On the 21st our company was sent out on picket guard. The remainder of the regiment went out with a foraging train. After they had traveled about ten miles, they met three hundred mounted rebels, but they seeing that our boys meant business, pulled off, and gave our boys the right of way.
When they had loaded our wagon train with forage to its full capacity the boys returned to camp.
On the 22d our cavalry captured fifty prisoners. They were not organized in the rebel army, but called themselves “The Boat-burners.” That day was Thanksgiving and all the officers made speeches.
On the 24th we went out with some foraging trains and had a regular stampede. December 1st, 1863, we heard heavy cannonading at a distance. Our cavalry and two batteries were having an engagement with the rebels. They drove the rebels back to Vermillion Bayou, but there they met the main rebel army and our little force had to draw off and skip back.
On the 2d our cavalry went to St. Martinsville. They ran into a squad of home guards who were armed with shot guns. Our men drove them back and captured several prisoners. On the morning of the 4th we rafted lumber across the bayou and began building our winter quarters.
On the 7th the Nineteenth corps moved off for Brasier City and left us. On the 18th we drew a new stand of colors which was presented to the Twenty-fourth Indiana by Governor O. P. Morton. In the evening we went out foraging. We returned, both wagons and men loaded down with as much sugar as they could carry. The boys had just put all of the kettles to use in making candy when the order came to cook rations for a hard day’s march on the morrow.
On the 19th we marched twenty-five miles, en route to New Orleans. We went into camp on the edge of the bayou. On the 20th we marched seventeen miles and went into camp at Centerville. On the 21st we marched through Pattersonville. After a distance of twenty miles had been traveled, we went into camp at Berwick, opposite Brasier City.
On the morning of the 22d we crossed the bay, boarded a train and reached Algiers at six p. m. We got off of the cars and went into camp. This was one of the worst camp grounds that we had ever pitched a tent on. It had been raining almost every day, and the mud was knee deep all over the camp.
A report was circulated that we were going to cross the gulf, and just at that time a call was made for veteran volunteers. Two-thirds of our regiment re-enlisted.
Not over six men in each company were left in camp to do camp duty, as the boys had taken up quarters in New Orleans.