Wednesday, 16 September 1863

General William Rosecrans' Federal army had easily taken abandoned Chattanooga four days ago, but Braxton Bragg's Confederate army was nowhere close to being defeated. The Southern forces were strung out on a roughly north-south line on the east side of a ridge called Lookout Mountain. Rosecrans' army was scattered and vulnerable, especially the men with General George Henry Thomas to the south near McLemore's Cove. Thomas could have easily been isolated and defeated, but the orders to do so never got delivered to General Thomas C. Hindman. The man carrying the orders, a French soldier-of-fortune known as Major Nocquot, was not available to testify at the court-martial of Hindman, as he had disappeared. Some $150,000 in Army funds went missing around the same time, but in all the confusion no connection was ever proved.

The Federal flagship USS San Jacinto, under Lieutenant Commander Ralph Chandler, captured the blockade running steamer Lizzie Davis off the west coast of Florida in latitude 25 degrees 58 minutes north, longitude 85 degrees 11 minutes west. She had been bound from Havana to Mobile with a large cargo including lead.

The USS Coeur de Lion, Acting Master W. G. Morris in charge, seized the schooner Robert Knowles on the Potomac River for violating the blockade.

The Confederate forces made an attempt to recross the Rapidan River, but were foiled by Union artillery and cavalry. They advanced in three columns, with artillery, toward the river, but being opposed by the mass of Federal troops on the north side, soon fell back.

A spirited skirmish took place at White Plains, Virginia, in which the Confederates were beaten back by overwhelming numbers.

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This post was edited on 9/16/13 at 4:24 am