I made it clear that I was only helping them with their evolutions, and that I would have no part of any war.
We crossed Bull Run Creek at a ford that morning, but did not go straight into battle. The cannon made the boys jump. Then the sounds of musketry spread. Our regiment shunted about in the rising heat. I did what I could to keep the boys calm. Whenever we stopped I bothered them with inspections. For thought is the enemy of duty.
The battle noise was shocking, and different to me. Missing were the sounds of swords and chants, the grisly humanness of it. Apart from a high distant keening that came and went, it sounded as though two vast foundries had gone to war. I had heard guns and volleys in my time, but this had the ring of machines making war on machines.
The morning passed with sudden movements forward, followed by flank marches and more halts. Into the trees we went, only to come back out. Stragglers wandered past us, for every battle has its share, and the first wounded followed them. That made the boys go quiet. I could feel them aching to plunge forward, to get into it and put the waiting and wondering behind them. They doubted themselves, as soldiers have done since the battles of flints and stones, and each man felt his separateness now.
I could not say where I was on the field, for I had no map. But our colonel rode over and directed me to move my company into the woods and to the right, to secure the regiment’s flank.
I marched the boys through the underbrush, with the sergeants coming on behind to collar shirkers. It was a jungle of a place. I reformed the company on the near side of a creek where the fall of the land would channel an enemy toward us, then I sent out pickets and gave the boys, “Rest in place.” We were beyond range, but their hearts refused to understand that.
The waiting was terrible for them. A thundering battle raged above us on the heights, and quitters come stumbling through the depths of the woods, crying out that we had been defeated, that the day was lost. Cowards always claim such. I knew that nothing had been decided. We had spent the morning moving forward, and, by the sound of things, we were just as likely to go forward again.
My immediate concern was to stop the boys, who were thirsting under the heat, from drinking out of the creek. I scented death in it.
A battery went into action above us. We could not see it, but the sound was enough to unsettle the company again.
“We gonna get in it, Captain Jones? We gonna get in it?” The young man’s eyes bulged like those of a driven animal. There is a quality of fear that makes a man run toward the object of his terror.
“We will await our orders,” I said. “Steady, now.”
“Think we’re winning up there, Captain?” another soldier asked. “Don’t it sound like we’re winning?”
“The generals have the matter in hand, Pierce. There is muck on the butt of your rifle. Attend to it.”
The army that had marched toward Manassas Junction was as raw as a newborn calf, and I was astonished that the generals thought it ready for battle. But let that bide. My heart was beating as hard as any, though I could not let the boys know. I had never felt so lonely on the edge of battle, for I had always had my butties to banter with me. This time I stood alone as the officer commanding. And there was still a greater difference about me now. I had something to lose. I stood up as straight as I could, and kept my face a mask, but my thoughts fled to my wife and child.
Light speckled down through the trees. It would have been a lovely place, but for the noise and the reel of blown powder. We waited in our little green world.
“It’s even hot in the damned shade,” a private declared.
I turned on him. “We will have no profanity, Roberts. Sergeant Childs, you will inspect the men’s rifle for cleanliness.” A groan rolled down the ranks at that. But I only wanted the men busy and not prey to their thoughts.
Battle? They did not even know what real heat was like, let alone battle. In the Punjab, the heat dropped more men from the ranks than the enemy did. But these were Northern boys, got up in wool, and it was hard enough for them.
The smoke drifted down to us, feeling its way between the tree trunks. The rifle fire grew so intense its crackling nearly smothered the sound of the cannon.
A great thrashing come through the brambles to our rear. Twas an officer, a lieutenant colonel, whom I had never seen. “Every man to the front!” he cried “General’s orders. All regiments to the top of the hill.”
He was flustered with the heat and his own importance, and sweat soaked his muttonchop whiskers When I inquired about our regiment, he assured me it was already on the move, that there was a crisis on the heights, that every man was needed.
“Would the colonel kindly keep his voice down?” I said. “No need to rile the men, sir.”
He looked around as if about to leap away from me. “Yes, of course… of course…”
“Now, sir, my last orders from my colonel were to guard this flank. May I ask on whose authority—”
“Everybody’s supposed to go forward. General’s orders. That’s all I know.”
I heard a great deal more crashing and clanging farther off on the flank, beyond the end of my line. The lieutenant colonel heard it, too, and glanced about in panic. A body of men were moving through the woods. In a moment, I saw them, a full regiment in blue, overtaking our position.
The security of the flank was no longer an issue. It angered me that I had not heard from our colonel. But he had been a banker four months before. Things great and little are forgotten in battle.
When I invited the lieutenant colonel to go forward with us, he said, “I’m bee-stung. I’m a wounded man.” And he disappeared.
I had Lieutenant Michaels form up the men in two ranks, then called, “Company… forward.” The creek had a slop of a bottom and we come out of it heavy with mud. I almost lost a shoe. I tried to keep pace with the regiment to our right, since there was nothing on our left where our own regiment should have been. The men had to work through thickets and over fallen logs, but they stepped along in good spirit, closing up the ranks as quickly as the ground allowed. Even with the growl of battle above us, I could hear the familiar sounds of canteens bouncing and the chink of metal on metal, the great rustle of soldiers on the move. There was more smoke now, and the firing thickened with every step we took up that slope.
A squirrel fled before me.
We broke out of the trees below the crest of the hill, but could not yet see the battle—only little knots of men meandering and a sutler’s wagon with the horses shot dead in their traces. We were as good as in it, though. Bullets hissed above our heads. The regiment to our right had been well drilled and its ranks hardly rippled as they climbed. It made me proud to see them. Then their green banner flapped out beside the national colors and I thought, “My God, they’re Irish.” I smartened up my boys right quick, for I could not let the sons of Erin shame us. We made our separate way through virgin rye.
All clear of the woods now, I saw trouble. On our left, there was a gap of two hundred yards between us and the next ranks of blue. Nor did I recognize the regimental flag in the distance.
There was a break in the line.
We crested the hill and I heard a gasp from every throat behind me. The smoke had settled heavily in a swale, and the battle was inside the cloud of it, lit by muzzle flashes. Men stumbled back toward us, materializing suddenly, a few of them wounded, others running and throwing down their rifles. Behind me, a frightened voice said, “God, that there’s a leg.” The blood would seem brighter than the sun to my boys, I knew. It would have been easiest on them to pitch them right into the battle.
Someone needed to cover that gap to our left, though.
I halted the boys, with no more time for explanations. They had to trust me now, though they were great ones, these Americans, for wanting reasons for the doing of a thing.
“Connors, to me,” I shouted. My voice was still that of a sergeant at drill, not of an officer.
Private Connors ran up, fac
e pale and lips the color of liver. He was a fine runner, Connors.
“See that officer over there? On the horse, see? You run down and tell him there’s a gap in our line. He can’t see it from where he is. Tell him there’s a gap on his left and we’ll try to cover it until a regiment comes up to close it. But a regiment must come up. Do you understand me?”
He nodded. But it was a great deal to remember.
“A gap on his left,” I repeated. “We have only one company. A regiment must come up. Now run you down there.”
The officer I had set Connors to chase after suddenly raised his hat, waving his men forward. His red hair caught the sun. The Irishmen went to it like great raging tigers, but after a minute I saw their flag no more.
A cannonball bounced across our front. The men watched it go. Then they began to laugh.
“Ain’t that the damnedest?” I heard. Twas Pierce again.
It meant a gun was positioned to enfilade our advance. And it would not be a joke when a ball laid down a squad in line.
“Company… left… face. Forward… march. Guide on me.”
I led them into the gap in the lines, positioning them just behind the crest, where there would be no killing of them until they were needed. I watched the battle from the height, with my sword sheathed and my arms folded so the boys would see no nervousness in me. I glanced back at them often enough to warn of the consequences of bad behavior.
I wanted orders, for the truth is I lacked the confidence an officer needs. I ached to see our own regiment or any other in blue break from the trees behind us to close up the line. We were in a bad way in a bad place and nobody seemed to mark it. When Connors come back, panting, he told me the red-haired colonel cursed heaven and earth and said he had no troops to spare.
“He said he’d send to General Tyler, though,” Connors went on.
“Did he understand that it’s a serious matter?”
The boy nodded, sweat dripping from his chin. “Oh, he was mad to the devil about it. He’s a wild fella. He’s just having a grand old time, and cursing a blue streak. But he didn’t like that talk about a gap.” He looked at me oddly, face pink as good roast beef from his exertions. I did not like his eyes.
“Is there water in your canteen, lad?”
He looked at me in embarrassment. “I drunk it all, sir. I’m—”
“Here.” I gave him my canteen, for I did not want to lose him. “Now go back to your place, Connors. You’ve done well.”
The battle appeared to be centered on a house several hundred yards away. When the smoke tore, I could just see its outline amid a great muddle of men and guns.
Lieutenant Michaels stepped up. He was a good lad, and might have made a fine officer.
“Sir,” he said. “Captain Jones. The men… they’re wondering… why we aren’t going into the fighting. They think—”
His head whipped back and blood and skull exploded down toward the men, wetting them thirty feet away. Gore slicked my cheek.
“Anderson, Boyle, to me,” I shouted. They were the two sorriest men in the company, and we could well afford to lose them.
“To me, I said.”
They came reluctantly. All at once, there was a great deal less enthusiasm for getting into the battle.
I liked the boy and could have wept over him. But it would not have done.
“You two will carry Lieutenant Michaels to the rear. You will treat the body with respect.” He was the only son of a judge, and grief would crush the old man’s heart.
Boyle and Anderson looked at me. I read their minds. They had no objections to going to the rear, and wished they had never volunteered for the war. But they were reluctant to pick up the boy with his head shot away.
“Do what I say,” I told them in the lowest voice they would hear over the rage around us. “Or I’ll have two others do it and you can join the front rank.”
Still they hesitated. But I knew they would do it then.
“Empty your haversack and put it over his head, if you don’t want to look at him.”
They took him away. They were lucky men. Within a minute, a gray rank—a broken attempt at a rank—emerged from the smoke hardly a shout away.
I rushed my boys up to the crest.
“Aim low now,” I told them. “Steady, lads. Steady. Aim at their knees. Fire by rank. Company. Ready. Rear rank. Aim. Fire. Load. Front rank. Aim. Fire. Load… Rear rank… aim… fire . . .”
They did it well, my boys, if such work can be called well done. Men fell before us. The gray line shivered and faded. A few of them fired back or shook their fists. Oh, they were game, but as green as us or greener. Soon they were drowned in the smoke again.
“Cease firing!”
The boys cheered themselves. I made them reload, check their pieces, and dress the line again. I blasted the sergeants until they woke to their business. Every man needed to be busy now, with all thought driven out of him.
I expected the Confederates to come back stronger, having glimpsed the weakness of our line. But it was a battle of confusions. The next men to emerge from the smoke wore blue. They were running toward us, disordered, throwing off their equipment.
“Hold your fire, boys,” I shouted. Still, a few men let off rounds. I would need to see to the discipline of that. “Hold your fire.”
I ran along the front of the line to stop them, and a fool thing it was to do. But luck was still with me.
In a moment, the first of the fleeing men come upon us, shouting of disaster and black horse cavalry, of ambushes and slaughter.
“Steady,” I shouted. “Not a man to move. Steady.” I raised my sword. “Eyes on me.”
A carriage, empty of passengers, raced across the field. More men ran toward us now.
“Stand fast,” I ordered. This was the worst of any battle. Panic was as contagious as cholera. And those who ran died all the sooner.
A few men faded from the back rank and I gave our sergeants the devil. But they were hardly true sergeants, and they were doing their best. The fear was on everybody.
I tried to stop as many of the fleeing men as I could, taking the flat of my sword to them. But even the officers were broken.
The blue ranks on our right fell back, but in good order. Their green flag was up again.
A runner found me.
“You in command here, Captain?”
I nodded. “I am the officer accountable.”
“Colonel Sherman’s compliments, sir. He asks you to hold as long as you can, to cover the withdrawal. He says it’s all buggered.”
“My compliments to the colonel. Tell him we will stand.”
I meant it, but did not know if I could fulfill the promise.
The flood of broken men thinned. I ordered the company forward, beyond the top of the crest, and had them stand ready. I noticed that more of the boys had faded away. We were not much, but I wanted to be seen. If we had not much strength to fight, I hoped to frighten the enemy from our front by a show of confidence, advancing at least a few steps while the units before us were collapsing. I hoped they might think us the vanguard of a fresh regiment.
The Southrons came for us then. Yelling like wild Afghanees, and no order to them. Some in gray, some in brown, and some of them just dressed for farm work. I had the men fire by rank again, for the effect was solid and it kept good discipline. And, by God, if we did not stop them once more. Then they come back at us again, with all the fury of battle on them. We sent them backward that time, too. It was nothing like the butchery of Chillianwala or the Mutiny. But there was blood enough.
The smoke had drifted, leaving a path of sunshine across the top of the hill, and I saw that we were only the fringe of the battle. But the retreat was shifting in our direction, and the powder clouds followed it.
On our right, down the hillside now, the red-haired colonel formed his men into a square, and imagine my astonishment. It was properly done, too, and his boys kept up a good fire. The Duke of Wellington himse
lf would have thought it well done.
The Rebels shifted away from them.
“Fix… bayonets‘.” I shouted.
I heard the dutiful clank and scrape.
Another round of firing erupted and smoke drifted over us like a cloud. I marched back and forth, before the men and behind them, trying to keep their courage up, calling them by name.
The smoke grew worse. The breeze, what little there was, had shifted again. Soon all we could see were hellfire flashes to our front and off to the right. The noise seemed denser for the darkness, and you could feel a physical shock when the cannon let off. Six-pounders, I judged them. Not as many as before, but they had been wheeled closer to us.
Another runner found me. Twas a miracle on that field. The same colonel wanted to know if we still could hold. The situation was desperate, the courier told me, the army was in collapse.
“We will hold,” I said, “so long as I am standing.”
Hardest on the men were the lulls in the fighting. They needed occupation to keep down the fear. I had seen but three of them fall to bullets. But if I had forty men left, it was a generous estimate. Cowards ran through our ranks, casting away their haversacks and cartridge boxes, anything they could undo while at a run, and they took the weaker men with them.
I heard cheering, but sensed it was not our own. I kept talking up the boys as best I could. To be honest, my pride was up, for we had not done badly. And say what you will, battle is an intoxicating thing.
The smoke had taken a terrible liking to us, thickening around our heads. I struggled to see. Then a dreadful rumbling arose within the cloud.
I saw nothing. Not even pips of light from rifle fire now. There was only a rushing thunder upon the earth and the black smoke.
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