Ormsby M. Mitchel to E.D. Townsend, September 28, 1861

Col. E. D. TOWNSEND, Assistant Adjutant-General: On the 26th instant, at the request of General Anderson and the Kentucky legislature, my own judgment concurring, I ordered Colonel Van Derveer, commanding Thirty-fifth Regiment Ohio Volunteers, to take and hold the Central Kentucky Railroad from Covington to Lexington. This has been successfully accomplished, the bridges all guarded, and our communications with Camp Dick Robinson are now secure. On the 27th instant Colonel Steedman, commanding Fourteenth Regiment Ohio Volunteers, left Covington under orders to occupy a point on the Lexington and Louisville Railroad near Locks 2 and 3, Kentucky River. We thus surround a force supposed to be concentrated in Owen County, Ky., commanded by Humphrey Marshall, while we secure our communication between Camp Dick Robinson and Louisville. A. Union company is forming at Maysville, Ky., giving us a cordon of troops extending from Maysville, by Lexington and Frankfort, to Louisville. I have taken possession of the Kentucky Central Railroad in the name of the Government.

O. M. MITCHEL,