Tuesday [June] 16 [1863]

[Stamped on page: Headquarters Department, Miss. and East La., Jackson, Miss. Official Business]

Enemy's heavy artillery keeps
up continuous fire -- their
attention specially directed
to work on Jackson road, --
which is consequently battered
very much: as the parapet
is knocked away we sink
a pit just in rear of it to protect
the men. They can knock down
in half an hour all the repairs
that we could put up in a night.

The sap on Graveyard road
has now reached to within 25 feet
of us -- our countermine is pro-
gressing well and it is now
reduced to the question who is
going to be the smarter and
blow up the other first. A
curious state of things at this
point: by cautiously looking
over you can see their gabion
within a few feet of you -- and
distinctly hear them pick as
they work. they are also work-
ing up by sap on the Jackson
road and on Lee's front, but
have not as yet advanced so
near our work.

It requires untiring energy
and most incessant labor to
keep the works in a defensible
state; and Lockett deserves much
credit for the promptness with
which he meets every emergency
that arises, and overcomes with
his small corps of sappers and
miners, and very limited means,
every endeavor of the enemy
as yet made to destroy our
works.

Major Samuel H. Lockett, chief engineer.