[Footnote: We must not forget the fact, however, that
the order dividing the army into wings was suspended on that
morning, and that this gives to the incident the air of an
intentional reduction of the wing commanders to the control of a
single corps. Official Records, vol. xix. pt. ii. p. 297.] The Ninth
Corps was ordered to follow the old Sharpsburg road through Fox's
Gap, our line of march being thus parallel to the others till we
should reach the road from Boonsboro to Sharpsburg.
But we were not put in motion early in the day. We were ordered
first to bury the dead, and to send the wounded and prisoners to
Middletown It was nearly noon when we got orders to march, and when
the head of column filed into the road, the way was blocked by
Porter's corps, which was moving to the front by the same road. As
soon as the way was clear, we followed, leaving a small detachment
to complete the other tasks which had been assigned us. In the
wooded slope of the mountain west of the gap, a good many of the
Confederate dead still lay where they had fallen in the fierce
combats for the possession of the crest near Wise's house. Our road
led through a little hamlet called Springvale, and thence to
another, Porterstown, near the left bank of the Antietam, where it
runs into the Boonsboro and Sharpsburg turnpike.
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