Army was moving. The next day, June 5, Hooker canceled all leave and army furloughs and instructed that all troops be prepared to march if necessary. In the meantime, Longstreet's and Ewell's corps were camped in and around Culpeper. With more Union reports intimating that Lee had moved a large portion of his army, Hooker ordered Sedgwick to conduct a reconnaissance in force across the Rappahannock River. A small skirmish began shortly after 5:00 p.m. as Vermont and New Jersey troops, supported by a heavy Federal artillery bombardment, paddled across the river and overran Confederate positions on the southern bank. As a precaution, Lee temporarily halted Ewell's Corps, but when he saw that Hooker would not press the Fredericksburg line to bring on a battle, he ordered Ewell to continue. The same day as Federal troops crossed the river, General Buford wrote that he had received credible information that "all of the available cavalry of the Confederacy" was in Culpeper County. On June 7, George H. Sharpe, head of the Bureau of Military Information, erroneously reported to Hooker that, while J. E. B. Stuart was preparing a large cavalry raid, Lee's infantry would be withdrawing to Richmond. Hooker decided to preemptively attack the Confederate cavalry force in Culpeper and ordered Cavalry Corps commander Alfred Pleasonton to command the assault. Lee rejoined the leading elements of his army in Culpeper on June 7 and ordered Albert G. Jenkins' cavalry to advance northward through the Shenandoah Valley. He also wrote to John D. Imboden and ordered him to attract Union forces in Hampshire County and to disrupt their communications and logistics as well as acquire cattle for use by the Confederate Army. To support these movements, Lee wrote to General Samuel Jones and asked him to spare any troops that he could. The following day, he wrote to James Seddon, Confederate Secretary of War, and attempted to persuade him to send troops currently in North Carolina to reinforce either his army or Confederate forces in the west. On June 9, Lee ordered Stuart to cross the Rappahannock and raid Union forward positions, screening the Confederate Army from observation or interference as it moved north. Anticipating this imminent offensive action, Stuart ordered his troopers into bivouac around Brandy Station. Brandy Station Alfred Pleasonton's combined arms force consisted of 8,000 cavalrymen and 3,000 infantry, while Stuart commanded about 9,500 Confederates. Pleasonton's attack plan called