by L. E. Waters
Slocum replies, “My scouts report they outnumber us.”
Greene takes it in with a long breath, as he strokes the two moles on his jaw. “I’m forced to spread a thin line all along the breastworks.”
Greary shakes his head immediately. “I strongly—”
Greene holds up a commanding hand in the air between them. “Even though it is risky to thin our line, I want to give the enemy the impression we are greater in number. It’s our only chance.”
Greary and Slocum accept his direction with uncertain nods and go to their men. After laying down our instruments to construct the fortifications—hauling logs, shoveling earth, chopping trees—Timmie and I rest in the rear of our posts until 6:45, when a whole division of Rebs attacks us directly.
It’s the first time I hear the Rebel yell—and wish it would be my last. For as long as I live this sound will haunt me while awake and in dreams. It’s the sound we all waited for and wished we could run from. The sound starts off in the distance of the far woods, travels and rises like the sound of high-pitched thunder.
“Wa-woo-woohoo! Wa-woo-woohoo!” a few begin, but soon it becomes a rolling, haunting echo. Each voice in its own time, like a pack of starving hounds on the hunt. Although most of me is terrified, there is another part that feels as though it’s familiar and fights the urge to cry along. It comes from deep within and reverberates with desperate, murderous force. No sane man could make such a sound and, from the colossal volume of it, thousands of maniacs are on the run toward us.
All our men turn nervously at this sound, as their commanders bark out readying commands to keep them from running. Those more seasoned, who can find their voices, respond with the rowdy Union cheer, which gives some of the new recruits some courage. I wait for direction to play the signal to fire and let loose once I’m ordered. The Rebs come out into the clearing in courageous droves, but keep getting pushed back and slaughtered in great numbers from our higher, fortified position. Some are even reaching the apex of the hill before they fall, making us incredibly nervous. They regroup and surge again in desperate and heroic charges.
At eight p.m. all the men crouched behind the breastworks wait for the next order to fire. Ammunition is running so low that the order is given to fix bayonets and spare ammunition. Eyes widen, mouths open, the men breathe shallowly, fingers on their triggers.
“Fire!”
I blow away. All heads rise above the trenches and the sound of hundreds of muskets going off at once is deafening. Above the clearing smoke, I see Jessie. Old Man Greene gives him a command, pointing to a hill that the enemy gained on the right flank of our position.
Without a trace of fear, Jessie’s eyes flash with pure elation. As I’m forced to stay back with the band, Jessie gathers James and others around him. He’s planning something by the way he describes maneuvers to them with his hands. The grey smoke looks like an angry sky and the way the cannon lights up the clouds with a thunderous rumble reminds me of the storm in my dream. I relax, seeing Elijah still shooting, crouched at the wall with another group. I turn to the line of soldiers right in front of me and see Victor loading his musket.
I step forward, pointing to Jessie below, and shout above the noise into his ear, “Jessie wants you to go with him! He’s been waving you over to him!”
I know it’s a lie but I want to keep him as far from Elijah as possible.
Victor nods, happy to have been chosen by Jessie to join his group. Yet Victor crawls away along the wall toward Elijah and my blood freezes as Victor taps him on his hunched shoulder and points to Jessie and his assembled group. Elijah nods and starts crawling behind Victor along the wall in Jessie’s direction.
I scream out, “Elijah! Don’t go!”
But the sporadic gunfire and background chaos drowns me out. Panic runs through me as Elijah nods slowly with the rest of the group in naïve acceptance.
I do the only thing I can do. I blow on my fife repeatedly in one high-pitched note. Many soldiers turn to my unfamiliar signal and finally Elijah looks my way. I cross my arms in the air and shake my head for him not to go. He shakes his head back and lays down his gun to join his two hands together in our sign. Tears block my view of him but I manage to give him the same message before a volley rings out and a cloud of smoke billows between us. I move to try to see him again. They all crouch together and then, after the next volley rings out, they all spring over the breastworks and down the smoke-filled terrain. The fife drops from my hand as I can only look on.
Incredibly, Jessie reaches the trench and motions for his group to follow him, but they hesitate a moment too long. I see the shell move with slow motion through the air. The sound also is slowed down and made distant with my anticipation and dread. It heads right for the group of all-too-familiar soldiers. I know instantly that this is the very scene in my dream, the fog smoke from guns and cannon, the hill, the thunder and lightning from combat. I call out like I can warn them but realize quickly how futile that is. No one hears the warning. They disappear only to be replaced by an explosion of debris, dirt, and smoke. After the smoke clears, two men lie thrown into a ditch left by the shell. Before my brain can even get the message, I’m running away from the band and racing toward the bodies. I don’t think of what I’m doing. I don’t ask for anyone to cover me. I don’t have any concern for the bullets buzzing past me. I have only one thought, and that thought fills my consciousness, leaving no room for bodily concern.
Elijah.
I pass an eviscerated body on the way to the ditch. I turn it over to check the face and see at once it’s Victor. Relief floods through me as I dash toward the crater. He could still be alive! I leap into the crater and immediately see James lying there. I look to the other body and can tell without even turning it over it’s Elijah. The same shape I rolled over to in our tent. I’m already crying as I go to turn him over and check for a heartbeat, but his warm thick blood coats my hands. His chest has been completely blown apart. I foolishly push my hands to try to halt the flow of blood, but my hand sinks into his flesh, the hole is so large. He isn’t even breathing anymore and I see his green eyes are open, staring to the sky.
I should’ve never told Victor to go with Jessie. Elijah would have never have gone down that hill. I want to die here, die with Elijah. The thought of living without him in my life can’t even be processed. If I stay here, I would die and that seems like the only thing to do. I sit there shivering from shock beside Elijah, praying for another shell to hit in the same spot. I start to rock back and forth while cradling him until I hear the moaning.
I clench my chattering teeth tight so that I can hear better. It isn’t coming from Elijah, as I hoped, but from James. I try to ignore it to focus on the misery of what has happened, but it’s persistent. James must be alive still.
Why was James alive and Elijah dead?
I glare over at James’ body with such resentment. I don’t even think I can make my muscles move again. They seem to have stiffened from the deep cold in my core. It must be ten minutes before I unwillingly put Elijah down and inch over to inspect James. He seems intact. Blood runs down his head in every direction, but it doesn’t look like any major damage has occurred. He could still live. How could I stay here to die if James could live? The thought of him reading his mother’s letter at the campfire surfaces. How much she seemed to love him and worry about him. Guilt runs through me as I realize I can’t just sit here waiting for death if James can still live.
Can I even drag him back to our trench? My muscles already scream out from the marches and building the breastworks and now the shock. I look over at Elijah and hate the thought of leaving him here for another cannon to blow him to pieces, but I’ll probably die dragging James back anyway. I roll over to Elijah and take all of his personal articles, all except for his identification disc. I don’t want the Rebs to get their hands on anything of his if I can help it. I bring up his limp arm and join his thumb and index finger to mine in
our symbol.
“Forever,” I whisper to him.
I burn one last look of him into my memory and kiss him on the lips while my tears stream down both our faces. I crawl back over to James, who I check again for a pulse since he’s stopped moaning. Still alive.
I grab the neck of his uniform, giving it a good tug, and I’m actually surprised by how light he is. He probably only weighs twenty more pounds than me. Without thinking, I start yanking him up over the crater and just keep going. It feels like an hour passes before I drag him back to our line. Orderlies wait for James with a stretcher and are shocked to see I don’t have a mark on me. I refuse to go with them to the field hospital, yet someone—I have no memory of who—wraps a wool blanket around my shoulders. I stagger back to a bullet-ridden tree to sit there in silence the rest of the night, trying to get warm again, while all around me the world explodes.
Jessie holds the trench the whole night with thirty or so other soldiers brave enough to reach it and, at nine-thirty p.m., the enemy withdraws. Our regiment is relived at ten, but remains in the rear of the trenches during the night. Old Man Greene charismatically cheers and commands his soldiers all night long, through shot, shell, and grape. Yet all the soldiers can speak of is how I ran down the hill out to the crater in the middle of fire and emerged with James in tow. They said I didn’t even flinch when bullets were hitting right beside us. I’m the talk of the camp. The hero fife boy.
We’re rallied at four a.m. and told to hold the line again. I can only get up by walking my arms up the tree trunk, since my muscles have atrophied so. I’m not the only one who is beyond sore; every soldier that passes by is walking like an old man, stiffened by fatigue and battle instead of age. I stretch each angry muscle to the point of shaking pain, trying to get some movement back. I march as best as I can right up to General Greene, who I catch in a moment of deep thought.
I quickly remember protocol and salute him weakly before stating, “I’m not playing today, sir. I’m fighting.”
He looks up with a stern grin on his heavily bearded face. “Is that so, Private?” And he hands me a musket he apparently had waiting for me. “You stick with Jessie. You both seem to be cut from the same crazy stone.”
He turns and, after I salute his back, I leave to find Jessie. I never thought I’d ever be put on the same level with Jessie, but I don’t care about much anymore. My whole life, past and present, lay rotting on the field below us and I wasn’t going to let the Rebs win this battle that Elijah died for.
As I walk up to Jessie, he turns and smiles. “So no more tootin’ your whistle, huh? Decided to become a hero?”
I don’t even look at him.
“You just keep surprising me, boy. One day it’s a praising whore, the next you’re tryin’ to win the Medal of Honor.”
I inspect my gun while he talks.
“Well, it’s always good to have someone who can drag ya to safety around here,” he finishes, with an almost painful backslap.
It’s the first time I feel like crying again. The brotherly feeling he exudes pulls at the seams I’ve tried to stitch back together.
“You might not be so lucky. I plan to get my head shot off real quick.”
He stares at me and laughs. “A realistic goal, just don’t get yourself all over me when ya do.”
We both crouch at the breastworks together and don’t say another thing the whole day. It’s July 3rd and, of course, as soon as our regiment is put in the trenches, the Rebs come full force on us again. Twice our flag is shot down and a Reb even gets within two feet of capturing it before being filled with five balls. Our color sergeant risks his life twice by splicing the staff and replacing it upon the works. We’re relieved at six-thirty at night but come back to the trenches three more times before the fight closes at one in the afternoon the following day. The flag has eighty-one bullet holes in it and seven in its staff at the end of the fight, proving how heavy the fire was. We hold our ground and have few casualties—thanks to the foresight and intelligence of Old Man Greene. The sheer fortitude of the breastworks is what saved the Union from being flanked. If the Confederates had slipped by us, they would have had access to the Baltimore pike, which was the only way the Union received supplies. Elijah did not die in vain, at least.
If I’d been able to feel anything, nightmares would eternally follow, but I’m numb. My muscles don’t even ache any longer. The news runs through the line that we’ve won this bloody battle and that the Confederates are on the run. I climb to the nearest elevation and look out across the battlefield. Bloated bodies are strewn about the hills and valleys like trees felled after a terrible summer storm. Scavengers climb amongst them, but instead of collecting timber they gather coin, pocket watches, boots and even clothing. I can’t look upon it anymore and I never will again.
When we’re relieved to rest, I start to go toward the woods, away from everybody, but Jessie grabs my arm.
“No, no, no. You’re not sleeping under no tree.” He yanks my shelter half out of my pack and ties it together while I stand, kicking rocks.
When Jessie finishes, he turns back to me. “Well, you didn’t get your head shot off today, but chin up, there’s always tomorrow.”
That does get a smile out of me and, after rolling out my bed, I fall asleep immediately without even having my ration for the day.
I’m awakened when Jessie comes back in but I keep my eyes closed.
“I know you’re awake. You don’t think I can hear your breathing change?”
Jessie’s hard to fool.
He throws something on me. Hardtack.
“If you don’t eat you’ll get dysentery and, after months of crapping water, you’ll regret not taking care yourself, hero.”
“I’m no hero. It’s my fault Elijah died.”
“So you fired that mortar?” He slaps his knee. “I knew there was something not right with you. Never figured you for a traitor though.”
“I told Victor to follow you when you ran for that trench.”
“So you think you killed Victor too? Maybe you should try to pick off some Rebs instead.” His laughter bothers me.
“Victor got Elijah to go with him. If I hadn’t told Victor you were going, Elijah would still be alive.”
He stops laughing and takes his hat off. “I guess you didn’t see it, being in that mortar hole and all, but a shell hit right where Victor and Elijah were crouching, just a few moments after they followed me. Killed Frankie, John and Harry.”
A heaviness lifts. “I didn’t hear about that.”
“So you see, that’s the funny thing about war.” He sighs and leans back. “You run out in front of a volley of fire and you might get killed, but it’s just as dangerous crouched behind breastworks. There’s no safe place in war. That’s why I’ve learned to just do what I’m told. I could hide in the infirmary like some of the cowards do, but you’re just as apt to catch your death there as well.” He yawns. “You didn’t kill Elijah today. This goddamn war did.”
I lift the hardtack up to my lips. I wish I could hug him, but I know that would be strange. Jessie whistles a song I don’t recognize as I chew. A light, rolling melody. Why is he suddenly caring so much about me? Then I realize a lot of his boys are on that field with Elijah, and James is lying in the field hospital. Maybe he actually cares about something other than himself.
Chapter 6
I awake to Timmie drumming out reveille and Jessie sings to the all-too-familiar rhythm:
“I can’t get ‘em up, I can’t get ‘em up,
I can’t get ‘em up, I tell you.
I can’t get ‘em up, I can’t get ‘em up,
I can’t get ‘em up, at all.
The corporal’s worse than the private,
The sergeant’s worse that the corporal,
The lieutenant’s worse that the sergeant,
But the captain’s worst of all.
I can’t get ‘em up, I can
’t get ‘em up,
I can’t get ‘em up this morning.
I can’t get ‘em up, I can’t get ‘em up,
I can’t get ‘em up to-day.”
Once we’re all deemed present and accounted for at roll call, I decide to go into the field hospital to see how James is faring. They took over a white farmhouse and converted it into a makeshift hospital where the soldiers are all strewn here and there. Most of them are missing arms and legs, and some, by their grey pallor, look as if they aren’t going to see tomorrow. I hear James making a disruption in the far room. When I get closer, James pushes an orderly out of his way. “I tell you, I’m right as rain. I’m leaving.”
The young orderly blocks his passage. James does look fine. He has some sutured cuts on various parts of his head and a few ugly burns on his neck and face, but he’s moving about with his normal strength. He turns to look at me when I come in and slouches his bare shoulders at once. James sits back onto the old cot, which is stained but most likely not with his blood.
The orderly turns to fill someone’s glass and I speak first. “I guess you’ll live.”
He glances up but looks back down at his feet, which are hanging down above the sticky, blood soaked floor.
“Yeah, I guess so.” He pauses for a bit and then hesitantly adds, “I heard about what you did.” Another pause. “I don’t even remember. The last thing I remember was Jessie waving for us and then I woke up here. They said I got knocked out with the blast. I don’t even know why I’m still here!” He says that last part louder so the orderly can hear.
A big pile of bandages rests next to the bed and I quickly realize I can definitely use them. The bed rags strapping down my chest are getting pretty filthy. I take four rolls and stick them under my coat while James is turned, watching the orderly’s reaction. I look over at the soldier beside James, who has a suspicious looking trigger finger wound—self-inflicted to get out battle I’m sure. The completely intact coward sees me noticing his wound and averts his eyes.