Pugnavimus ensibus.
We fought with our swords.
--REGNER LODBROG.
About midnight the Second Division was ordered down the plank-road to
join Sheridan. Bartlett's brigade had proceeded as far as Gravelly Run,
reaching it at dark. They found the stream swollen, the bridge gone, and
the enemy strongly posted on the other side. The brigade was withdrawn
during the night. It was no easy task to move troops under the
circumstances. Orders had to go from corps commander down through
brigade, regimental, and company officers to the privates, who had to be
aroused from sleep and got into ranks without noise.
Through the deep mud and intense darkness we moved toward Dinwiddie
Court-house. The darkness was so deep that we could tell nothing about
localities. We must have marched past the Court-house. We might easily
have passed the village without being aware of it. We then about-faced
and retraced our steps for some distance. There is a road leads north
from Dinwiddie toward Five Forks. We may have taken this, or we may have
followed the plank-road a couple of miles farther back to a road which
leads across to the one just mentioned. However this may be, daylight
found us confronting the enemy somewhere in this vicinity. The only
force found was a picket or skirmish line, which was easily driven away.
The Second Division massed near the residence of J. M. Brooks, on the
Five Forks road. Here we remained from about 7 A. M. until 10 A. M.
During this time the other two divisions arrived, and took position a
little north of us on the same road. When we reached this point the One
Hundred and Ninetieth was thrown forward in skirmish line.
Meantime, the rebels had retired to their fortified position at Five
Forks. Their works extended more than a mile, east and west, making a
slight angle with the White Oak road, turning northward about a
half-mile east of the Ford road. A heavy skirmish-line was deployed in
front of their left, and extending some distance eastward, and south of
the White Oak road. This force consisted of fourteen hundred riflemen,
reputed the best in Lee's army. In this position they awaited our
attack.
About ten o'clock we began to move, taking the road leading past
Gravelly Run Church. At first there seemed to be some uncertainty about
the movements and position of the enemy; but it was soon evident that
his entire force was in our front. The column advanced along the road,
with frequent brief halts, which indicated that we were nearing the foe.
Erelong we could hear skirmishing, and an occasional discharge of
cannon. Ambulances were passing, freighted with wounded cavalrymen, and
later, stretcher-bearers, with their bloody burdens, met us, as we moved
slowly toward the front.
Near Gravelly Run Church, our line of battle was formed. The Second
Division was on the left, the Third on the right, the First in reserve,
close behind the other two, a little on the right of the center. The two
divisions in front were arranged as follows: Each division placed two
brigades in front, in two lines each, and the remaining brigade in the
rear of the center, in two lines. In the Second Division, the Maryland
Brigade was on the left, ours on the right, and Winthrop's in reserve.
The One Hundred and Ninety-first, including the fragment of the One
Hundred and Fifty-seventh, and the Fourth Delaware, were the first line
of battle, under Colonel Pattee. The One Hundred and Ninetieth was
ordered forward to skirmish. We deployed in the woods, and waited for
the completion of the arrangements going on in our rear. A few rods
farther on there was open ground, which, in our front, gradually sloped
down to woods. Opposite the left of the regiment, the open ground
extended farther toward the north and west, and on that side was a
slight hollow, with rough, broken ground beyond. Rebel skirmishers were
in the woods in our front, now exchanging shots with cavalry in the open
ground near us. Our skirmish-line was ready for business in a few
minutes; but it was some time before the divisions were formed, in
readiness for the assault.
If you should attempt to form an idea of that thin line of waiting men,
who were to lead the way in the decisive struggle, which all knew was at
hand, the mental picture would probably differ widely from the reality.
Cast your eye to the left, along the line. You can see a goodly
distance. The wood is not very dense. That does not look much like
"battle's magnificently stern array." There is nothing magnificent or
stern about it. You expected something of a scene. There is nothing of
the sort. Instead, these men surprise you by their quiet bearing and
seeming indifference. Most of them are young men. A few days ago they
were so neat and tidy in dress and appearance, you might almost mistake
that they were college students playing soldier. Now they are dirty,
smeared with mud, half wet still from the rain, which only ceased this
morning. Some are seated, leaning against the trees, taking it easy,
conversing as pleasantly as if these were the ordinary occurrences of
life. That bright-faced fellow, of Company E, is diligently polishing a
little rusty spot, which he has discovered on his gun barrel. If there
is time, he will scrape the mud from his shoes, and from his pants,
which are stiff with it, almost to the knees. A few are nervous and
anxious, but most of the really faint-hearted took advantage of the hard
march last night to secure absence to-day. Dunn is on hand,--he that
took himself from the field yesterday with such agility, at the
beginning of the fight, and gave such comical reasons for his
unceremonious flight, when he came up in the evening. R---- is in the
line, looking black, silent, and still troubled in his knees. Do these
careless men realize that they are about to decide the fate of a great
nation? Perhaps they are unconscious of the greatness of the present
hour; but what of that? They stood in their lot.
But our waiting is over at last; and, at the word of command, every
soldier is in his place. These men were _not_ stolid, ignorant, nor
inexperienced. Their thinned ranks show how well they know what battle
means. You can see some pale faces, and lips compressed, as
"FORWARD" passes down the line. We pass out of the woods into
the open field. A few rods ahead, some mounted cavalrymen are firing
toward the woods, which conceal the enemy. We can see a puff of smoke
here and there among the trees. A little farther, and the cavalry gallop
away to the right, and bullets begin to whistle past, some over, some
tossing up the dirt at our feet. It would be a waste of powder to return
the fire at this distance; besides, we are going down there. But the
bullets begin to come closer. They are fairly hot as they hiss around
us. We quicken our pace. It is five hundred yards to the woods. The men
on our left open fire--four hundred yards, three, the line slackens a
little, and a volley, and another, and another, bursts in quick
succession from our Spencer rifles. Then a cheer, as we dash for the
woods at headlong speed, yelling and firing as we go. The rebel
skirmishers give way before our charge, and the woods are gained.
Up to this time I had not looked back. I supposed we had advanced about
a thousand yards, and would soon encounter the main force of the enemy.
As we reached the woods, I turned to see if the line of battle was yet
in sight. My eyes fell upon the most stirring scene I ever witnessed.
This was the grandeur, the sublimity of war. The corps was coming in
order of battle, line after line sweeping on with steady step. Their
front extended nearly a mile across the open ground, guns at a
right-shoulder, glittering in the sunlight like silver, battle-flags
fluttering in the air. In front, the skirmishers were fighting savagely;
on the left a score of cannon were thundering, shells screaming out
their horrid warning, as they leaped from the smoking guns. But this
living avalanche swept on in stern silence, as if there breathed within
it a great soul, which scorned to speak or strike but once. A single
glance took in the inspiring scene. I gazed but a moment, and then
hurried into the woods.
The ground here consisted of alternate ridges and depressions, covered
with trees and bushes, with occasional open places. It was hard ground
to fight over, every ridge serving as a rallying point, and affording a
superior position for defense. Our advance was now a succession of
charges. When the rebels were driven from one ridge, they rallied at the
next. A short distance from the edge of the woods, where we first
encountered them, was a little brook, running nearly east; along its
banks were some large rocks, while a few rods nearer were piles of wood,
logs, and other means of shelter. Quite a large group of rebels made a
stand here. Sergeant Hasler, Crocket, one or two others and myself,
centered our attention on these, and advanced upon them, at first taking
what cover we could among the trees, firing rapidly as we went. As we
were pressing forward, my foot tripped on something, and I came to the
ground with stunning force. Crocket, who was a few yards to my right,
hurried toward me, his face the very picture of anxious sympathy, and
inquired if I was struck. Recovering my breath, in a moment I was on my
feet again, and assured him I was all right.
We now rushed on them with a cheer, and they broke and fled. We were so
close on them, that seven of their number took refuge behind a large
rock, while three or four more fled across the brook, leaving one of
their number wounded on its bank. The men behind the rock now waved hats
past it in token of surrender, and soon they were marching toward the
rear in charge of Crocket. The wounded rebel whom I had seen fall, lay
about a rod to the left, shot through the thigh. I gave him a drink,
filled my canteen, and went on.
We had now become scattered, and made our way onward without much regard
to order or concert of action. For a while the two lines were mingled
together in the underbrush, so that you scarcely knew which way to look
for friend or foe. Sometimes I was with others, and again entirely
alone. The woods resounded with the yells of the combatants and the
crack of rifles, as the deadly fight raged along the line.
Passing through the corner of an open field, I noticed some rebels eight
or ten hundred yards to the left and front in such a position that I
could give them a flank fire, while just a short distance from me in the
field was a stone pile. The temptation was too strong to be resisted. I
repaired to the stone pile and opened on them. At the first shot they
looked to see whence it came; the next, they dodged, and hugged close to
their rifle-pit, and then discovering me, they returned the fire. Their
first shots went wild, but they soon got the range, and began to strike
the stone pile. I gave them a few parting shots from my Spencer, and
went on into the woods.
The skirmishing continued at close range, as before. The rebels fought
stubbornly from point to point. Their works seemed farther off than we
expected, but the crisis must come soon. We had just passed over a
ridge, and the rebels had made a stand among the timber beyond. A slight
depression lay between us, down which a gully had been washed by the
water. None of our men were in sight, but I could hear their firing in
the brush, right and left.
Wishing to gain the timber beyond the gully, I started forward without
waiting to recharge my rifle, which I had just fired. The trees which I
wished to gain were not more than forty feet away, and the gully about
half that distance. I had gone but a step or two when a rebel soldier
rose to his feet in the gully, facing me, with rifle in hand. It was a
groundhog case. As he rose, I rushed at him, aiming at his heart and
calling on him to surrender. He instantly dropped his gun. It was all
over in less time than it takes to pen this sentence. His gun was loaded
and capped. We waited till the line of battle came up. As they pushed
through the brush behind us, seeing a rebel soldier, a dozen rifles were
leveled on us; but they saw how it was in time to withhold their fire.
Leaving my prisoner with them, I started forward again.
We soon reached an abrupt rise of ground beyond which we could not
advance. Before us was the left of the enemy's intrenched position. We
had done our work. We had driven every thing before us, and others must
face the storm now. Some kneeling, others lying flat on the ground, we
continued to fire and waited for the line of battle. In a few minutes we
could see them coming on through the woods. A short distance behind us
was a small patch of swampy, boggy ground. As this was approached orders
were given and executed as coolly as if on the parade ground. The
portion of the line opposite the swamp folded back of the other toward
the left, and when the ground was passed, went back to place again
without the least delay or confusion.
As they moved up the bank upon which we were, a volley burst upon them
before which they wavered and swerved backward a few paces, as here and
there a man reeled and staggered or sank to the earth. There was no
panic--not a back turned--only that instinctive shrinking which Life
sometimes feels when Death unexpectedly thrusts out his ghastly face
through the smoke of battle. A color-bearer sprang forward with the
battle-flag. He halted beside me and rested the end of the flagstaff on
the ground. He half-faced about toward the men. His voice rang out like
a bugle blast, as he raised his arm and shouted:
"Here are your colors!"
The line responded with a yell as it sprang forward, and soon was
wrapped in the sulphurous smoke of its volleys which it thundered
against the foe.
As the line moved on, I stepped behind them and passed farther to the
right, and again went out ahead. The "left wheel" which the corps made
in this battle resulted naturally from the position of the forces
engaged. If we had moved directly forward in the direction in which we
started, only the left of the Second Division would have struck the
rebel's works; but the men posted in their front, as they were forced
back, retreated toward the north-west, and we naturally swung around in
following them.
We were now in front of the Third Division, the rebels still contesting
every foot of ground. We finally drove them across an open field about a
hundred yards wide. A road was on our left; at least all the Bucktails
in sight were on the right of the road. A house stood near the road next
to the woods, out of which we had driven the rebels, who were now
firing from the farther side of the field. We were crossing the field,
and some had reached the woods beyond, when the line of battle came up
by the house behind us and opened fire. We hurried back to escape their
bullets, which we considered more dangerous than those of the enemy. I
stood behind them near the house, watching their firing, very much
disgusted with the performance. There was a young lady in the house,
apparently the only occupant. She was almost wild with fright, and gave
vent to her feelings in screams and cries of terror.
A little lieutenant was prancing around back of the line, flourishing
his saber in gallant style. He accosted me, and demanded why I was
standing back, doing nothing. I replied that I did not belong on
his--line, and made some comments perhaps not strictly polite. This
added wrath to his excitement. I think this must have been the first
time he had smelled gunpowder, except at a distance, and he supposed
they were doing grandly. There was no telling how much effort it had
cost him to get his courage screwed up sufficiently to bring him thus
far; and to have this dirty, mud-bedraggled scrub of a boy intimate
that the whole outfit should be furnished with long ears, was too much.
As Homer would say, "his diaphragm became black all over." At this point
Captain Birkman appeared on the scene and announced that he was
responsible for me. This ended the matter.
After firing awhile, this brigade started to advance across the field.
The regiment on the left moved up in good order as far as the edge of
the woods. The others straggled forward in disorder. Both officers and
men seemed to be confused. By the time they reached the woods they were
little better than a mob, and had to halt to re-form. I think the man in
command of the brigade was responsible for this. I now started out to
skirmish again, intending to keep in front of the regiment on the left.
As I reached the point where the road entered the woods, I met Mike
Coleman coming on a run, and greatly excited.
"Why, Mike, I thought you were kilt! I heard you were shot in the head
back yonder."
Scarcely pausing for a reply, he went on:
"We've got them! we've got them! We're right in their rear. We'll take
them all! Why don't these men come on?"
With this he hurried back to the men just behind us, and in a breath
told them the situation, and urged them to come on without delay. To his
great disgust, his appeals were unheeded, and he turned to me saying we
would go alone. But now we saw some of the Bucktails coming forward, and
soon about twenty of us were deployed at skirmish distance, advancing on
the rebel rear. Their line could be seen stretching far to right and
left. Our Spencers rattled among the trees as we rained the bullets upon
them. They turned on us savagely, and their rifles blazed and flashed in
reply. Presently their fire slackened. They right-faced, and began to
move off toward the west, at first with some order; but soon they were
only a panic-stricken mob, fleeing in all directions, some to the right,
some to the left, others toward us. The latter we disarmed and sent to
the rear without any guard, and kept up a fire on those who were running
to the right. They threw down their guns by hundreds, and surrendered.
Toward the close a rebel soldier came toward me at full speed, with his
gun at a trail-arms. I did not notice him until he was within
twenty-five or thirty yards of me. I yelled at him to surrender; but he
came on without checking his speed. I stepped from the tree by which I
was standing, and leveled my rifle on him.
"Drop that gun!" I yelled again.
He dropped it as if it had burned him, and hustled off his
accouterments, and threw them on the ground. I made him stay with me,
intending to take him back myself. My cartridges were about exhausted,
and I fired all but one or two at the rear of the fleeing rebels, and
started back with the prisoner.
The sun had now gone down. The moon was shining peacefully. How quickly
those fateful hours of battle had passed! I started for the point where
our line had formed, expecting to dispose of my prisoner there, and then
sleep all night. As we passed along, the dead lay scattered here and
there as they fell. There was something startlingly solemn in those
motionless forms, the stony eyes staring in the moonlight.
Beyond the church I found a large number of prisoners, and turned over
my man to the guards, and started to return. I was joined by L. C.
Walb, who had also been back with prisoners. The church had been turned
into a hospital. It was full of wounded, and many were laid on the
ground outside. A few rods past the church we lay down to sleep. There
came a reaction after the excitement of the day. Nerves, strained to
their utmost tension for hours, relaxed, and seemed to tingle with the
pain of weariness. The jarring noises of battle were reproduced as the
senses glided through that strange interval between waking and sleeping,
and more than once I came back to consciousness with a start, scarcely
able, for a moment, to distinguish the real and the unreal. A low,
moaning sound came from the hundreds of wounded about the church; not
any single groan or cry of pain, but only a sound as if the hurried
breath from suffering lips smote upon the strings of an unseen harp,
which sounded out its sad cadences through the air. But at last I sunk
into a sound sleep.
Our losses were less severe than on the preceding day. Eight hundred and
thirty-four were killed and wounded, and fifty-four were missing. The
opposing force of the enemy was practically annihilated. Three thousand
were killed and wounded, and five thousand five hundred were made
prisoners. Eleven stand of colors were taken, and four guns, with their
caissons; also wagons and other material.
Captain Birkman, of Company A, says of this battle, in an extract kindly
furnished from his diary: "The most successful attack I ever witnessed."
It was a decisive battle, and settled the fate of the Confederacy. Since
leaving camp on the morning of March 29th, three days before, the Fifth
Corps had lost nearly one-fourth of its number in battles.
In this engagement the direct assault was made by the Second Division,
the other divisions swinging around on the enemy's left flank and rear.
The Third Brigade first struck, and broke through the rebel works.
Sergeant Huck, with the colors of the One Hundred and Ninety-first, was
the first man across the rebel rifle-pits. Colonel Pattee, commanding
the first line, was the first mounted officer across, and leaped his
horse over the breastwork while the foremost of the assailants were
crowding over. They found themselves in the midst of the panic-stricken
rebels, who threw down their arms and surrendered in large numbers. The
Maryland brigade struck the rebel position almost at the same time, and
with like results. The division then passed on down along the rear of
the rebel position, doubling them up rapidly, and driving them in
confusion.
We have read how the infantry faltered, till General Sheridan led them
to the charge. We venture the opinion that this is wholly imaginary.
These two brigades moved upon the rebel works as steadily and swiftly as
the nature of the ground would allow. General Sheridan's reputation does
not need any artificial bolstering, least of all at the expense of
deserving men and officers.
The arbitrary removal of General Warren from the command of the Fifth
Corps was unknown to the soldiers until the following morning. We heard
only expressions of surprise and disapproval. It must be a cause of
regret to all fair-minded men, that he was not allowed to share in this
grand success with the men whom he had so long commanded. He was held in
high esteem by the private soldiers, who regarded him as a brave and
skillful officer.