Upon arriving to location Honey Springs, Indian Territory, the company moved off the local paths to make camp. The local civilians were more than eager to assist us in meals and layout of the nearby lands and offered entertainment in the evening hours to ease the tensions of the long marches in the days before. Friday evening during officer’s call that evening, Lt. Plunk was asked to summon Sgt. Hucker to make preparations for his scouts to take a look over the land in the early morning hours. Early morning came and Sgt. Hucker moved out with Cpl. J. Siltman, and Pvts. Plunk and K. Nicely to take a look of the land while the company commenced in morning reports, weapons inspections, and company drills. The company had done splendid in drills as they have always done in the past as the temperature started to rise.

Upon arrival of Sgt. Hucker and his scouts, Col. Gross was heard saying that he had sent Sgt. Hucker out to scout the land, not to take prisoners. This alerted everyone’s attention to what will lay ahead of today. On good graces, Col. Gross paroled the Confederate prisoner and asked Sgt. Hucker to escort the prisoner well beyond our lines. No doubt he went to his commander to pinpoint our whereabouts. Col. Gross sounded the battalion assembly for us to move out as the heat of the day told us what we were in for.

After marching for several hours, the sound and smells of war was soon upon us as we moved our battalion into position as artillery hammered away at the enemy lines. We marched in line over the hill down towards the enemy and were able to push them around the fields in to a pocket in the tree line where they made attempts to redeploy on the other side of the creek bed. Seeing this possibility as an opportunity, Col. Gross detached our company to use the trails that Sgt. Hucker and his scouts mapped out earlier in the day, to cut off the enemy’s withdrawal from the field. With Sgt. Hucker taking lead point, he lead the company at the quick step through the winding trails to the cut-off point, and attacked with everything we had, but we were overwhelmed by the enemy forces that were withdrawing from the field with the rest of the battalion on their heels.

While being held just off the battlefield, we overheard the enemy arguing about how they were supposed to keep prisoners with wet powder from the rain in the days before. We escaped the grasp of the enemy’s grip and made it safely back to our lines in the battalion with out a loss or shot fired. We even were able to retrieve our weapons accoutrements in the break out. Had they used what ammunition we had left, the escape would have been disastrous for us. We bedded down for the night just to move out in the morning to peruse the enemy’s retreat. The weather is going to have to stay like this if they want their powder to dry out, so we have to get to them before that happens. From the way it sounded earlier, it was drying out quick enough. Hope we get there before it dries.

Day 2 - 28 September 2008

While marching in peruse of the enemy, we met a small group of enemy soldiers and 2 artillery pieces who seem to have enough dried powder with them to hit us hard. They hid in the tree lines and bushes and ambushed us as we marched my in column of fours. Col. Gross ordered us to halt and formed the battalion battle line to attack. What happened next is what we all feared. The enemy’s powder had dried enough to accept the spark and hurl shells and bullets into our lines as more confederates battle lines came into view. They came at us from just about every angle causing our lines to form an angle and back to straight lines over and over again. With a spot of luck, friendly calvary came over the hill to suppress the dismounted Rebel calvary. We turned our attention to the enemy infantry that was hitting us from almost every direction. Losses were high as the remainder of the company withdrew with the battalion from the battlefield leaving behind good men dead and wounded at the mercy of the Confederates.