On the 12th Milroy reported skirmishes with Confederate cavalry on the Front Royal and Strasburg roads, adding: "I am perfectly certain of my ability to hold this place. Nothing but cavalry appears yet. Let them come." As late as the 13th, Halleck telegraphed Schenck, in answer to an inquiry, that he had no reliable information as to rebel infantry being in the Valley, and the same day Schenck wired his chief of staff at Harper's Ferry to "Instruct General Milroy to use great caution, risking nothing unnecessarily, and be prepared for falling back in good order if overmatched." Milroy advised Schenck of fighting at Winchester on the 13th, and from General Kelley, on the same day, Schenck learned for the first time that General Lee was on his way to drive Milroy out of Winchester. Schenck at once _attempted_ to telegraph Milroy to "fall back, fighting, if necessary, and to keep the road to Harper's Ferry." Halleck wired Schenck on the 14th: "It is reported that Longstreet and Ewell's corps have passed through Culpeper to Sperryville, towards the Valley."( 7) This was the first intimation that came from Halleck or Hooker that Lee's army contemplated moving in the direction of the Valley, or that there was any apprehension that it might escape the vigilance of the Army of the Potomac, supposed to be confronting it or at least watching its movements. Another dispatch came on the 14th to General Schenck as follows: "Get Milroy from Winchester to Harper's Ferry if possible. He will be 'gobbled up' if he remains, if he is not already past salvation. "A. Lincoln, "President United States." It remains to narrate what did take place at Winchester, and then, in the full light of the facts, to decided upon whom censure or credit should fall. When, on the 14th, Halleck announced that Longstreet and Ewell's corps "have passed through Culpeper to Sperryville towards the Valley," we had been fighting Ewell's corps, or parts of it, for two days at Winchester, three days' march from Culpeper, and other portions of Lee's army had reached the Valley and Martinsburg. The report that Winchester was to have been attacked on June 10th was true, but the advance of the Union cavalry south of the Rappahannock, and its battle on the 9th at Brandy Station, north of Culpeper Court House (Lee's then headquarters), so disorganized the Confederate cavalry as to cause a delay in the movement of Ewell's corps into the Valley, then proceeding _via_ Front Royal.