The afternoon of the 28th of March, the brigade, now the third of
General Casey's division of the Fourth Army Corps, General Keyes,
commanding, was actually en route for Alexandria; Captain Maxfield's
diary says:--"With boots blacked, hands in white gloves and brass
shoulder scales on," a campaign guise difficult for the men of '64 to
appreciate.
This was a hard march for green troops, unaccustomed to heavy marching
order, with more too than the phrase implies, for besides gun,
equipments, forty rounds of cartridges, the knapsacks were not only
stuffed with the ordinary kits of soldiers, but were laden with the
remains of civilian wardrobes and the accumulations of a winter's
garrison duty. I think that no man of D ever reached a more welcome
camp ground than the one outside of Alexandria that night. And by the
time the newly issued shelter tents were buttoned together, were
pitched, and the camp fires were lighted, there were many too weary to
care for anything but to creep supperless into their tents, wrap their
blankets around them and rest their aching bones. In the morning
reveille awoke them to see a Spring snow storm, half rain and half snow
beating down, followed by a day of discomfort and another night on a
wet camp ground, and glad enough the next afternoon, that of March
30th, were all to get on board the transport Constitution, with all its
discomforts of wet decks, on which the men must sleep closely crowded
together; four regiments of our brigade, the Eleventh, the 56th and the
100th New York, and the 52d Pennsylvania regiments, with Regan's
Battery, jamming the five decked Constitution to its utmost capacity.
Proceeding to Fortress Monroe, we were ordered to land at Newport News,
to which place we were taken by a smaller steamer, the Constitution
drawing too many feet of water to be able to reach the landing place.
In steaming across the bay the masts of the sunken war ships could be
seen standing above the surface of the water telling of the great Naval
combat that so lately took place in this placid water. Soon a puff of
smoke rolled out from a rebel battery off Sewell's Point, announcing
the coming of the first hostile shot. It fell so far short of our
steamer that the tell-tale spray of water its plunge threw into the air
was received by us with a yell of derision.
Landing at Newport News the 2d of April, the brigade went into camp,
where we remained for a few days owing to lack of wagon transportation.
It was here that the men first went on picket. And Captain Maxfield's
diary records that there was a rush among them to go on picket duty,
probably as great a one as there was in later years to escape such
service.
The 6th of April, we proceeded to Young's Mills, where we occupied the
log barracks rebel troops had occupied the previous winter. Here the
regiment was paid off, and where they had learned it is a mystery, but
it did seem as if not only the men of D but those of every company of
the regiment were adepts in the mysteries of the national game; for
wherever you went through the thick woods surrounding the barracks you
would come across groups of men squatting around the tops of hard bread
boxes laid on the ground, and hear such mystic phrases as:--"Ante up or
leave the board." "It's your deal." "I raise you five cents." "I see
you and go you five better." Some of the men wrecked their available
fortunes in a few hours at the game, then would borrow a quarter from
some friend and regain all they had lost, only to lose it again before
night. Such is the see-saw of fortune.
The 17th of April, we rejoined the brigade in position before Lee's
Mill, on the creek known as the Warwick River. We took a modest part in
the siege of Yorktown. I chiefly remember a reconnoissance in which
Company D followed a skirmish line as its reserve.
By company front, trying to keep a perfect alignment, keeping step as
if on parade, D crashed through woods and bushes, quite undaunted until
a shell came screeching towards them; and as it fell some twenty feet
before them, burst in a cloud of smoke and the pieces went flying into
the air, our heroes waited with open mouths for half a minute perhaps,
certainly quite long enough for all danger to have passed, then at one
and the same time each and all, as if by a common impulse, threw
themselves flat upon the ground, and digging their noses into the soil,
lay there for another full half minute before arising to march on their
dignified way.
Think of that you men of Morris Island, to whom flying shot and shells
became a matter of course, of no more consequence than beans from a
bean shooter. But that was your first shell, and 'twas long before you
had heard the warning cries of "Jim Island" and "Sullivan," long before
those names had become so familiar to you as to have hardened your
nerves to comparative indifference.
It was in this reconnoissance that the first man of the regiment was
killed, Private Mace, of Company A. As the first man of the regiment
killed, his body had a fascination for all of us as it lay in camp, and
few of us but were awe struck as we looked upon the waxen face of our
comrade, now drained of blood, but yesterday blooming with health and
spirits, struck dead in a second as if by a thunderbolt. The only other
matter for record here is our being called out early one morning to
stand to arms and listen to the attack a portion of the Vermont brigade
made on the dam across the Warwick, known as Dam No. 1. Though the
charging and the answering yells, the crash of musketry and the booming
of cannon came to us, out of danger, but as the crash and uproar of a
distant thunder shower, yet it was so suggestive of what was going on
in the semi-darkness beyond the intervening woods, that it gave some of
us a dread foreboding that the time was really near at hand when we
must be active participants in just such bits of the bloody game of
war.
We were not in the trenches before Yorktown at any time except as
individuals. Then to creeping to the outer works and watching the slow
operations of the siege, we much preferred to sit in the interior works
and listen to the blood-curdling tales of the so-called California
sharpshooters, the butts of whose rifles were notched to their utmost
capacity, each notch representing a dead rebel, according to its
owner's statement, but as it was estimated that the combined notches on
the butts of their rifles outnumbered the entire rebel force under
Magruder, it is more probable that they bore quite as much testimony to
the mendacious abilities of the story tellers as to their sharp
shooting ones.
One fine May morning, that of the 4th, it was known that Magruder had
evacuated Yorktown the night before, and under the command of our new
brigade commander, Brigadier General Henry M. Naglee, we were in quick
pursuit. We crossed the rebel lines at Lee's Mills, which fortified
position we gallantly carried without loss in the absence of the flying
enemy.
As the different commands of our army moved forward, they converged on
the road leading from Yorktown to Williamsburg with the result that
this road was soon packed with horse, foot and artillery, all pushing
eagerly forward, and without overmuch regards for right of way.
Company D, holding the right of the regiment, was a pleased auditor to
a little conversation between Colonel Caldwell and the irate commander
of a regiment the Eleventh had unceremoniously displaced. The displaced
commander was evidently, by manner and seat in the saddle, a regular
officer, which then meant among other things, an officer with large
ideas of his own importance as a trained military man, and small ones
of all volunteer officers.
"Sir," roared he, riding up to Colonel Caldwell, "How dare you march
across the head of my command?"
The Colonel looked at him in his large placid way, without answering
him, much as a mastiff looks at a snarling terrier.
"Do you know who I am, sir?" yelled the angry commander, now doubly
enraged at the elaborate indifference, and the apparently studied
silence of our Colonel. "I am Major so-and-so of such and such a
regiment."
"And I," answered Colonel Caldwell, smiling blandly, touching his cap
with military courtesy as he spoke, "And I am Colonel John C. Caldwell,
commanding the Eleventh Maine Regiment of Infantry Volunteers, and am
quite at your service, sir."
Speechless with rage, and fairly gasping at the haw-haw of approval we
country bumpkins gave the Colonel's answer, Major so-and-so backed his
horse a little, turned him, and galloped away in as furious a state of
mind as any gallant Major ever galloped in.
This bright May day was spent by the infantry in marching and halting
while the cavalry pressed forward on the heels of the flying enemy.
Towards night the regiments went into bivouac. Then the men scattered
for foraging purposes. The inhabitants had mainly fled to Richmond,
perhaps naturally, they consisting of women, children and male
antiquities generally, McClellan's report stating that every able
bodied male of the Peninsula was in the ranks of the rebel army.
They went hastily, evidently. I remember one house from which the
occupants had fled just as they were about to seat themselves to a meal
apparently, for the table was spread with dishes and untouched
victuals. Loading themselves with food and furniture from these
deserted houses, the boys returned to camp.
My particular group of D slept that night on a feather bed, spread on
the ground, with sheets, quilts, pillows--all the accompaniments. But,
alas, it began to rain heavily in the night, so that before morning our
downy nest of the evening before was about as comfortable a sleeping
place as a bed-tick filled with mush and milk would be--a soaked,
oozing, nasty mess.
In the morning we pushed forward in a heavy rain over roads cut up by
artillery wheels and punched full of holes by the hoofs of innumerable
horses. We could soon hear the battle of Williamsburg progressing in
front as we, wet to the skin, plodded on our miserable way. Towards
night, General McClellan ordered General Naglee to push forward and
reinforce General Hancock, who was reported as heavily pressed. We
moved forward rapidly and zealously, but before we could reach Hancock,
that brilliant commander had, by feigning a retreat, led the opposing
enemy from their intrenchments into the open field, where with a few
heavy volleys he stopped them, then charging with the bayonet, routed
and dispersed their column, capturing some five hundred of it.
We arrived only in time to witness the overthrow of the enemy, and to
give the victors generous cheers of congratulations. Taking position in
line, we stood to our arms through a cold, wet night, entirely without
fire, and almost without food, our nearly empty haversacks furnishing
us with a very scanty supper. It was a night to remember.
But in the morning, the dreaded morning, when all that long line of
earthworks, beyond which lay the old city of Williamsburg, must be
carried; in the morning our chilled blood was not only warmed by a
brilliant sun, but by the knowledge that the Confederates had evacuated
these intrenchments too, and were still falling back towards Richmond.
The supply trains had been left behind in leaving the lines before
Yorktown, and when enterprising wagon-masters did get their trains
towards the front, they were compelled to give way to hurrying troops
and artillery. It now became necessary to await the coming of these but
lately despised supply trains, for soldiers, to march and fight, must
be fed, and you might as well try to get fight out of empty cartridge
boxes as out of empty haversacks.
A few days then, we of necessity spent before Williamsburg, to rest the
exhausted troops and to replenish empty cartridge boxes and haversacks.
These few days were mainly passed by our men in taking a first sight of
the horrors of war. Not only our own wounded were there, but the
enemy's as well, left behind in the care of their surgeons, in the
hurried flight of the rear guard that had made the stand for delay at
Williamsburg. Cut, hacked, shot, dead and dying, a sorry sight there
was in the barracks Confederate troops had occupied during the winter,
now used for hospital purposes. And out on the field was a worse one.
Dead bodies lay where they fell, and as they fell. Some in the act of
loading, some as if firing, these that had been shot dead in their
tracks; others lay on their backs or curled into tortuous shapes,
staring stonily, as if for a last look at the world that had faded from
their darkening eyes as the life blood poured from their mortal wounds.
However hardened we became afterwards, the most indifferent of us by
nature was then visibly affected by the gruesome sights we saw on the
bloody field of Williamsburg.
The 9th of May we were on the march again, but moved slowly, the roads
being few and narrow, and the weather rainy. On the 13th, Colonel
Caldwell having been promoted a Brigadier-General, took leave of us and
Colonel Plaisted assumed command. It was two o'clock in the morning of
the 14th of May before we reached New Kent Court House, and about the
19th before we reached the Chickahominy and took possession of the
ruins of Bottoms and the Railroad Bridges.
A reconnoissance D and a piece of artillery made showed that the last
named bridge had been burned. We had a merry exchange of grape with the
enemy's artillery across the river, here about forty feet wide, fringed
with a dense growth of forest trees, and bordered by low marshy bottom
lands, varying from half a mile to a mile in width, as McClellan
describes it. The following day, the 20th, Naglee's Brigade crossed
Bottoms Bridge and D with another company of infantry and a squadron of
cavalry followed General Naglee for some miles along a road leading
through White Oak Swamp to the James River. We touched the enemy's
cavalry but once and quickly formed at a bridge to receive his
anticipated charge. It not coming, General Naglee crossed the bridge
with his cavalry and charged the enemy, the General at the head of his
little force scattering the enemy in every direction but ours. We then
marched on again for some miles, when the infantry went into position
at a big farm house on a commanding hill and General Naglee and the
cavalry rode away towards the James River. It was said that they
watered their horses in that river before returning to us, which they
did in about an hour. We then made a rapid retrograde movement for
Bottoms Bridge, marching back by another road than that we had taken in
advancing, by this sharp manoeuvre escaping the attention of a body of
gray coated gentlemen who had assembled at a point on our line of
advance to give us a taste of Southern hospitality on our return march.
This rapid and brilliant reconnoissance, right through the enemy's
country, gave General McClellan important information regarding roads
and their connections that he found very useful to him when unexpected
circumstances forced us to retreat in that direction.
On the 24th of May, General Naglee's brigade dislodged the enemy from
the vicinity of Seven Pines and secured a strong position for our
advance. McClellan says also that on the 25th, under cover of a
movement by General Naglee, the whole Fourth Corps took up and began to
fortify a position at Seven Pines. On the 28th his record also shows
Casey's division was moved forward to Fair Oaks, three-quarters of a
mile in advance of Seven Pines, leaving General Couch at the works at
Seven Pines. General Casey immediately began a new line of rifle pits
and a small redoubt for six field guns to cover our new position. Here
we were engaged in constant skirmishing and picket service until May
31, when the battle of Fair Oaks was fought. When about noon of the
31st of May the Rebel Commands of D. H. Hill, Huger, Longstreet and G.
W. Smith swept down on Casey's division, D and other companies of the
regiment were on the picket line, D on the extreme right. The few
members of D left in camp joined regiments moving to the front as they
came forward, and with the rest of Naglee's Brigade, to use the
language of General McClellan's official report concerning our brigade,
"struggled gallantly to maintain the redoubt and rifle pits against the
overwhelming masses of the enemy." As individuals those of D so engaged
did their duty, both here and in the later stands made at General
Couch's rifle pits. One of them, Private Gray, reported missing, was
undoubtedly killed while voluntarily attached to some stranger
organization, receiving burial with their dead of his adopted regiment.
But the story of D as a company we will tell from information furnished
us by its First Sergeant, Brady, who commanded and directed its
movements when it made its stand on the picket line against an
advancing line of battle. The portion of the Regiment not on picket was
taken into the battle by then Major Campbell, and shares with the 104th
Pennsylvania the warm encomiums of official writers on the heroic
bravery shown by these two regiments that day.
The night before the battle of Fair Oaks was one of a terrible storm,
that we all know. D went on picket that evening, occupying the extreme
right of the line, an entirely unsupported position. The men passed a
miserable night, watching in darkness and storm, sheltering themselves
as they best could and still remain alert, for all the signs pointed to
an early attack on us; the pressure of the enemies skirmish lines, the
plain movements of their troops, and the fact that they must either
dislodge us or lose Richmond. Towards morning the storm ceased, and the
day broke with the promise of clearness. Shortly afterwards Sergeant
Brady came out of camp with Private Annis, then a detailed cook, Annis
bearing a camp kettle in which he proceeded to prepare coffee, when the
men partook of a rough breakfast. Soon Lieutenant Washington, of
General Johnston's staff, rode unexpectedly into the line of D, having
mistaken a road in carrying orders to some rebel command. Quickly
halted, he ruefully yielded himself a prisoner, and under Captain
Harvey's pilotage made an unwilling way to General Casey's
headquarters. Captain Harvey failing to return, the command of the
company devolved upon Second Lieutenant Johnson, as First Lieutenant
Stanwood was away sick. The capture of Lieutenant Washington made the
pickets doubly alert. Besides, General Naglee himself rode out to their
line to make observations, and warned them that they were liable to be
attacked at any moment. Soon great activity was displayed by the rebel
pickets in the immediate front, and sharp picket fighting took place
during the forenoon. A little after noon the roar of the attack on the
left was heard. It was uncertain what the pickets should do. Lieutenant
Johnson and Corporal Keene moved out on the right to learn, if they
could, what force, if any, guarded the flank. They found it entirely
unguarded, and moved along until they fell in with Sumner's advance,
when they were occupied in giving information concerning the movements
of the enemy, and the bearing of the roads to General Sumner's aids.
Sergeant Brady had been left in command of the company by Lieutenant
Johnson, and shortly a rebel line of battle appeared moving towards the
line held by D. Under Sergeant Brady's orders, some of the men began to
barricade the road they centered on by falling trees across it, the
others keeping up a rapid fire on the enemy to give the idea by their
boldness that they covered a line of battle, while really between them
and Fair Oaks there was then no force whatever. This ruse succeeded to
an unexpected degree, the rebel line of battle halting, throwing out a
strong skirmish line, and making an elaborately cautious advance. Of
course their skirmishers easily flanked our forlorn pickets, and
curling them back in spite of their stubborn resistance, finally
scattered them through the woods.
Before the rebel onset, Sergeant Brady, realizing by the sound of the
battle that he was cut off from his camp, had carefully cautioned the
men to make their line of inevitable retreat toward the right and rear,
and fortunately for most of them they followed these orders, reaching
our lines in safety. Those that were captured were Sergeant Bassett,
Corporal Dakin, Musician Strickland, Privates William and Moses
Sherman, House, and lastly Sergeant Brady himself, who, the captor of
two rebel soldiers, was triumphantly following his prisoners into our
lines as he supposed, when, reaching the railroad, a line of rebel
infantry confronted him, and he found it necessary to exchange place
with his own prisoners, who, you may be sure, took a great pleasure in
escorting him to Richmond. These, with Private Gray killed, and Private
Blaine wounded, cover the loss of D at the battle of Fair Oaks.
It will be seen by this, that when night fell on the first day of the
battle of Fair Oaks, Company D was somewhat scattered. Some of its
members had joined the colors, but many were still wandering in search
of them, while a stout detachment was already housed in Libby Prison.
But before the next day noontime, the company was fully organized again
under the command of Lieutenant Johnson, Captain Harvey relinquishing
the command, pending the acceptance of his resignation, which
circumstances forced him to send in.
The regiment took no part in the second day's fighting, constituting
part of the reserve. That night they lay in the edge of a piece of
woods. During it certain mules belonging to the Q.M. Department of our
army were stampeded, galloping in a body along our line of battle, the
rattling of the chains of their harnesses which had not been removed
when they were unhitched from the wagons, so resembling the clanking of
the scabbards of galloping cavalrymen, that many of the Eleventh, more
than will confess it, were sure that the rebel Stuart and his cavalry
were upon us. For a few minutes the utmost consternation and confusion
prevailed, but the truth was quickly known and quiet restored. Of
course no one was really scared, still it is said that some of the
Eleventh, and they not all of the rank and file either, displayed an
unexpected aptitude for tree climbing during the misconception.
After the battle we had occasion to look over the battle-field, for of
course we did not know that our missing were captured, they might be
killed or wounded.
It told the same ghastly story of war as that of Williamsburg. Our
hastily abandoned camp had been rummaged by the Confederates and the
shelter tents and old blankets taken from it to spread on the wet
ground as they lay in line of battle. The long line of wet trampled
tents and blankets told the exact position the enemy occupied the night
of the first day of the battle. The kettles still hung over the charred
embers of the extinguished cook fires, the headquarters' tents still
stood in their places, the horns of the band still hanging on the limbs
of the apple trees they were hanging on when the band took its hasty
departure for Augusta. It tooted for us no more. In a day or two our
division was placed under command of General Peck and ordered to guard
the Railroad Bridge and Bottoms Bridge; Couch's division guarding the
fords across the White Oak Swamp. For some days our position was at the
bridges, we camping at the end of the Railroad Bridge, just where the
Confederate artillery had stood when D and its Federal piece of
artillery first opened fire on each other from opposite ends of the
bridge. Then came the swift and almost unheralded march of Jackson from
the Valley to the south side of the Chickahominy and the Seven Days'
Battles. The story of the Battle of Gaines' Mills was brought to us by
the seemingly interminable army of the disheartened troops that for
hours filed across the Railroad Bridge, without officers or orders,
clamoring that all was lost, and that Jackson was moving swiftly
towards us, crushing all opposition.
With a well-manned battery, strongly supported, placed on the hill
behind us, the Eleventh went down into the swamps of the Chickahominy,
remaining there in a long skirmish line for two or three days,
expecting every hour to hear the skirmishers of the enemy crashing
through the woods of the opposite shore of the Chickahominy, now easily
fordable by light troops. But before the momentarily uncertain enemy
moved forward McClellan's rapidly laid plans had been fully acted on,
our right wing was across the Chickahominy by its various bridges, the
bridges were destroyed, and the retreat to the James River was in full
operation. As we moved away from the Railroad Bridge, the center spans
of which had been destroyed by axemen of the Eleventh the day before,
the famous train of cars that our men had loaded with shells and
combustibles at Savage Station came tearing down the track, and
reaching the bridge took its mighty header.
General "Dick" Taylor, of the Confederates, who was in command of the
troops at the other end of the bridge, says of it, while the battle of
Savage Station was raging on the afternoon of June 29th, Magruder
attacking Sumner, to be beaten off, the din of the distant combat was
silenced to his ears by a train approaching from Savage Station,
gathering speed as it rushed along, quickly emerging from the forest to
show two engines drawing a long string of cars. Reaching the bridge,
the engines exploded with a terrible noise, followed in succession by
the explosion of the carriages laden with ammunition. Shells burst in
all directions, he says, the river was lashed into foam, trees were
torn for acres around, and several of his men were wounded.
To this harsh music we moved swiftly away till we had crossed White Oak
Swamp Bridge in gathering darkness and reached the high ground beyond
it. Here we bivouacked in line of battle, all but the guards sleeping
on their arms, while the rear guard came filing across the bridge.
In the morning exhausted troops could be seen lying fast asleep
everywhere--in the fields, the woods, even in the dusty road itself.
But all of our troops were across the swamp, and as fast as the packed
condition of the roads to the James would permit, all but those of
us to form the rear guard of the day, the divisions of Smith and
Richardson and Naglee's Brigade, under command of Franklin, to lay here
and hold Jackson himself at bay, were moving slowly towards the next
selected position to make a stand--Malvern Hill. That Jackson was on
the other side of the bridge we knew, the rattle of the skirmishers'
rifles told us that. But just about noon he announced his presence by
suddenly opening on us with thirty pieces of artillery.
One moment there was nothing above us but a cloudless summer sky, the
next the air was full of shrieking shells, bursting in puffs of white
smoke, and showering down a storm of broken iron. It was so startling
in its suddenness that it is not strange, as the Second Corps
chronicler says, that there was "a scene of dire confusion." And to add
to it, the men in charge of a ponton train drawn up by the roadside,
waiting for an opportunity to lumber away along it, unhitched their
horses, mounted them and fled for the James River.
The confusion lasted but for a minute, and in it the Eleventh had no
share. We were lying in the edge of the woods that bordered the great
cleared field in which the troops and trains were massed, and perhaps
had an advantage in all being wide awake. At any rate we were not a bit
demoralized. Scarcely a man started to his feet, all waiting for the
word of command. It came quickly, and from the mouth of General Naglee
himself, who riding up to us and seeing our immovability while the
troops around us were in evident confusion, could not restrain his
delight at our coolness, but cried out "Fall in, my Yankee squad," for
the Eleventh was few in numbers now. We fell in, and as he proudly led
us across the big field to a new position, we stiffened our necks and
neither dodged or bowed to the storm of iron beating down upon us. We
had made a hit, and we knew it.
Taking up a position behind the rails of a torn-down fence, the
Eleventh lay listening to Jackson's cannon and watching Hazzard's
battery as it swept the White Oak Swamp Bridge with a storm of grape
and cannister that kept even Jackson at bay. The cannoneers fell one by
one--were thinned out until the officers not yet killed or wounded
dismounted and took their places at the guns. It was whispered that
their ammunition was giving out--was most gone--a few rounds more and
the last shell would be fired, and then Jackson and his 35,000 men
would pour across the bridge and up the heights to learn what sort of
stuff we were made of.
But this was not to be. Just as we were gathering ourselves together
for the apparently fast coming struggle, there came a yell from the
rear, a sound of desperately galloping horses, and with slashing whips
Pettits' battery came tearing on at the top of their horses' speed,
General Naglee leading them into position. Ours, as did all the
regiments massed in the big field, rose and cheered Naglee and the
artillerymen as they swept by. Inside of a minute from their first
appearance, they were in position, unlimbered, and were sweeping the
bridge with grape and cannister.
Away on the left, at Glendale, there was fighting, and hard fighting
too. Our men were so hard pressed that Franklin felt obliged to return
two brigades to Sedgwick that he had borrowed from him. And our old
commander, Colonel Caldwell, who had been with us during the day (now a
Brigadier-General and commanding a brigade in Richardson's division),
marched away with his brigade too, and rendered effective service in
beating the masses of the enemy off.
They attacked at several points in their efforts to break through the
lines of our men covering the roads by which our supply, ammunition and
artillery trains were retreating to Malvern Hill. Slocum, on the
Charles City road, was attacked at half-past one o'clock, but held his
position by a sweeping artillery fire. Then, McCall, at Glendale, a
point half way to Malvern Hill, was heavily attacked. McCall and many
of his men and guns were captured, but the strength of the rebel blow
was exhausted in the necessary effort, so that Sumner, whose line had
been in the rear of McCall's, letting the broken troops through, opened
heavily with artillery and musketry, repulsing all the enemy's efforts
to break his line. Later in the day an attempt was made on Porter,
stationed at Malvern Hill. He, too, by the aid of the gunboats,
maintained his position. As night fell, we prepared to retreat. The
abandoned ponton train was set on fire, and by its flaring light we
moved back, marching on and on until morning found us in position with
our own division at Malvern Hill.
The line of battle stretched around Malvern Hill, which is a point on
the James River of perhaps sixty feet in height with a broad cleared
top. Our line of defence made a huge semicircle, the flanks on the
river and under protection of the gunboats. Our own position was on the
right flank, close to the river. But a third of the troops of our army
were actually engaged in the battle of July 1st, 1862. It was an
artillery battle; the hill was crowned with sixty pieces of artillery,
planted to sweep all possible openings by which troops could advance.
Magruder and D. H. Hill made determined efforts to withstand their fire
but, when supplemented with a rolling infantry fire, no troops could
stand it. Night fell with our position undisturbed at any point.
As for me, I slept through most of the uproar; slept the sleep of the
thoroughly tired-out. And I understand that all that could of the army
did so too, refreshing tired Nature against the hour of need; many of
the troops actually engaged waking to do their brief part in repelling
an assault, and that done, to lie down in their line of battle to fall
asleep again.
When darkness set in the retreat was continued. Troops, batteries and
trains moved towards Harrison's Landing all night. Morning broke, the
heavens opened, and torrents of rain descended. Our division lay in a
covering position to oppose any advance the enemy might make, but he
had given up the chase. With our troops already on the James, under
cover of our gunboats, he knew it was madness to pursue further. So,
the sodden, tired men, the trains of wounded, batteries and wagons
floundered unmolested through the mud into Harrison's Landing, and not
till all were past us, the last straggling man and wagon, did we of the
rear guard move into that haven of rest and safety for the beaten,
battered, exhausted Army of the Potomac.