The Killer Angels: The Classic Novel of the Civil War

by Michael Shaara

  “Buster? You all right?”

  Bleak gray look. Holding his side.

  “Fine, Colonel. Hardly touched me.”

  He turned, showed his side. Tear just under the right shoulder, blood filling the armpit. Kilrain stuffed white cloth into the hole. “Be fine in a moment. But plays hell with me target practice. Would you care for the carbine?”

  He sat down abruptly. Weak from loss of blood. But not a bad wound, surely not a bad wound.

  “You stay there,” Chamberlain said. Another attack was coming. New firing blossomed around them. Chamberlain knelt.

  Kilrain grinned widely. “Hell, Colonel, I feel saintly.”

  “Tom’ll get a surgeon.”

  “Just a bit of bandage is all I’ll be needin’. And a few minutes off me feet. Me brogans are killin’ me.” Lapse into brogue.

  Tom moved off into the smoke. Chamberlain lost him. He stood. Whine of bullets, whisking murder. Leaves were falling around him. Face in the smoke. Chamberlain stepped forward.

  Jim Nichols, K Company: “Colonel, something goin’ on in our front. Better come see.”

  Nichols: a good man. Chamberlain hopped forward, slipped on a rock, nearly fell, hopped to another boulder, felt an explosion under his right foot, blow knocked his leg away, twirled, fell, caught by Nichols. Damned undignified. Hurt? Damn!

  How are you, sir?

  Looked at his foot. Hole in the boot? Blood? No. Numb. Oh my, begins to hurt now. But no hole, thank God. He stood up.

  Nichols pointed. Chamberlain clambered up on a high boulder. Going to get killed, give ’em a good high target. Saw: they were coming in groups, from rock to rock, tree to tree, not charging wildly as before, firing as they came, going down, killing us. But there, back there: masses of men, flags, two flags, flanking, moving down the line. They’re going to turn us. They’re going to that hole in the left …

  He was knocked clean off the rock. Blow in the side like lightning bolt. Must be what it feels like. Dirt and leaves in his mouth. Rolling over. This is ridiculous. Hands pulled him up. He looked down. His scabbard rippled like a spider’s leg, stuck out at a ridiculous angle. Blood? No. But the hip, oh my. Damn, damn. He stood up. Becoming quite a target. What was that now? He steadied his mind. Remembered: They’re flanking us.

  He moved back behind the boulder from which he had just been knocked. His hands were skinned; he was licking blood out of his mouth. His mind, temporarily sidetracked, oiled itself and ticked and turned and woke up, functioning. To Nichols: “Find my brother. Send all company commanders. Hold your positions.”

  Extend the line? No.

  He brooded. Stood up. Stared to the left, then mounted the rock again, aware of pain but concentrating. To the left the regiment ended, a high boulder there. Chamberlain thought: What was the phrase in the manual? Muddled brain. Oh yes: Re-fuse the line.

  The commanders were arriving. Chamberlain, for the first time, raised his voice. “You men! MOVE!”

  The other commanders came in a hurry. Chamberlain said, “We’re about to be flanked. Now here’s what we do. Keep up a good hot masking fire, you understand? Now let’s just make sure the Rebs keep their heads down. And let’s keep a tight hold on the Eighty-third, on old Pennsylvania over there. I want no breaks in the line. That’s you, Captain Clark, understand? No breaks.”

  Clark nodded. Bullets chipped the tree above him.

  “Now here’s the move. Keeping up the fire, and keeping a tight hold on the Eighty-third, we re-fuse the line. Men will sidestep to the left, thinning out to twice the present distance. See that boulder? When we reach that point we’ll re-fuse the line, form a new line at right angles. That boulder will be the salient. Let’s place the colors there, right? Fine. Now you go on back and move your men in sidestep and form a new line to the boulder, and then back from the boulder like a swinging door. I assume that, ah, F Company will take the point. Clear? Any questions?”

  They moved. It was very well done. Chamberlain limped to the boulder, to stand at the colors with Tozier. He grinned at Tozier.

  “How are you, Andrew?”

  “Fine, sir. And you?”

  “Worn.” Chamberlain grinned. “A bit worn.”

  “I tell you this, Colonel. The boys are making a hell of a fight.”

  “They are indeed.”

  The fire increased. The Rebs moved up close and began aimed fire, trying to mask their own movement. In a few moments several men died near where Chamberlain was standing. One boy was hit in the head and the wound seemed so bloody it had to be fatal, but the boy sat up and shook his head and bound up the wound himself with a handkerchief and went back to firing. Chamberlain noted: Most of our wounds are in the head or hands, bodies protected. Bless the stone wall. Pleasure to be behind it. Pity the men out there. Very good men. Here they come. Whose?

  The next charge struck the angle at the boulder, at the colors, lapped around it, ran into the new line, was enfiladed, collapsed. Chamberlain saw Tom come up, whirling through smoke, saw a rip in his coat, thought: no good to have a brother here. Weakens a man. He sent to the 83rd to tell them of his move to the left, asking if perhaps they couldn’t come a little this way and help him out. He sent Ruel Thomas back up the hill to find out how things were going there, to find Vincent, to tell him that life was getting difficult and we need a little help.

  He looked for Kilrain. The old Buster was sitting among some rocks, aiming the carbine, looking chipper. Hat was off. An old man, really. No business here. Kilrain said, “I’m not much good to you, Colonel.”

  There was a momentary calm. Chamberlain sat.

  “Buster, how are you?”

  Grin. Stained crooked teeth. All the pores remarkably clear, red bulbous nose. Eyes of an old man. How old? I’ve never asked.

  “How’s the ammunition?” Kilrain asked.

  “I’ve sent back.”

  “They’re in a mess on the other side.” He frowned, grinned, wiped his mouth with the good hand, the right arm folded across his chest, a bloody rag tucked in his armpit. “Half expect Rebs comin’ right over the top of the hill. Nothing much to do then. Be Jesus. Fight makes a thirst. And I’ve brought nothin’ a-tall, would you believe that? Not even my emergency ration against snakebite and bad dreams. Not even a spoonful of Save the Baby.”

  Aimed fire now. He heard a man crying with pain. He looked down the hill. Darker down there. He saw a boy behind a thick tree, tears running down his face, ramming home a ball, crying, whimpering, aiming fire, jolted shoulders, ball of smoke, then turning back, crying aloud, sobbing, biting the paper cartridge, tears all over his face, wiping his nose with a wet sleeve, ramming home another ball.

  Kilrain said, “I can stand now, I think.”

  Darker down the hill. Sunset soon. How long had this been going on? Longer pause than usual. But … the Rebel yell. A rush on the left. He stood up. Pain in the right foot, unmistakable squish of blood in the boot. Didn’t know it was bleeding. See them come, bounding up the rocks, hitting the left flank. Kilrain moved by him on the right, knelt, fired. Chamberlain pulled out the pistol. No damn good except at very close range. You couldn’t hit anything. He moved to the left flank. Much smoke. Smoke changing now, blowing this way, blinding. He was caught in it, a smothering shroud, hot, white, the bitter smell of burned powder. It broke. He saw a man swinging a black rifle, grunts and yells and weird thick sounds unlike anything he had ever heard before. A Reb came over a rock, bayonet fixed, black thin point forward and poised, face seemed blinded, head twitched. Chamberlain aimed the pistol, fired, hit the man dead center, down he went, folding; smoke swallowed him. Chamberlain moved forward. He expected them to be everywhere, flood of brown bodies, gray bodies. But the smoke cleared and the line was firm. Only a few Rebs had come up, a few come over the stones, all were down. He ran forward to a boulder, ducked, looked out: dead men, ten, fifteen, lumps of gray, blood spattering everywhere, dirty white skin, a clawlike hand, black sightless eyes. Burst of white smoke, agai
n, again. Tom at his shoulder: “Lawrence?”

  Chamberlain turned. All right? Boyish face. He smiled.

  “They can’t send us no help from the Eighty-third. Woodward said they have got their troubles, but they can extend the line a little and help us out.”

  “Good. Go tell Clarke to shift a bit, strengthen the center.”

  Kilrain, on hands and knees, squinting: “They keep coming in on the flank.”

  Chamberlain, grateful for the presence: “What do you think?”

  “We’ve been shooting a lot of rounds.”

  Chamberlain looked toward the crest of the hill. No Thomas anywhere. Looked down again toward the dark. Motion. They’re forming again. Must have made five or six tries already. To Kilrain: “Don’t know what else to do.”

  Looked down the line. Every few feet, a man down. Men sitting facing numbly to the rear. He thought: Let’s pull back a ways. He gave the order to Spear. The Regiment bent back from the colors, from the boulder, swung back to a new line, tighter, almost a U. The next assault came against both flanks and the center all at once, worst of all. Chamberlain dizzy in the smoke began to lose track of events, saw only blurred images of smoke and death, Tozier with the flag, great black gaps in the line, the left flank giving again, falling back, tightening. Now there was only a few yards between the line on the right and the line on the left, and Chamberlain walked the narrow corridor between, Kilrain at his side, always at a crouch.

  Ruel Thomas came back. “Sir? Colonel Vincent is dead.”

  Chamberlain swung to look him in the face. Thomas nodded jerkily.

  “Yes, sir. Got hit a few moments after fight started. We’ve already been reinforced by Weed’s Brigade, up front, but now Weed is dead, and they moved Hazlett’s Battery in up top and Hazlett’s dead.”

  Chamberlain listened, nodded, took a moment to let it come to focus.

  “Can’t get no ammunition, sir. Everything’s a mess up there. But they’re holdin’ pretty good. Rebs having trouble coming up the hill. Pretty steep.”

  “Got to have bullets,” Chamberlain said.

  Spear came up from the left. “Colonel, half the men are down. If they come again …” He shrugged, annoyed, baffled, as if by a problem he could not quite solve, yet ought to, certainly, easily. “Don’t know if we can stop ’em.”

  “Send out word,” Chamberlain said. “Take ammunition from the wounded. Make every round count.” Tom went off, along with Ruel Thomas. Reports began coming in. Spear was right. But the right flank was better, not so many casualties there. Chamberlain moved, shifting men. And heard the assault coming, up the rocks, clawing up through the bushes, through the shattered trees, the pocked stone, the ripped and bloody earth. It struck the left flank. Chamberlain shot another man, an officer. He fell inside the new rock wall, face a bloody rag. On the left two Maine men went down, side by side, at the same moment, and along that spot there was no one left, no one at all, and yet no Rebs coming, just one moment of emptiness in all the battle, as if in that spot the end had come and there were not enough men left now to fill the earth, that final death was beginning there and spreading like a stain. Chamberlain saw movement below, troops drawn toward the gap as toward a cool place in all the heat, and looking down, saw Tom’s face and yelled, but not being heard, pointed and pushed, but his hand stopped in mid-air, not my own brother, but Tom understood, hopped across to the vacant place and plugged it with his body so that there was no longer a hole but one terribly mortal exposed boy, and smoke cut him off, so that Chamberlain could no longer see, moving forward himself, had to shoot another man, shot him twice, the first ball taking him in the shoulder, and the man was trying to fire a musket with one hand when Chamberlain got him again, taking careful aim this time. Fought off this assault, thinking all the while coldly, calmly, perhaps now we are approaching the end. They can’t keep coming. We can’t keep stopping them.

  Firing faded. Darker now. Old Tom. Where?

  Familiar form in familiar position, aiming downhill, firing again. All right. God be praised.

  Chamberlain thought: Not right, not right at all. If he was hit, I sent him there. What would I tell Mother? What do I feel myself? His duty to go. No, no. Chamberlain blinked. He was becoming tired. Think on all that later, the theology of it.

  He limped along the line. Signs of exhaustion. Men down, everywhere. He thought: we cannot hold.

  Looked up toward the crest. Fire still hot there, still hot everywhere. Down into the dark. They are damned good men, those Rebs. Rebs, I salute you. I don’t think we can hold you.

  He gathered with Spear and Kilrain back behind the line. He saw another long gap, sent Ruel Thomas to this one. Spear made a count.

  “We’ve lost a third of the men, Colonel. Over a hundred down. The left is too thin.”

  “How’s the ammunition?”

  “I’m checking.”

  A new face, dirt-stained, bloody: Homan Melcher, lieutenant, Company F, a gaunt boy with buck teeth.

  “Colonel? Request permission to go pick up some of our wounded. We left a few boys out there.”

  “Wait,” Chamberlain said.

  Spear came back, shaking his head. “We’re out.” Alarm stained his face, a grayness in his cheeks.

  “Some of the boys have nothing at all.”

  “Nothing,” Chamberlain said.

  Officers were coming from the right. Down to a round or two per man. And now there was a silence around him. No man spoke. They stood and looked at him, and then looked down into the dark and then looked back at Chamberlain. One man said, “Sir, I guess we ought to pull out.”

  Chamberlain said, “Can’t do that.”

  Spear: “We won’t hold ’em again. Colonel, you know we can’t hold ’em again.”

  Chamberlain: “If we don’t hold, they go right on by and over the hill and the whole flank caves in.”

  He looked from face to face. The enormity of it, the weight of the line, was a mass too great to express. But he could see it as clearly as in a broad wide vision, a Biblical dream: If the line broke here, then the hill was gone, all these boys from Pennsylvania, New York, hit from behind, above. Once the hill went, the flank of the army went. Good God! He could see troops running; he could see the blue flood, the bloody tide.

  Kilrain: “Colonel, they’re coming.”

  Chamberlain marveled. But we’re not so bad ourselves. One recourse: Can’t go back. Can’t stay where we are. Result: inevitable.

  The idea formed.

  “Let’s fix bayonets,” Chamberlain said.

  For a moment no one moved.

  “We’ll have the advantage of moving downhill,” he said.

  Spear understood. His eyes saw; he nodded automatically. The men coming up the hill stopped to volley; weak fire came in return. Chamberlain said, “They’ve got to be tired, those Rebs. They’ve got to be close to the end. Fix bayonets. Wait. Ellis, you take the left wing. I want a right wheel forward of the whole regiment.”

  Lieutenant Melcher said, perplexed, “Sir, excuse me, but what’s a ‘right wheel forward’?”

  Ellis Spear said, “He means ‘charge,’ Lieutenant, ‘charge.’ ”

  Chamberlain nodded. “Not quite. We charge, swinging down to the right. We straighten out our line. Clarke hangs onto the Eighty-third, and we swing like a door, sweeping them down the hill. Understand? Everybody understand? Ellis, you take the wing, and when I yell you go to it, the whole regiment goes forward, swinging to the right.”

  “Well,” Ellis Spear said. He shook his head. “Well.”

  “Let’s go.” Chamberlain raised his saber, bawled at the top of his voice, “Fix bayonets!”

  He was thinking: We don’t have two hundred men left. Not two hundred. More than that coming at us. He saw Melcher bounding away toward his company, yelling, waving. Bayonets were coming out, clinking, clattering. He heard men beginning to shout, Maine men, strange shouts, hoarse, wordless, animal. He limped to the front, toward the great boulder w
here Tozier stood with the colors, Kilrain at his side. The Rebs were in plain view, moving, firing. Chamberlain saw clearly a tall man aiming a rifle at him. At me. Saw the smoke, the flash, but did not hear the bullet go by. Missed. Ha! He stepped out into the open, balanced on the gray rock. Tozier had lifted the colors into the clear. The Rebs were thirty yards off. Chamberlain raised his saber, let loose the shout that was the greatest sound he could make, boiling the yell up from his chest: Fix bayonets! Charge! Fix bayonets! Charge! Fix bayonets! Charge! He leaped down from the boulder, still screaming, his voice beginning to crack and give, and all around him his men were roaring animal screams, and he saw the whole regiment rising and pouring over the wall and beginning to bound down through the dark bushes, over the dead and dying and wounded, hats coming off, hair flying, mouths making sounds, one man firing as he ran, the last bullet, last round. Chamberlain saw gray men below stop, freeze, crouch, then quickly turn. The move was so quick he could not believe it. Men were turning and running. Some were stopping to fire. There was the yellow flash and then they turned. Chamberlain saw a man drop a rifle and run. Another. A bullet plucked at Chamberlain’s coat, a hard pluck so that he thought he had caught a thorn but looked down and saw the huge gash. But he was not hit. He saw an officer: handsome full-bearded man in gray, sword and revolver. Chamberlain ran toward him, stumbled, cursed the bad foot, looked up and aimed and fired and missed, then held aloft the saber. The officer turned, saw him coming, raised a pistol, and Chamberlain ran toward it downhill, unable to stop, stumbling downhill seeing the black hole of the pistol turning toward him, not anything else but the small hole yards away, feet away, the officer’s face a blur behind it and no thought, a moment of gray suspension rushing silently, soundlessly toward the black hole … and the gun did not fire; the hammer clicked down on an empty shell, and Chamberlain was at the man’s throat with the saber and the man was handing him his sword, all in one motion, and Chamberlain stopped.

  “The pistol too,” he said.

  The officer handed him the gun: a cavalry revolver, Colt.

  “Your prisoner, sir.” The face of the officer was very white, like old paper. Chamberlain nodded.