He made a wide circuit by the south, and again joined Van Dorn.
On the 6th of September, at Memphis, I received an order from General Grant dated the 2d, to send Hurlbut's division to Brownsville, in the direction of Bolivar, thence to report by letter to him at Jackson.

The division started the same day, and, as our men and officers had been together side by side from the first landing at Shiloh, we felt the parting like the breaking up of a family.

But General Grant was forced to use every man, for he knew well that Van Dorn could attack him at pleasure, at any point of his long line.

To be the better prepared, on the 23d of September he took post himself at Jackson, Tennessee, with a small reserve force, and gave Rosecrans command of Corinth, with his three divisions and some detachments, aggregating about twenty thousand men.

He posted General Ord with his own and Hurlbut'a divisions at Bolivar, with outposts toward Grand Junction and Lagrange.