Alarmed by Wheeler's approach and puzzled by Stoneman's absence, McCook consulted his officers and decided to return to the Chattahoochee by way of Newnan. To avoid Confederate cavalry that might have discovered the destruction in Palmetto and Fayetteville, he detoured around Fayetteville and moved south on the Panhandle Road. Meanwhile, Confederate Brigadier General William H. "Red" Jackson, following the Atlanta & West Point Railroad from Fairburn to Palmetto, found the aftermath of McCook's raid and hurried through Fayetteville with two brigades. At the intersection of the Panhandle and McDonough roads, Jackson's force met McCook's rear guard as Colonel John T. Croxton ordered the 8th Iowa Cavalry to charge, and for the next 3 hours charge answered counter-charge until Croxton's men fought through the roadblock and rejoined McCook's column at Glass Bridge on the Flint River. As darkness approached, McCook, deep behind Confederate lines and lacking reliable maps, found an enslaved person who knew the narrow roads and sent the column onward, leaving Croxton's battered brigade in the rear. Believing the raiders were trying to reach the Chattahoochee, Jackson returned to Fayetteville hoping to get ahead of them, while Joe Wheeler, arriving with about 500 men after a 20-mile ride from Flat Shoals, followed and then turned southwest. That night, fighting flared at Whitewater Creek and Shake Rag as Wheeler repeatedly struck the rear guard of the Union column on the Lower Fayetteville Road. About 8:00 a.m. on July 30, Companies D and E of McCook's 8th Indiana Cavalry reached the hill above the depot at Newnan, only 9 miles from the Chattahoochee after 3 days and 3 nights in the saddle. Seeing a northbound train halted because of broken tracks at Palmetto, they charged downhill, but Brigadier General Philip D. Roddey and 550 dismounted Alabama cavalrymen at the freight cars opened fire, and the attack was thrown back.