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Jackson and Price left Jefferson City Jackson stopping, on June 18th, at Booneville, one rendezvous for his forces, while Price continued up the river to Lexington, another rendezvous. General Lyon, leaving St. Louis on June 13th with an expeditionary force on boats, reached Booneville almost as soon as Jackson.
In returning, the column marched back by another indirect route to its old camp near Farmington, where we learned that the whole army had moved into and beyond Corinth, in pursuit of Beauregard, on the 13th of May, the very day we had captured Booneville.
As soon as the camp of my brigade was pitched at Booneville, I began to scout in every direction, to obtain a knowledge of the enemy's whereabouts and learn the ground about me.
The head of the enemy's column on the Blackland and Booneville road came in contact with my pickets three miles and a half west of Booneville. These pickets, under Lieutenant Leonidas S. Scranton, of the Second Michigan Cavalry, fell back slowly, taking advantage of every tree or other cover to fire from till they arrived at the point where the converging roads joined.
I therefore endeavored to familiarize all with our surroundings, but scarcely had matters begun to shape themselves as I desired when our annihilation was attempted by a large force of Confederate cavalry. On the morning of July 1, 1862, a cavalry command of between five and six thousand-men, under the Confederate General James R. Chalmers, advanced on two roads converging near Booneville.
"We buried Thorp in the bottom there, and some of the party cut their names on the stones that they covered his body up with, to keep the coyotes from eating up his bones. "Boyd got on to the river with us all right, and I never heerd of him after we separated at Booneville. We pulled out soon after the Indians left, but we didn't get no buffalo-meat.
Order was soon restored. I had been at Jefferson City but a few days when I was directed from department headquarters to fit out an expedition to Lexington, Booneville and Chillicothe, in order to take from the banks in those cities all the funds they had and send them to St. Louis. The western army had not yet been supplied with transportation.
For the rest of the month but little of moment occurred, and we settled down into camp at Booneville on the 26th of June, in a position which my brigade had been ordered to take up some twenty miles, in advance of the main army for the purpose of covering its front.
About twenty miles from Warsaw, on the road to Booneville, there was a German settlement, known as Cole Camp. When the troubles commenced in Missouri, a company of Home Guards was formed at Cole Camp. A few days after its formation a company of Secessionists from Warsaw made a night-march and attacked the Home Guards at daylight.
General Beauregard's evacuation of Corinth and retreat southward were accomplished in the face of a largely superior force of Union troops, and he reached the point where he intended to halt for reorganization without other loss than that sustained in the destruction of the cars and supplies at Booneville, and the capture of some stragglers and deserters that fell into our hands while we were pressing his rear from General Pope's flank.
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