The day had been a mild one in comparison with the fortnight preceding, and rain set in early in the evening. The surface of the clayey roads soon became very slippery, then cut into deep ruts, and the moisture was just enough to give the mud the consistency of tenacious putty. The teams, half starved, were very weak, and it seemed as if they would never mount the hills before them, which were the southern end of the ridge of Bay's Mountain, separating the Holston valley from the Nolachucky. Three or four teams had to be united to drag up a single cannon or caisson, and the time as well as the distance was thus trebled or quadrupled. In some instances more than twenty horses were thus hitched to a single piece, besides having infantrymen at the wheels as thick as they could cluster, pushing and lifting. The column which was halted thus waiting for the wagon trains and artillery to climb a hill, grew weary of standing. The men would break ranks and sit down in the fence corners, where they built little camp-fires, and, rainy as it was, they fell asleep leaning against each other in these little bivouacs. Then would come word from the front to close up, and the regimental officers would give the command to fall in. The men would rouse themselves, the column would march, perhaps less than a hundred yards, when the road would be blocked again, the men would again seek the fence corners and stir up the fires that had been left by those who were now in advance. Thus in cold and wet and weariness the night wore on, till when day broke about six o'clock next morning we had put a distance of less than two miles between us and the village, and Willich's division had barely reached the first wooded ridge beyond the town. During all the last hours of the night we were anxious lest we should be attacked by the enemy, who by crowning the hills above the road would have had us at great disadvantage. I had concerted with General Willich a plan of action if we were assailed, but the enemy took no advantage of our situation, and I have always believed that as the meeting at Dandridge was a mutual surprise, by a similar coincidence both parties were retiring at the same time. Our cavalry moved off toward New Market at daybreak, but it was not till late in the forenoon, when we had toiled on several miles further, that the Confederate cavalry approached our infantry rear-guard and accompanied its march for a time with some light skirmishing.