THE EXPEDITION TO NORTH CAROLINA. B CHAPTER I. THE FIRST COMMANDER OF THE NINTH CORPS. Y a singular good fortune, not paralleled by any other corps in the Army of the United States, the relations of the Ninth Corps with its leading officers were unchanged during the continuance of the War of the Rebellion. General Ambrose Everett Burnside was its first commander, and from the date of the organization of the Corps until his retirement from the service, General Burnside's history was identified with its own. Many of the officers and men who composed it were those who fought the battles of Roanoke Island and Newbern. They were with their General at South Mountain and Antietam. They were a part of the Army of the Potomac when the heights of Fredericksburg were assailed. They followed their leader to the deliverance of East Ten-, nessee. They again became a portion of the Army of the Potomac in the closing campaign of the war, and the ensanguined fields of the Wilderness, Spottsylvania, Cold Harbor, and Petersburg bore witness to their united valor. The career of the Corps and its story are inseparable from those |