In late August 1863, the Federal Army of the Cumberland began moving toward Georgia, and on the extreme right of its lines the XX Army Corps under Major General Alexander M. McCook advanced across Lookout Mountain with Alpine, Summerville, and Rome as its objective line of march. Federal cavalry regiments scouting far ahead of the main body skirmished at Tap's Gap and Neal's Gap with Confederate cavalry under Major General Joseph Wheeler on September 1, 1863, and cavalry skirmishes continued almost daily near Summerville, Melville, Trion Factory, and Alpine for the next fifteen days. On September 10, 1863, from Alpine, orders went out for scouting toward Lafayette, Rome, and Summerville, and Brigadier General George Crook led the Second Brigade, Second Cavalry Division up the Broomtown Valley road and established his headquarters at Valley Store. On September 12 at 10 p.m., Crook directed Colonel McCook to move toward Lafayette at daylight if his horses were not too tired, while Crook planned to move in the same direction on the Broomtown road. In his official report of September 29, 1863, Crook recalled that on September 13, with General Stanley sick, he was ordered to take all the cavalry to reconnoiter Lafayette and determine the enemy force there. He sent Colonel McCook with two brigades by the Summerville road while he advanced on the direct Broomtown road so the two commands would march abreast, but McCook, meeting too heavy a force, swung onto Crook's road in his rear. Crook then struck Confederate pickets about 10 miles from Lafayette and drove them steadily without firing until within about 3 1/2 miles of town, when he ordered a regiment to charge and gather up the pickets in front of the enemy line of battle. Colonel Campbell, leading the North Pennsylvania, made what Crook called a gallant charge and captured all the pickets in front of that line, and although several volleys were fired into his men, the dust was so thick that only 3 were wounded and 2 were missing. After this action near Lafayette, Crook's command returned to Valley Store and then moved through Neal's Gap to the top of Lookout Mountain, where it secured the Dougherty's Gap road into McLemore Cove until September 19, 1863, just before the Battle of Chickamauga on September 19-20, 1863.