fourth the whole army was put in motion toward Yorktown, where heavy works, strongly manned, were known to exist. The sharp shooters led the advance of the column on the road by which the Fifth Corps advanced, being that nearest the York river. Slight resistance was made by the enemy's cavalry at various points, but no casualties were experienced by Co. F on that day.

Cockeysville, a small hamlet some sixteen miles from Hampton, was reached, and the tired men of Co. F laid down in bivouac for the first time. Heretofore their camps, cheerless and devoid of home comforts as they sometimes were, had had some element of permanence; this was quite another thing, and what wonder if thoughts of home and home comforts flitted through their minds. Then, too, all supposed that on the morrow would occur a terrible battle (for the siege of Yorktown was not then anticipated); nothing less than immediate and desperate assault was contemplated by the men, and, as some complimentary remarks had been made to the regiment, and especial allusion to the effect those five shooting rifles, held in such trusty and skillful hands, would have in a charge, they felt that in the coming battle their place would be a hot and dangerous, as well as an honorable one. At daybreak on the morning of the fifth, in a soaking rain storm, the army resumed its march, the sharp shooters still in the advance, searching suspicious patches of woods, streaming out from the road to farm houses, hurrying over and around little knolls behind which danger might lurk, while now and then came the crack of rifles from a group across a field, telling of the presence of hostile cavalry watching the advance of the invaders. More strenuous resistance was met with than on the day before, but the rebels fell back steadily, if slowly. The rain fell continuously and the roads became difficult of passage for troops. The sharp shooters, however, fared better in this respect than troops of the line, for deployed as skirmishers, covering a large front, they could pick their way with comparative ease. At ten o'clock A. M., all resistance by rebel cavalry having ceased, the skirmishers emerged from dense woods and found themselves immediately in front of the heavy earth works before Yorktown. They were at once saluted by the enemy's artillery, and were now for the first time under the fire of shell.

Dashing forward one or two hundred yards, the skirmishers took position along and behind the crest of a slight elevation crowned by hedges and scattered clumps of bushes. The men of Co. F found themselves in a peach orchard surrounding a large farm house with its out-buildings. In and about these buildings, and along a fence running westwardly from the cluster of houses, Co. F formed its line, at a distance of some five hundred yards from a powerful line of breastworks running from the main fort in front of Yorktown to the low ground about the head of Warwick creek.

Once in position, Co. F went at its work as steadily and coolly as veterans. Under the direction of a field officer, who watched the result with his glass, a few shots were fired by picked men at spots in the exterior slope of the works to ascertain the exact range, which was then announced and the order given, "Commence firing."

The rebels, ensconced in fancied security behind their strong works, and who up to that time had kept up a constant and heavy fire from their artillery, while their infantry lined the parapets, soon found reason to make themselves less conspicuous and to modify very essentially the tone of their remarks, which had been the reverse of complimentary. Gun after gun was silenced and abandoned, until within an hour every embrasure within a range of a thousand yards to the right and left was tenantless and silent. Their infantry, which at first responded with a vigorous fire, found that exposure of a head meant grave danger, if not death.

Occasionally a man would be found, who, carried away by his enthusiasm, would mount the parapet and with taunting cries seem to mock the Union marksmen, but no sooner would he appear than a score of rifles would be brought to bear, and he was fortunate indeed if he escaped with his life. At this point occurred the first casualty among the men of Co. F, Corp. C. W. Peck receiving a severe wound. During the day a small body of horsemen, apparently the staff and escort of a general officer, appeared passing from the village of Yorktown, behind the line of breastworks before spoken of, towards their right. When first observed little more than the heads of the riders were visible above the breastworks; near the western end of their line, however, the ground on which they were riding was higher, thus bringing them into plainer view, and as they reached this point every rifle was brought into use, and it appeared to observers that at least half the saddles in that little band were emptied before they could pass over the exposed fifty yards that lay between them and safety. While the sharp shooters had been successful in silencing the fire of the enemy's cannon, and almost entirely so that of their infantry, a few of the rebel marksmen, who occupied small rifle pits in advance of their line of works, kept up an annoying fire, from which the Union artillerists suffered severely.

These little strongholds had been constructed at leisure, were in carefully selected positions, usually behind a cover of natural or artificially planted bushes, and it was almost impossible to dislodge their occupants; every puff of smoke from one of them was, of course, the signal for a heavy fire of Union rifles on that spot; but sharp shooters who are worthy of the name will not continue long to fire at what they cannot see, and so, after one or two shots, the men would devote their attention to some other point, when the Confederate gunner, having remained quite at his ease behind his shelter, would peer out from behind his screen of bushes, select his mark, and renew his fire.

One spot was marked as the hiding place of a particularly obnoxious and skillful rifleman, and to him, Private Ide of Co. E of New Hampshire, who occupied a commanding position near the corner of an out house, devoted himself. Ide was one of the few men who still carried his telescopic target rifle. Several shots were exchanged between these men, and it began to take the form of a personal affair and was watched with the keenest interest by those not otherwise engaged, but fortune first smiled on the rebel, and Ide fell dead, shot through the forehead while in the act of raising his rifle to an aim. His fall was seen by the enemy, who raised a shout of exultation. It was short, however, for an officer, taking the loaded rifle from the dead man's hand, and watching his opportunity through the strong telescope, soon saw the triumphant rebel, made bold by his success, raise himself into view; it was a fatal exposure and he fell apparently dead.

At nine o'clock P. M. the sharp shooters were relieved by another regiment and retired to a point about half a mile in the rear, where the tired soldiers lay down after nearly twenty hours of continual marching and fighting. The fine position they had gained and held through the day, was regained, however, by the rebels by a night sally and was not reoccupied by the Union forces again for several days. On the next day, Gen. Porter, commanding the division, addressed the following highly complimentary letter to Col. Berdan: