The company numbered one hundred and thirty men, and commenced its march.
They forded the Tennessee River at Muscle Shoals, and marched south unmolested, through the heart of the Choctaw and Chickasaw nations, and pressed rapidly forward two or three hundred miles, until they reached the junction of the Tombeckbee and Alabama rivers, in the southern section of the State.

The main army was now but two days' march before them.

The troops, thus far, had been mounted, finding sufficient grazing for their horses by the way.

But learning that there was no forage to be found between there and Pensacola, they left their animals behind them, under a sufficient guard, at a place called Cut-off, and set out for the rest of the march, a distance of about eighty miles, on foot.

The slight protective works they threw up here, they called Fort Stoddart.
These light troops, hardy men of iron nerves, accomplished the distance in about two days.