After the Cross Lanes affair I fully expected that the Confederate
forces would follow the route which Casement had taken to
Charleston. Floyd's inactivity puzzled me, for he did no more than
make an intrenched camp at Carnifex Ferry, with outposts at Peters
Mountain and toward Summersville. The publication of the Confederate
Archives has partly solved the mystery. Floyd called on Wise to
reinforce him; but the latter demurred, insistent that the duty
assigned him of attacking my position in front needed all the men he
had. Both appealed to Lee, and Lee decided that Floyd was the senior
and entitled to command the joint forces. [Footnote: Official
Records, vol. v. pp. 155-165, 800, 802-813.] The letters of Wise
show a capacity for keeping a command in hot water which was unique.
If he had been half as troublesome to me as he was to Floyd, I
should indeed have had a hot time of it. But he did me royal service
by preventing anything approaching to co-operation between the two
Confederate columns. I kept my advance-guards constantly feeling of
both, and got through the period till Rosecrans joined me with
nothing more serious than some sharp affairs of detachments.