This morning, Saturday, October 7th, it is alternately snowing and raining so Captain Morgan told Captains Smith and Hendricks to rest their men while our Virginia Rifle Company pressed forward carrying our batteaux and using our hatchets and some limited pioneer equipment—axes, saws, spades, pick-axes, and a few adzes—to broaden the two-foot-wide footpath to ten feet in width. We managed to progress little more than a mile by nightfall.

Sunday, October 8th the weather was equally bad. Despite the continuing rain and snow, our company managed to cut and clear another two miles. Near dusk the two Pennsylvania Rifle Companies moved up to our position to encamp for the night. When they arrived, Captain Smith reported an ice-coated falling tree killed one of his Riflemen early this morning. It was our first casualty since leaving Cambridge on the 11th of September.

Monday, the 9th of October the air is cold, the sky is clear, the moon is full, and Captain Morgan has us up and cutting brush before the sun tinted the eastern horizon. Despite the early start and improved weather, we only manage to advance three miles. We do little better on October 10th.

On Wednesday, October 11th, shortly after we were underway, Lieutenant Colonel Greene’s 2nd Division overtook us from behind. He had with him Colonel Arnold’s order relieving the Rifle Companies of our “road building” duties and directing us to proceed “by the most expeditious means possible to secure a rendezvous site for the entire force at Lake Mégantic.”

By noon on Thursday the 12th, all three Rifle Companies have gladly surrendered most of our “road-building” tools to Lieutenant Colonel Greene’s Massachusetts “Musket-men” and the pioneers3 sent forward from Col. Enos’s Fourth Division.

In order to help mark the way forward and provide security for Lieutenant Colonel Greene’s “road builders,” Captain Morgan ordered our Virginia Rifle Company forward of them—dragging our batteaux with us up the narrow Indian trail.

We started out early Friday, October 13th, about a mile ahead of the pioneers and nearly to the second of the three “ponds” on the route. As we trudged uphill in heavy rain, a messenger from our lead security element was sighted running toward us. He breathlessly reported, “possible enemy movement ahead.”

Captain Morgan quickly ordered 1st Lt. Humphrey to alert the rest of our Rifle Company and told our little Headquarters team, “Grab your rifles, fighting gear, and follow me.”

We ran up the path for about a quarter mile where we discovered the “possible enemy” is actually Lieutenant Steele’s twelve-man scouting party. They are a pitiful sight; ragged, filthy dirty, and exhausted. Four of them carried no packs or equipment, and only six were carrying rifles.