statement of captain payne.
G. W. Martin was an enlisted man in my company during the whole period of the war. The high character he always bore, and for which my knowledge of him enables me to vouch, together with the corroborating account of the two men who were with him, and which I have heard from them, assures me of the truth of his statement.
A. D. Payne,
Captain, Company "H" (or Black-Horse Troop"), Fourth Virginia Cavalry, Wickham's Brigade, Fitz Lee's Division, A. N. V.
Colonel W. C. Wickham's Report of an Engagement near Aldie, 17th of June, 1863.
Head-quarters Fourth Va. Cavalry,
June 20th, 1863.
Captain J. D. Ferguson, A. A. G. Lee's Brigade:
Captain,—I submit the following report of the part taken by the troops under my command in the engagement near Aldie on the 17th instant.
I was ordered to take my own regiment, the First and Fifth, and Breathed's battery through Middleburg to Aldie, and go into camp there, where I would find the rest of the brigade.
On reaching Dover Mills, I ordered Colonel Rosser to go on to Aldie and select a camp, and whilst the other regiments were watering, received a dispatch from him to the effect that a regiment of the enemy's cavalry was in his front, between him and Aldie, and that he was about to attach them. I at once placed the Fourth regiment in position to cover my left flank on the road from the Snickersville pike, and with the First regiment and two of Breathed's guns went forward to the support of Colonel Rosser, who, I found, had driven the enemy back, but been in turn compelled to give way a little, before a very large force.
A few well directed shot from Breathed's guns checked the advance of the enemy upon this road, but not in time to save the gallant sharpshooters of the Fifth, who had, unfortunately, been pushed rather too far forward on ground where it was impossible for cavalry to aid them.
The enemy, finding themselves foiled in their attempt on this line,
