah at Berry's
Ferry, and defiled through the Gap.
The men were crazy with delight, singing and dancing as they
went along. The prospect of a battle seemed to intoxicate them.
Stuart brought up the rear, passing last through the Gap; and
then pushed on to the front.
The movement by the Little River turnpike was found impracticable,
and at Piedmont Station, on the Manassas Gap Railroad,
the bulk of the infantry took the cars; the rest were to follow.
Jackson's brigade went by the first train; we disembarked in the
evening at Manassas, and the column was marched to a wood of
pines in rear of Mitchell's Ford.
The roar of artillery which greeted us as we approached indicated
that the adversaries were face to face, and the decisive
struggle about to begin.
