MARCH 20. Friday. I was up at reveille as usual and went down to the ditch. To my surprise I saw a big oak just outside the channel washed up by the roots. The tree was about three feet in diameter. Another of nearly the same size washed out before noon. I went fishing this morning. We can see fish weighing from forty to one hundred pounds, working up against the current. I threw my spear at them, but they were too far off. I saw a laughable incident this evening in front of McPherson’s headquarters. Some of the boys were trying to fasten a yawl to a tree and float down to where the fish were showing themselves in an eddy. The first time they missed the tree and went whirling into the center of the channel and came very near upsetting. They finally brought it to, and after a good deal of hard work, got it into position for another trial. This time they were successful, caught a projecting limb and pulled themselves into the eddy formed by rushing around the tree. After they had made themselves fast by a long rope, they undertook to get out of the eddy, which proved no easy job, for as soon as one end was pushed into the current the boat would whirl around and back up into its former position. While on the whirl it threw off one man’s hat. McPherson and officers and nearly the whole regiment were out watching them, and the cheering was loud enough to raise the dead. It was nearly dark when they got out of their predicament. I worked nearly all day on the company’s papers. MARCH 21. The water rose in the canal so that it ran up into our camp in the night. It washed away the trees that were rooted up yesterday. The channel is smooth and a good boat could go through it. One year ago today we left Winchester, Virginia, on our march for Manasses Junction. Part of Providence was burned this afternoon. The few citizens and Negroes whom the raise of the water had overtaken, were wading in the streets, waist deep, trying to save what things they had left. MARCH 22. We had orders to draw and cook one day’s rations early this morning. The water rose a good deal last night, and nothing but a small temporary levee keeps the camp from being inundated, and that is being washed away. The cattle and mules are all being driven higher up. MARCH 23. It rained all night. Our tent leaked like a sieve. We still remain in camp but it has rained nearly all day. MARCH 24. We had a hard storm last night, with heavy thunder. This afternoon some miserable fellows set fire to some buildings, among them a church. Such men should be sent to Alton. The channel is deepening and widening, and the water is rising. It is now about two feet above our camp. I expect some dark night to be wading out to our transports, and that right suddenly. The news came last night that a number of Farragut’s fleet were at the mouth of the ditch, below Vicksburg, and that he had taken Warrentown with all its ordinance. Gen. Carr’s division went down on transports today.