a surprise having passed, and there being a large force of the enemy near, the scouting party returned to camp. Colonel Magruder reported that he had himself gone, the morning before, with a larger force to the York road, as the enemy had crossed Hampton creek, leaving Dreux in command, who organized this expedition after he left. He ascertained that the enemy's force which fled was about 400, and that a war steamer came up after the skirmish and threw shells into the woods where it took place. The gallant colonel died from his wounds the next morning.
On the 11th, Thomas H. Wynne, chairman of the city committee on defenses, informed the secretary of war that the city council of Richmond was willing to bear a fair proportion of the expenses of erecting defenses around the city, but as that was an important point to the Confederate government, it should take charge of this work, as it had done elsewhere.
Brigadier-General Huger, from Norfolk, July 12th, submitted a list of the Virginia volunteer companies under his command, as organized into regiments and battalions, calling attention to the fact that all the infantry regiments had their complement of companies, except the Forty-first, which would soon be filled up by companies ready to be mustered in. These regiments were: The Third, Roger A. Pryor, colonel, F. H. Archer, lieutenant-colonel, and Joseph Mayo, major; the Sixth, William Mahone, colonel, Thomas J. Corprew, lieutenant-colonel, and W. P. Lundy, major; the Ninth, F. H. Smith, colonel, J. T. L. Preston, lieutenant-colonel, and Stapleton Crutchfield, major (the superintendent and two professors of the Virginia military institute); the Twelfth, D. A. Weisiger, colonel, F. L. Taylor, lieutenant-colonel, and Edgar L. Brockett, major; the Twenty-sixth, R. E. Colston, colonel, H. T. Parish, lieutenant-colonel, and John C. Page, major; the Forty-first, John R. Chambliss, Jr., colonel, George Blow, Jr. , lieutenant-colonel, and Fred W. Smith, major. The Forty-first had but seven companies. There was a cavalry regiment of eight companies, without field officers, and a battalion of field artillery of five companies, without field officers. Of the officers named, Mahone afterward became major-general, and Pryor, Weisiger, Colston and Chambliss, brigadier-generals.
