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Helena, being fifteen miles long and six or seven broad, containing fifty plantations and three thousand negroes, and perhaps more since the evacuation of Edisto. Port Royal is two-thirds or three-quarters the size of St. Helena, Ladies half as large, and Hilton Head one-third as large. Paris, or Parry, has five plantations, and Coosaw, Morgan, Cat, Cane, and Barnwell have each one or two.
Howard is here, all ready to start for the Augusta Railroad at Midway. We find the enemy on the east aide of the Salkiehatchie, and cavalry in our front; but all give ground on our approach, and seem to be merely watching us. If we start on Tuesday, in one week we shall be near Orangeburg, having broken up the Augusta road from the Edisto westward twenty or twenty-five miles.
The floods of the Savannah, the swamps of the Combahee and Edisto, the "high hills" and rocks of the Santee, the flat quagmires of the Pedee and Cape Fear Rivers, were all passed in midwinter, with its floods and rains, in the face of an accumulating enemy; and, after the battles of Averysboro' and Bentonsville, we once more came out of the wilderness, to meet our friends at Goldsboro'. Even then we paused only long enough to get new clothing, to reload our wagons, again pushed on to Raleigh and beyond, until we met our enemy suing for peace, instead of war, and offering to submit to the injured laws of his and our country.
General Blair was ordered to break up this railroad, forward to the point where it crossed the Santee, and then to turn for Columbia. On the morning of the 13th I again joined the Fifteenth Corps, which crossed the North Edisto by Snilling's Bridge, and moved straight for Columbia, around the head of Caw-Caw Swamp.
On the 18th November, the camp of the Hills was broken up, and General Greene advanced with his army to the Four Holes, on the Edisto, in full confidence that the force under Marion would be adequate to keep General Stewart in check. But, by the 25th of the same month, our partisan was abandoned by all the mountaineers under Shelby and Sevier, a force of five hundred men.
To make it so, Greene moved his troops across the Edisto, and took post at Skirving's plantation, six miles in advance of Jacksonborough, and on the road which leads to Charleston. There was yet another step necessary to this object.
He leaves Cruger at Ninety-Six, who is to move, as soon as possible, with his bloody tory recruits and their property, and take a route that will put the Edisto between him and our forces. Moving down the southern bank of this river to Orangeburg, he will thence make a junction with Rawdon at Friday's Ferry." "Then they will divide their force?" said Geiger eagerly. "Yes."
The distance from Savannah to Goldsboro' is four hundred and twenty-five miles, and the route traversed embraced five large navigable rivers, viz., the Edisto, Broad, Catawba, Pedee, and Cape Fear, at either of which a comparatively small force, well-handled, should have made the passage most difficult, if not impossible.
Stephen's to the Edisto passing through both lines of the enemy's communication with Charleston, and reached Harden a distance of one hundred miles in season for his relief. His approach and arrival were totally unsuspected by the enemy, for whom he prepared an ambush in a swamp near Parker's ferry. A small body of his swiftest horse were sent out to decoy the British into the snare.
When I reached the head of column opposite Orangeburg, I found Giles A. Smith's division halted, with a battery unlimbered, exchanging shots with a party on the opposite side of the Edisto. He reported that the bridge was gone, and that the river was deep and impassable. I then directed General Blair to send a strong division below the town, some four or five miles, to effect a crossing there.
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