“By jinks! but I thought you were done for when I saw you fall into the Potomac and float down to Harrison Island!” exclaimed Leroy. “You are a sight for sore eyes!” and he fairly hugged his friend. Andy had to tell his story twice, once to the officers and again to the mess he had joined. The winter quarters of the Grays had been close to the shelter of a belt of timber land. Here the cavalrymen had built up houses of logs and mud, covered over in many cases with bits of canvas and whatever of boards came handy. The floors were strewn with pine brush, some brush, covered with rubber cloths, serving also for beds. Some of the houses had little ovens built of sun-dried bricks, and two had sheet-iron wood stoves. All told, the boys in gray had passed a fairly comfortable winter. “The worst part was when we went out with the pickets,” said Leroy. “That week was a corker, and I was detailed up at the top of yonder hill, to carry the news back in case there was an alarm. It rained and snowed nearly all the time, and one night I was nearly blown away, and an old tree came down within ten yards of me and the horse. That was a close call, I can tell you, and I didn’t get over it for hours. You can thank your stars and bars you were at home in a warm bed.” The orders to move came that night, at nine o’clock. “Roll call at five o’clock, boys; half an hour for breakfast, and the column moves at six sharp. Heavy marching orders. We are not coming back, but the general’s order is not to carry any more than necessary.” “Heavy marching order, but don’t carry more than what is necessary,” mused Andy. “That looks as if we were going to get along as fast as possible. Where are we going, Bosdell?” “Don’t know, but I heard something said about crossing the Rappahannock. My opinion is the Yankees are going to leave Washington by boat and land at Urbanna, and then try to march overland to Richmond.” “We can get to Urbanna in one day, if we ride hard,” said Leroy. “But can enough of our troops get there?” “We might stop them at the York River,” said Andy, “that is, if we could hurry and steal a march around their right flank.” History has shown how near Bosdell’s guess was to being right. One of the first plans of the campaign was to land at Urbanna, situated some fifty miles above Fortress Monroe, but delays and military operations in the interior of Virginia made a change necessary, and the Union forces went down to the end of the peninsula, as previously described.