I was to cross the country, some thirty miles with a team of fast horses and a guide, as no trains were supposed to be on the track, it being Sunday. But there was in preparation a special train which left at 1.30 p. m. I waited and went on it. At Grimsby at 2.10 p. m. intelligence was given of Colonel Booker having passed on his way to Hamilton. I inferred that excessive zeal for the good of his battalion, nothing to the contrary in his conduct or character being known to me, had induced the journey to urge up provisions and field equipments. Yet the fact of his leaving his command before the enemy also suggested itself as inexplicable. I assert with all the emphasis which language admits, that I expected to have good reports to make of Colonel Booker’s eminent military services, until dismal specks discolored the floating rumours that were met about the Welland Railway. At Port Colborne, on the platform, up the street, along the canal wharf, everywhere that day and next day statements were pressed on me both by Hamilton and Toronto volunteers. I hesitated to believe; questioned, cross questioned, sifted, and still doubted, until many refused to reply farther, alleging that I seemed not to believe anything they said implicating Colonel Booker. This gentleman’s name and conduct fills too much of the Narrative. But in the mismanagement of the action of June 2nd, in the subsequent aspersions thrown on the 13th battalion by Lt.-Col. Booker, and in the prominence through a concatenation of circumstances, given to the combat at Limestone Ridge, as the crisis of the short, prompt, decisive campaign, the reputation of the 13th battalion; the good name of Hamilton city which sent it forth to the fight; the reputation of the Queen’s Own, of Toronto city which gave them to the service; of the York and Caledonia Rifles; of the Province of Canada whose sons they were a sample of—all were injuriously affected through Lt.-Col. Booker, unless the facts would bear proof that his misconduct was only personal. I have proved that, beyond farther cavil, the volunteers engaged at Limestone Ridge were brave alike, and alike deserving of a historical good name in the present day, and in time to come. To establish this on incontestable grounds I have made many journeys, questioned many persons, balanced conflicting statements, and incurred an unprofitable delay in getting this work before the public; a delay without financial recompense to me as an author, but favorable to the main object which I had in view, a vindication of the Militia Volunteers of Canada.