Show GRAFTS FIRST BATTLE how lEc Felt When Approaching the luiicmy As soon as the enemy saw us they decamped de-camped as fast ns their horses would carry them I kept my men in the ranks and forbade for-bade their entering any of tho deserted houses or taking anything from them We halted at night on the road and proceeded the next morning at an early hour Harris had been encamped in a creek bottom for the sake of being near water The hills on either side of the creek extended to a considerable con-siderable height possibly more than one hundred feet As wp approached the brow of the hill from which it was expected we could see Harris camp and possibly find his men ready formed to meet us my heart kept getting higher and higher until it felt to me as though it was in my throat I would have given anything then to have been back in Ilinois but I had not the moral courage to halt and consider what to do I kept right on When we reached a I I point from which tho valley below was in full view I halted The place where Hams I had been encamped for a few days before I was still there and tho marks of a recent encampment were plainly visible but the troops were gone My heart resumed its I place It occurred to me at once that Harris Har-ris had been as much afraid of me as I had been of him This was a view of the question I ques-tion I had never taken before but it was one I never forgot afterwards From that event to the close of the war I never experienced ex-perienced trepidation upon confronting an enemy Personal Memoirs of U S Grant |