the head of the column.

So early as eight o'clock Birney of the Third Corps, whose division had
been thrust in between Howard and Slocum, reported to Sickles that a
movement in considerable force was being made in our front. Sickles
conveyed the information to Hooker, who instructed him to investigate
the matter in person. Sickles pushed out Clark's rifled battery,
with a sufficient support, to shell the passing column. This, says
Sickles, obliged it to abandon the road. It was observed that the
column was a large one, and had a heavy train. Sickles considered it
either a movement for attack on our right, or else one in retreat.
If the former, he surmised at the time that he had arrested it; if the
latter, that the column had taken a more available route.

It was while Rodes was filing past the Furnace that the first attack by
Clark's battery was made; and Col. Best, with the Twenty-third Georgia
Regiment, was sent out beyond the Furnace to hold the road. Best
subsequently took position in and about the Furnace buildings, and
placed some troops in the railroad cutting south.

Sickles, meanwhile, had again reported to Hooker, and been instructed to
strengthen his reconnoissance. But it was noon before this order was
given, and he was then advised to push out with great caution. He asked
for the whole of Birney's division, and another one in support. With
these he thought to get possession of the road on which the enemy was
moving, and, if it was a retreat, cut him off; if a flank movement,
thrust himself in between the two bodies of the enemy. Hooker accorded
this request; and Birney was advanced a mile and a half through the
woods, bridging two or three arms of Scott's Run, and some marshy ground,
and making his way with great difficulty. Two regiments of Berdan's