I have no doubt but that Colonel Streight would have succeeded had he been properly equipped and joined me at the time agreed upon. The great delay in an enemy's country necessary to fit him out gave them time to throw a large force in our front. Although Colonel Streight had two days' start, they can harass him, and perhaps check his movements long enough for them to secure all their important bridges. If he could have started from Bear Creek the day I arrived there, then my movements would have been so quick and strong that the enemy could not have got their forces together.
The animals furnished him were very poor at the start. Four hundred of them were used up before leaving me, and those furnished him by me were about all the serviceable stock he had, though I hear he got two hundred good mules the day he left me, in Moulton Valley.
On my return, I sent Colonel Cornyn, with the Tenth Missouri, Seventh Kansas, Fifteenth Illinois Cavalry, and Ninth Illinois Mounted Infantry, to attack the force congregated at Tupelo and Okolona. He came up with the enemy on Wednesday, and immediately attacked them, they being some three thousand strong, under Major-General S. J. Gholson and Brigadier-General Ruggles. Brigadier-General Chalmers, with thirty-five hundred men, was at Pontotoc, but failed to come to Gholson's aid, though ordered to.
Colonel Cornyn fought so determinedly and so fast that he soon routed the force in his front, driving them in all directions, killing and wounding a large number and taking one hundred prisoners, including some seven officers; also a large number of arms and one hundred and fifty horses, saddles, etc.
The enemy fled toward Okolona and Pontotoc, and Colonel Cornyn returned to Corinth.
The expedition so far can be summed up as having accomplished the object for which it started, the infantry having marched two hundred and fifty miles and the cavalry some four hundred, and fought six successful engagements, driving the enemy, three thousand strong, from Bear Creek to Decatur, taking the towns of Tuscumbia and Florence, with a loss not to exceed one hundred, including three officers. Destroyed a million and a half bushels of corn, besides large quantities of oats, rye, and fodder, and five hundred thousand pounds of bacon. Captured one hundred and fifty prisoners, one thousand head of horses and mules, and an equal number of cattle, hogs, and sheep; also one hundred bales of cotton, besides keeping the whole command in meat for three weeks. Destroyed the railroad from Tuscumbia to Decatur; also some sixty flat-boats and ferries in the Tennessee River, thereby preventing Van Dorn, in his move, from crossing to my rear; also destroyed five tan-yards and six flouring-mills.
It has rendered desolate one of the best granaries of the South, preventing them from raising another crop this year, and taking away from them some fifteen hundred negroes.
We found large quantities of shelled corn, all ready for shipment, also bacon, and gave it to the flames.
I am, respectfully, your obedient servant,
G. M. Dodge,
Brigadier-General U. S. A.