The Other Side of Life

by Andy Kutler

  They looked on as Garrity climbed down from his horse, removed his frock coat, and casually strolled into the open field littered with fallen cavalrymen and horse carcasses. His sidearm was holstered, his saber left behind with his horse. Even his field glasses were still tethered to his saddle horn. He was about as naked as a cavalryman could be.

  “That’s all fine and dandy, Sarge,” said Briscoe, interrupting Ellerbee’s thoughts, “but the blue bellies have infantry over thar, and where thar’s infantry, thar’s sharpshooters.”

  That part you got right, Ellerbee thought to himself.

  ***

  Cal Garrity paid no mind to the unseen marksmen, or the chatter behind him that carried on the wind.

  He never explained it before because he wasn’t sure he could. But it had become his custom to walk out from his own lines, onto the ground where his men would fight. The opportunity was not always available, but when it was, he took advantage.

  Cal kept an eye on the ground ahead as he rolled up the damp sleeves of his shirt, feeling the burn of the sun as it beat down on his bare arms and neck. He walked about fifty yards into the open field before dropping to one knee. He winced a bit as his leg folded, feeling the familiar twinge of soreness from where the Mexican had struck his leg with the stock of a shotgun some two years ago.

  It seemed like two hundred.

  He needed to come out here. To clear his mind before a fight and see the ground in its entirety. On occasion, he heard a musket ball whistle past his ear, followed by a distant cheer as some Yankee tried to impress his squad mates. But for the most part, they let him be, perhaps more mesmerized by his daring than threatened by his presence. Of course, it wasn’t entirely a leap of faith on his part. Those were infantrymen over there, and he knew their Springfield rifles carried an effective range of four hundred, maybe five hundred yards. Cal was quite a bit further away than that. There was always the possibility that some enterprising lad would crawl forward, cloak himself in the tall grass, with one of those long-range scopes affixed to his rifle.

  Cal wouldn’t think about that right now.

  The Union lines were maybe a half-mile in front of him. It was early afternoon now, and the sun had just about reached its zenith. He pulled a thick cigar from his breast pocket. Cal wasn’t much of a smoker before the war, almost blasphemy for a son of Virginia. But as tobacco was the one commodity in abundance among the Confederate supply officers, Cal had taken up the habit. It also made a decent substitute for a meal, which he and his men had missed quite a few of this past year. He struck a match on his service belt and lit the cigar, inhaling the pungent smoke. He rested his crossed forearms on his knee as he stared at the open space ahead of him, the lines of Federal soldiers barely visible in the distance.

  He scanned the field with his eyes, but there wasn’t much to see. The sounds of shovels in the distance delivered the grim news. He knew the Federals were either digging in or placing artillery. Maybe both.

  He glanced back at the line of spruces, seeing glimpses of gray and butternut behind the foliage.

  How many? How many will we lose this time?

  It wasn’t just the soldiers. Of course he hated losing his men, and he had lost too many, particularly this year. The 1st Virginia Cavalry was a close regiment; for two years now they had rode together, fought together, went hungry together. Each man who went down was like a brother or cousin to them all. Strangely though, Cal was prepared for that. Perhaps it was his training, his experience in the western territories, or even the premonitions he once had. But he knew he would lose men, and other than the stomach-turning carnage, it was something he had grown accustomed to.

  The horses were a different matter. Even as an experienced cavalrymen, he had not anticipated the loss of so many, nor had he imagined the gruesome remains strewn across each battlefield. The sight of so many slain horses sickened him to this day, and Cal was aware that he was more affected by it than most.

  For those like Major Alex Saunders in Richmond, the horses were just numbers, inventoried little differently than the ammunition, food stores and other necessities for sustaining the Army. They thought of the losses in terms of the impact on Stuart’s cavalry corps. For Cal, the losses were so much more personal. He had been raised in the heart of Virginia horse country. His grandfather was a horse breeder, and gave him a blue roan for his twelfth birthday. From that day on, Cal knew he was destined for a saddle. While he went to West Point to win over Emily’s family, that decision was made easier knowing he would have the opportunity to emerge as a horse soldier, not an infantryman or engineer.

  The horses always played their part. Loyal and obedient, they carried the soldiers into battle after battle, following every command of their master, even as they may have sensed certain death. They were war-hardened now, just like the men, and no longer bucked and panicked during an artillery barrage or volley of rifle fire from entrenched infantry. Just like the men, their flesh was often torn open by musket balls, canister and grape shot, and even an occasional saber. Yet there was always a surgeon to attend to the men. A wounded horse went untreated more often than not, and on most occasions the soldiers were compelled to shorten the animal’s suffering.

  Every time he had lost a horse in the war, and Cal had lost several, it was as if he had lost one of his most trusted old sergeants.

  He heard an exchange of rifles in the distance and turned his attention back to the enemy.

  Not for the first time, Cal wondered if he knew any of the men across the field. His thoughts constantly returned to old friends. Ethan. Whitaker. Gaylord. What had happened to all of them? He had sent letters to Camp Chance, even Ethan’s father in Wisconsin. He never received a single response and simply assumed his letters hadn’t made it to their destinations.

  Cal could see an officer riding behind the Union lines in the distance, a high-ranking one judging by the color guard and retente of staff officers that followed him. Even at this distance, Cal could discern the American flag fluttering in the breeze, a flag he had once proudly served.

  He loved his 1st Virginians. They had performed so admirably and had formed an unflagging espirit de corps Cal had never experienced, even among the dragoons. But he still felt that pang of shame whenever he glimpsed his old flag. Maybe it was the oath he had broken, or the friends he had turned his back on.

  But he knew it was something more. He knew what that flag stood for, and that in so many ways he shared more in common with the men in blue than he did with his own.

  His officers spoke often of “the cause.” Well, those Union men had a cause of their own. The preservation of a country. Freedom, and the natural rights of other men. There was nobility in that cause, so much more so than the one he was fighting for.

  Any way you parsed it, he and his men were fighting for those damn plantations, the slave-filled tobacco and cotton fields, and an institution that the rest of the civilized world had shunned and damned long ago. He remembered when he once argued the Southern side of things, so many of those conversations with Ethan out in the New Mexico desert. This was about the economic lifeblood of the South, he had maintained, time and time again. He still believed that. But he also understood there were other values at stake, beyond the power of the dollar.

  Not that he regretted his decision. Even after he returned home from Mexico, he could have joined the Union Army. There were other native Virginians fighting for the Union, starting with the commanding general of their army. But the fight was joined for Cal the day the Federals marched into Virginia and attacked at Manassas Junction. It was the one act that could drive him to take up arms against his former peers and willingly leave his wife behind. And when his regiment rode on Virginia soil, his role made sense to him. But it was here in Pennsylvania, and earlier in Maryland, where his doubts plagued him the most. They were the invaders now.

  Cal stood, flicking the cigar butt away. It was time. He lifted his hat and doffed it high to those in front of him, before tur
ning back to his own lines.

  Corporal Briscoe saw their colonel returning. “What the hell was that, Sarge?”

  “A salute, Private.”

  “To them blue bellies? Is he stark mad?”

  “Shut yer arse, son. The colonel was a Federal once. The lot of us were.”

  Cal approached, taking the reins from his orderly and climbing into his saddle. His company commanders had anticipated the officers’ call and formed a semi-circle around him.

  “My guess,” Cal began, “is that there is a better part of a division in front of us. At least a brigade. General Stuart is convinced we can break through the Yankee lines. There will be a dozen other regiments joining us in the attack.”

  Cal paused, lifting his field glasses to his eyes, scrutinizing the enemy position.

  It was a show of course. He had no need to observe the Union lines again. It was simply an excuse to hide his eyes behind the bulky glasses. He knew how well his officers could read him.

  They were boxed in by the Federals on three sides. A westward advance was Stuart’s only option, and the general was aware that the 1st Virginia, all by itself, had nearly broken through the same enemy position earlier that afternoon. Yet Cal knew there was at least two regiments in front of him now, entrenching themselves, and no one knew what the enemy had in reserve.

  His officers, who he always spoke to with candor, deserved more. He lowered the glasses with a heavy sigh.

  “Sir?” prompted Captain Hewitt.

  Cal removed his hat, wiping the sweat on his brow with the back of his sleeve. “General Stuart has called on the 1st Virginia to lead this attack. It is believed that our efforts on the field before us, while General Lee and the infantry are engaged in the town, may very well save this army and thrust a dagger into the Yankees’ heart.”

  He immediately regretted the mocking tone with which he had repeated Stuart’s words, failing to mask his frustration. He wanted his officers to know the charge was not his idea, that he understood the regiment had already sustained significant casualties barely two hours ago. That he had even protested to Stuart. But they would know all of that, they did not need patronizing.

  “Again?” grinned Captain Osgood Wilhyte, his boyhood fishing companion.

  Cal gave Ozzie an appreciative smile. Behind them, a battery of cannon opened up, twelve-pound Napoleons, and Cal gestured to the front lines.

  “As you can hear, our artillery is attempting to move those Federals away from that farmhouse. The Yankees don’t seem inclined to take General Stuart’s advice.”

  There were small chuckles.

  “Which brings us to the sainted First Virginia,” rang the cheerful voice of Major Dinkins, another West Pointer and his second-in-command. They had been classmates once and Dinkins had served under Cal since Manassas. A ferocious scar stretched across his cheeks and lips from a Union saber slash last year, making him and Cal almost a matched pair. Yet it was his former classmate’s sprightly humor that Cal appreciated most. It reminded him of Ethan Royston.

  “Which brings us to the sainted First Virginia,” Cal repeated, smiling. “The general is of the opinion that a full charge will smash the dismounted troops holding that fence line, and push the Yankees back far enough so the rest of our forces can move into position along that ridge. He is sending in the better parts of our brigade and General Hampton’s.”

  “And what do you think, Colonel?” asked Dinkins, now very serious.

  Cal took a deep breath. He certainly had his own doubts but knew better than to voice them among his subordinates, as several were newer officers with little experience. Nor did he wish to offend any of the veterans, most of whom were fiercely loyal to Stuart, with some even wearing an ostrich feather in their hats just as the famed cavalier did. There was a time for candor, and a time to ensure he had a cohesive, confident regiment going into battle.

  “I think it is a viable plan, Chet. We know little about what reserves the Yankees can bring to bear, but perhaps General Stuart is correct, and now is not the time for caution.”

  Cal pulled his watch from his tunic, and snapped it shut again.

  “We move at two o’clock, a little more than ten minutes from now.”

  The silence among the officers stretched for a few more uncomfortable moments, the men contemplating the plan and their chances, and the implications of their regiment spearheading the assault. They exchanged anxious looks, understanding that some of them would not survive the day.

  Cal took note of the darkened mood. The brashness and bravado that had once been so prevalent had mostly evaporated these last difficult months. The Yankees were getting markedly tougher.

  ***

  It took only a few minutes for the entire regiment to form for attack. They were spread along the tree line, three ranks deep. Cal was at the front of the column, flanked by Ellerbee and his bugler, just ahead of the regimental colors. There was a distant rumble to the north, perhaps a few miles away, and they all instinctively turned their heads. The clamor did not subside.

  “God almighty,” said their young bugler, barely fifteen years old. “What is that noise?”

  Another man tipped his hat back. “Sounds like thunder, but thar ain’t a cloud in the sky.”

  “Maybe we’ll get us some rain, Corporal. My lips are so dry I can barely spit, let alone make a note with this horn.”

  Another man slapped the back of his neck. “A nice pour might get rid of some of these damned mosquitoes too.”

  Cal and Ellerbee shared a small smile, the exchange revealing just how new some of these replacements were.

  “It ain’t thunder,” Ellerbee said, twisting his face into a contemptuous scowl. “That’s artillery in Gettysburg. Our cannon.”

  Cal lifted the field glasses, his focus returning to the field in front of him. He saw a guidon fluttering in the breeze and squinted his eyes.

  “Seventh Michigan is still out there,” he murmured to no one in particular. Those were the Federals who had chased them from the field earlier.

  Cal looked at his watch. It was time.

  He removed his hat, wiping his brow one last time with the back of his gloved hand. He lowered his eyes and whispered to himself. “Dear Lord, please shield and protect these men from harm.”

  He paused, suddenly recalling a passage he heard in a West Point classroom, in what seemed like another lifetime. “Oh Lord, thou knowest how busy I must be this day. If I forget thee, do not thou forget me.”

  Ellerbee was just behind him and spat tobacco juice as he surveyed the fields ahead. The Yankees could be seen scurrying into position, preparing to repulse the attack. “We could try and flank ’em again, Colonel,” he called out. “Might be a newbie in front of us.”

  Cal shook his head. “Can’t count on that. The Federals seem much better of late at protecting their flanks. I’m not sure we have the strength anyway. We send out more than a company or two on the flanks and our center may not be able to punch through their lines. Stuart wants every regiment to concentrate in the center.”

  The sergeant grunted, and Cal eased his horse back so they were abreast of one another. “Speak your mind, Jess, and be quick about it.”

  Ellerbee didn’t hesitate, having thought about this for some time. “I’m a good soldier, Colonel, you know that. And I don’t mind the First Virginia leading every attack for this division since sixty-one. But we’re down to barely three hundred effectives. Half the men don’t have enough cartridges to fill their revolvers. And a mounted charge against I don’t know how many brigades in front of us? With repeating rifles? It ain’t rightly fair, Colonel.”

  “General Stuart believes those men out there will break. It’s happened before.”

  “Not lately,” muttered Ellerbee.

  Cal gave him a reassuring smile. “The Lord may strike me down for saying this, but I will grant you that Jeb Stuart ain’t perfect. But have faith, Jess; he’s been right a hell of a lot more than he’s been wrong.”


  Ellerbee grunted again. “He only needs to be wrong once for us all to meet our maker.”

  Cal put his hat back on and threw his hand in the air. “Draw sabers!”

  Hundreds of swords were pulled from their sheaths, the noise seeming to echo across the field as regiments to their flanks and rear followed suit. Cal signaled for his men to advance, and as they emerged from the tree line, the regiment broke into a brisk trot. They were less than five hundred yards from the enemy.

  Cal turned in his saddle, unable to resist a glimpse of the breathtaking sight of two brigades moving in perfect symmetry, nearly twenty-five hundred sabers glittering in the late afternoon sun.

  Four hundred yards.

  The first Federal volleys were unleashed, dropping a handful of his men. Cal drew his saber, resting the tip on his shoulder, knowing every eye in the regiment, perhaps the other regiments as well, was on him at the moment, waiting for his command. He took three small breaths, and then waved his saber in the air.

  “First Virginia…charge!” he shouted, kicking the Appaloosa as she lurched into action. He heard the bugle at first but the trademark Rebel yell rising up from regiment after regiment soon drowned everything else out. The mass of horsemen hurdled the first fence line as they gripped their reins with one hand and wielded their sabers with the other.

  Even above their own screams, they heard the sounds of the Union cannon awakening. But it was too late for the Federal spotters to sight the distance or even reload with short-range canister shot. Cal saw a large farmhouse and barn on his right, and a crescendo of loud pops erupted as more Union troops opened up with their rifles. Several more of his men were hit. He saw Ellerbee go down as a hail of bullets struck his mare. She tumbled to the ground, rolling over her rider and crushing his legs. But Cal could not stop. He waved his saber over his head, shouting at the top of his lungs, urging his men on.