80. On the Firing Line
By JAMES KENDALL HOSMER (1863)
WE have had a battle. Not quite a week ago we began to hear
of it. We knew nothing certain, however, until Saturday. (It is
now Tuesday.) Toward the end of that afternoon, the explicit
orders came.
[_]
This was on the lower Mississippi River.
The assault was to be made the next morning, and our
regiment was to have a share in it. We were not to go home
without the baptism of fire and blood.
Before dark, we were ordered into line, and stacked our arms.
Each captain made a little speech. "No talking in the ranks; no
flinching. Let every one see that his canteen is full, and that he
has hard bread enough for a day. That is all You will carry
beside gun and equipments."We left the guns in stack,
polished, and ready to be caught on the instant; and lay down
under the trees. At midnight came the cooks with coffee and
warm food. Soon after came the order to move; then, slowly
and with many halts, nearly four hundred strong, we took up
our route along the wood-paths. Many other regiments were
also in motion. The forest was full of Rembrandt pictures,— a
bright blaze under a tree, the faces and arms of soldiers all
aglow about it; the wheel of an army-wagon, or the brass of a
cannon, lit up; then the gloom of the wood, and the night
shutting down about it.
At length, it was daybreak. We were now only screened from
the rebel works by a thin hedge. Here the rifle-balls began to
cut keen and sharp through the air about us; and the
cannonade, as the east now began to redden, reached its
height,—a continual deafening uproar, hurling the air against
one in great waves, till it felt almost like a wall of rubber,
bounding and rebounding from the body,— the great guns of
the "Richmond,"the siege-Parrotts, the smaller field-batteries ;
and, through all, the bursting of the shells within the rebel
lines, and the keen, deadly whistle of well-aimed bullets. A few
rods down the military road, the column paused, The banks of
the
ravine rose on either side of the road in which we had halted:
but just here the trench made a turn; and in front, at the
distance of five or six hundred yards, we could plainly see the
rebel rampart, red in the morning—light as with blood, and
shrouded in white vapor along the edge as the sharpshooters
behind kept up an incessant discharge, I believe I felt no
sensation of fear, nor do I think those about me did.
We climb up the path. I go with my rifle between Wilson and
Hardiker; keeping nearest the former, who carries the national
flag. In a minute or two, the column has ascended, and is
deploying in a long line, under the colonel's eye, on the open
ground. The rebel engineers are most skilful fellows. Between
us and the brown earth-heap which we are to try to gain to-day,
the space is not wide; but it is cut up in every direction with
ravines and gullies. These were covered, until the parapet was
raised, with a heavy growth of timber; but now it has all been
cut down, so that in every direction the fallen tops of large
trees interlace, trunks block Lip every passage, and brambles are
growing over the whole. It is out of the question to advance
here in line of battle; it seems almost out of the question to
advance in any order: but the word is given, "Forward!"and on
we go. Know that this whole space is swept by a constant
patter of balls: it is really a leaden rain. We go crawling and
stooping: but now and then before us rises in plain view the
line of earth-works, smoky and sulphurous with volleys; while
all about Lis fall the balls, now sending a lot of little splinters
from a stump, now knocking the dead wood out of the old tree-trunk that is sheltering me, now driving up a
cloud of dust from a little knoll, or cutting off the head of a
weed just under the hand as with an invisible knife. "Forward! "
is the order. We all stoop; but the colonel does not stoop : he is
as cool as he was in his tent last night, when I saw him drink
iced lemonade. He turns now to examine the ground, then faces
back again to direct the advance of this or that flank. Wilson
springs on from cover to cover, and I follow close after him. It is
hard work to get the flag along; it cannot be carried in the air;
and we drag it and pass it from hand to hand among the
brambles, much to the detriment of its folds. The line pauses a
moment. Captain Morton, who has risen from a sick-bed to be
with his command, is coolly cautioning his company. The right
wing is to remain in reserve, while the left pushes still farther
forward. The major is out in front of us now. He stands upon a
log which bridges a ravine,— a plain mark for the sharpshooters,
who overlook the position, not only from the parapet, but from
the tall trees within the rebel works. Presently we move on
again, through brambles and under charred trunks, tearing our
way, and pulling after us the colors; creeping on our bellies
across exposed ridges, where bullets hum and sing like stinging
bees; and, right in plain view, the ridge of earth, its brow white
with incessant volleys.
Down into our little nook now come tumbling a crowd of
disorganized, panting men. They are part of a New York
regiment, who, on the crest just over us, have been meeting
with very severe loss. They say their dead and dying are
heaped up there. We believe it; for we can hear them, they arc
so near: indeed, some of those who come tumbling down are
wounded; some have their gun-stocks broken by shot, and the
barrels bent, while they are unharmed. They are frightened and
exhausted, and stop to recover themselves; but presently their
officers come up, and order them forward again. From time to
time, afterwards, wounded men crawl back from their position a
few yards in front of where we are.
We begin to know that the attack has failed. We know nothing
certainly. There are rumors, thick as the rifle-balls, of this
general killed, that regiment de. stroyed, and successful
attempts elsewhere. The sun goes down on this day of blood.
We have lost several killed, and several more wounded, and
have done all we were called upon to do. The colonel tells us
we have been cool, prudent, and brave. We have not been as
much exposed as some other regiments, and our loss has not
been large, The fire, however, seemed very hot, and close at
hand; and the wonder to us all is, that no more fell. Darkness
settles down; shots are received and returned, but only at
random now, and, ever and anon, from the batteries goes
tearing through the air a monstrous shell, with a roar like a
rushing railroad-train, then an explosion putting every thing for
the moment in light.
At dusk, I creep back to the ravine, where I am to sleep. For
food to-day, I have had two or three hard crackers and cold
potatoes. We have no blank. ets : so down I lie to sleep as I
can on the earth, without covering; and, before morning, am
chilled through with the dew and coldness of the air.