Hooker sometimes indulged in sharp criticisms even in his official reports. During the battle in Lookout Valley he sent a portion of his left wing, under General Shurtz, to the assistance of General Geary; but the former became mixed as to his topography, and did not reach the battle-field until too late to aid Geary, who accomplished his task successfully. He reported, in extenuation of his failure, that he found a wide swamp in his path, and had been compelled to go around it. Hooker, in his official report, after stating General Shurtz's excuse, adds very quietly that he had thoroughly examined the country between General Shurtz's camp and the battle-field, and that no such swamp as described existed. Another criticism on some of his subordinates during the battle of Lookout Mountain reacted on Hooker in consequence of being too delicately put by him, and too broadly by Grant in an indorsement. During the assault of that mountain, General Walter Whitaker commanded the second line of the attacking column under Geary, and the formation being that of _échelon_ on the right, Whitaker was some distance in the rear. When Geary's front line reached and took the rebel position, a large number of prisoners and several cannon were captured, and turned over by the front line to Whitaker. Whitaker sent the prisoners to the rear, secured them and the guns; and in his official report represented them as his captures. Geary, in his report, mentioned, as he had a perfect right to do, the captures as his, and thus the reports showed double the list of actual captures. Hooker, in a quiet, sarcastic vein, whose irony is hardly visible to those not acquainted with the circumstances, alluded to this double report, and gave the full number of captured guns and men with an ironical exclamation point at the end of the sentence. Grant turned the joke on Hooker by indorsing his report, with the statement that the amount of captured material enumerated exceeded the actual captures by the whole army! When Burnside was in command of the Army of the Potomac he executed an order, which was afterward suppressed by the President, dismissing several officers of his army from the service for various reasons. Among the number was General Hooker, dismissed, as might naturally be supposed, for having criticised the action of his commanding general at Fredericksburg. The order, which was known as "General Order No. 8," was not carried into effect, and only saw the light through the treachery of a clerk in the adjutant general's office of the army. Instead of the order being carried out, Burnside soon after resigned, and Hooker assumed command of his army.