Sheridan, on his part, had gone nearly as far as he intended, but as he meant presently to begin with his cavalry above Staunton the work of destroying the value of the whole valley to the Confederate army, on the 29th he ordered Wright and Emory to Mount Crawford to support Torbert in this work. Grant, who, ever since he reached the James, had cast longing eyes upon the Virginia Central railway, as well as upon the great junction at Gordonsville, now strongly desired Sheridan to go to Staunton or Charlottesville, but Sheridan set himself firmly against the plan on account of the daily increasing difficulty of supplying his army and the great force that must be wasted in any attempt to keep open a line of communication longer or more exposed than that he already had to maintain. As an alternative, Sheridan, who seems to have thought Early had quitted the valley for good, proposed to bring the Valley campaign to an end with the destruction of the crops, and then to move with his main force to join Grant on the James. Grant, at once agreeing to this, directed Sheridan to keep Crook in the valley and to transfer the rest of his force to the armies before Richmond. On the morning of the 6th of October Sheridan faced about and began moving down the valley, the infantry leading in the inverse order of its advance, and the cavalry bringing up the rear in one long line that reached from mountain to mountain, busied in burning as it marched the mills, the barns, and everything edible by man or beast. From the Blue Ridge to the Shenandoah Mountains, nothing was spared that might be of use to the Confederates in prolonging the war. When Early discovered this he followed on the morning of the 7th of October, with his whole force, including Kershaw, as well as the cavalry brigade of Rosser, sent by Lee from Petersburg. The command of all the cavalry being given to Rosser, he at once began treading on the heels of Torbert. On the 9th, at Tom's Brook, Torbert, under the energetic orders of Sheridan to whip the Confederate cavalry or get whipped himself, turned on Rosser, and, after a sharp fight, completely overwhelmed him and hotly pursued his flying columns more than twenty miles up the valley. Several hundred prisoners, eleven guns with their caissons, and many wagons --tersely described by Sheridan "as almost everything on wheels"--fell into the hands of the captors. But more important even than these trophies, confidence in Rosser's cavalry was destroyed at a blow, and its early prestige wiped out forever. On the 10th of October Sheridan once more crossed Cedar Creek and went into camp, Emory holding the right or west of the valley road, Crook on the left or east of the road, and the cavalry covering the flanks. Wright took up the line of march by Front Royal on Washington.