Early in the summer of 1862, General Lee proceeded to increase his fighting force so as to make it more nearly equal in number to that of McClellan, and to that end every man that could be spared from other sections in the South was called to Richmond. Numerous intrenchments were thrown up along the roads and in the fields about Richmond, thus giving it the appearance of a fortified camp. General Lee, in an address to his troops, said that the army had made its last retreat. Each army at this time numbered in the neighborhood of 100,000 men. Meanwhile, McClellan's army was acclimating itself to a Virginia summer, and now that the sweltering heat of June was coming on, the swamps about their camps were fountains of disease, which began to tell on the health of the men. The hospitals were crowded, and the death rate was appalling. McClellan proceeded to transfer all his men to the south side of the Chickahominy River, excepting the corps of Franklin and Porter, which were left on the north side of the river to await reënforcements under General McCall, which arrived about the middle of June. General Lee sent a division of his cavalry, under the command of J. E. B. Stuart, to encircle the army of McClellan. Stuart started in the direction of Fredericksburg June 12th, as if to reënforce Jackson, and the first night bivouacked in the pine woods of Hanover county. Then, turning to the east, he soon came upon a Union force, drawn up in columns of four, ready to dispute the passage of the road, and which fell back in confusion as the Confederates advanced. Stuart pushed on and fell upon a company of Federal infantry at Tunstall's Station, which surrendered at once. The Confederates quickly turned about, crossed the Chickahominy River and joined Lee's army before Richmond, thus giving Lee the desired information of the position of McClellan's army. Meanwhile, General "Stonewall" Jackson with his army was making haste to join Lee's army, and on June 25th reached Ashland, in striking distance of the Army of the Potomac. McClellan was pushing his men forward to begin the siege of Richmond. His advance guard was within four miles of the Confederate capital, and his fond hope was that within a few days at most his artillery would be belching forth its sheets of fire and lead into the beleaguered city. In front of the Union camp was a strip of pine woodland, full of ponds and marshes. The Union soldiers pressed through this thicket, met the Confederate pickets among the trees and drove them back. Upon emerging into the open the Federal troops found it filled with rifle pits, earth works, and redoubts. At once they were met with a steady and incessant fire, which continued nearly all day, and at times almost reached the magnitude of a battle. This is sometimes called the second battle of Fair Oaks, and was the prelude of the Seven Days' battles.