Daniel Govan

Patrick Claiborne gave the order to advance at about a quarter to one that afternoon, and his division went in against the Iowa Brigade of Colonel William Hall, which was posted at the left or southern end of Frank Blair's 17th Corps.

Brigadier General Daniel Govan's brigade of Arkansans, Claiborne's leftmost brigade, had lost a lot of men in the previous day's fighting east of Atlanta, and Govan's two lead regiments, the 2nd and 24th Arkansas, numbered only about 200 men, but they hit the Iowans with such ferocity at the start of the charge that a number of the Yankees surrendered.

However, after they'd recovered from the initial shock and saw they actually outnumbered their attackers, the Iowans picked up their muskets and demanded that the Arkansans give themselves up.

But Govan's other two regiments then hit the Iowans' flank and the defending Yankees laid down their arms a second time and meekly handed back over to the colonels of the 2nd and 24th Arkansas their recently surrendered swords.

On Govan's right, Claiborne's Middle Brigade, the Texas Brigade, Brigadier General James Smith, hit the gap between 16th and 17th Corps and split the Federal position like firewood.

Advancing through the hole in the enemy lines, the Texans continued forward with a cloud of skirmishers leading the way through the woods toward a fateful encounter with James McPherson.

The 35-year-old commander of the Army of the Tennessee Corps had graduated at the top of the West Point class of 1853 and then served as an engineering instructor at the academy before working on forts and other army installations, literally from sea to shining sea, from New York Harbor to San Francisco Bay.

Colonel Robert Scott rode near the party as well, on his way to retrieve an Ohio regiment that had been posted in reserve.