We returned to camps
a little after dark at the same place we started from the morning before. It
was a cold, rainy day.
We learned that
quite a sad affair had happened in camps that day-the result of card playing.
W. K. Natcher had shot and killed George Aiken. Natcher was put under arrest.
Both from Company A.
On the above date,
Colonel T. E. Bramlette, who was stationed at Columbia with his regiment (First
Kentucky Infantry) and a part of Wolford's and Haggard's Cavalry, made the
following report of our visit to Burkesville, in a dispatch addressed to
General G. H. Thomas:
I
received a dispatch before day this morning from Burkesville that two hundred
rebel cavalry were at the ferry on the south side of the river. A few of them
crossed over and went to Boles', saw and arranged with him and his partners for
the slaughter of hogs, and returned. The courier informed me that the men who
are acting for the rebels are killing and packing a large number of hogs at
Burkesville, viz : J. B. Alexander, J. R. Ryan, James and Sam Boles, and Robert
Cross.
I
have no doubt but steamboats will be up in a few days and carry off the large
amount of pork, wheat, etc., the rebels are gathering upon the river. The
rebels are now in possession of the river from Mill Springs down. . . . . . . .
. .
I
sent Colonel Wolford to the aid of Colonel Haskins with five hundred cavalry,
embracing part of Colonel Haggard's command.
As
I have before advised, the rebels are at Mill Springs, in force about eight
thousand, but as yet have not crossed the river, and I do not believe will.1
Colonel Haskins,
with his regiment, the Fourth* Kentucky Infantry, was now encamped on the north
bank of the Cumberland, some ten miles above Mill Springs.
General Zollicoffer,
having reached the vicinity of Mill Springs late in the afternoon, established
his headquarters at one Mr. A. R. West's, within about one mile of the river.
As a portion of Captain Allison's company had gone through with the General,
and was still acting as escort for him, Allison and his men put up at the same
place.
Colonel Stanton, who
had arrived at Mill Springs with two regiments of infantry and McClellan's
Battalion and Sanders' company of cavalry, about two days in advance of
Zollicoffer, had failed to secure any boats, from the fact that Colonel Haskins
had taken the precaution to have them sunk; and for want of transporta[tion] he (Stanton)
had failed to cross the river, as directed by Zollicoffer, to cut off Haskins'
Regiment.
_______________
1 Col,
Thomas E. Bramlette to Brig.-Gen. George H. Thomas, November 29, 1861
* Afterward the Twelfth.
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