General Ewell, hearing the firing, soon after joined us, when Griffin was ordered up with a section of the Baltimore Light Artillery. Scarcely had he fired the first shot, however, when there issued from the woods in the rear of the cavalry three or four puffs of smoke, and as many shells came shrieking over and around us, and almost at the same time a battery on our right opened an enfilading fire that made the position untenable. “Some things can be done as well as some others!” exclaimed the General. “Captain Griffin, you will limber up and go to the rear.” By twelve o’clock the next day, Sunday, the 29th of June, the railroad had been destroyed for a considerable distance, and we suspended our labors. During the afternoon I took a stroll through the enemy’s deserted camps, and feeling fatigued, I laid down on the railroad bank and commenced to read a chapter from a little Testament I had picked up in my rambles. I had been thus engaged perhaps half an hour, when on raising my head I was astonished to behold, about two miles up the road on the other side of the Chickahominy, a locomotive and train of cars standing upon the track. Returning immediately to camp I reported the fact to Colonel Johnson, who informed General Ewell, and he, with General Trimble and several others, repaired to the spot. Glasses were brought into requisition, but to save us we could not make out what they were doing. During my absence a tree had been cut down and rolled in front of the engine to conceal their movements. For half an hour we were lost in conjecture, when suddenly the tree was removed from the track, and the train, all enveloped in flames and smoke, came rushing with fearful speed directly towards us. That it was an infernal machine of some sort instantly suggested itself, and a general stampede ensued, we forgetting at the moment that the end of the bridge towards the enemy had been burned the evening before, and therefore the impossibility of the train reaching us. On the fiery mass rushed, every moment increasing its speed, until it reached the bridge, when it plunged headlong into the shallow stream, and a vast pillar of white smoke sprang upwards into the sky, which rose higher and higher, and continually unfolded itself from within in waves of snowy vapor, until the sun was hidden from our view. The sound of the explosion instantly followed, and the earth shook and trembled as though riven by an earthquake. It was a spectacle of inexpressible grandeur, and one never to be forgotten by the few who witnessed it. For a moment we were held spell-bound; when General Ewell, who was the first to recover his presence of mind, exclaimed “That was an ordnance train. Have the troops formed immediately, for the enemy is retreating, and we will be of no further use on this side of the Chickahominy.” And his conclusion seemed correct, for now in every direction could be seen the smoke from burning stores.