by Lisa Klein
“Follow that lane beyond the wheat field and you’ll see where Sickles has put himself, sticking out like a sore thumb,” Roebling said, stooping slightly and directing my gaze with his outstretched arm.
My face inadvertently brushed against the rough nap of his sleeve, and I smelled the sharp tang of wool and sweat, but I didn’t draw back, so intent was I on the scene. There they were, the wayward troops, occupying a peach orchard on a rise along the Emmitsburg Road, and separated from the rest of the line by a wide gap. A sudden burst of artillery fire came from the orchard.
General Warren erupted like an angry cannon.
“Now that damn fool Sickles is provoking the rebels! They’re going to attack before we’re ready and collapse the line there.” Roebling went to the general’s side just as another aide called out, “General, look! The rebels’ right flank is getting mighty close.”
Using Roebling’s glasses, I peered along the distant ridge until I could make out the gray soldiers moving toward the Emmitsburg Road about half a mile south of General Sickles’s men in the peach orchard. My hands began to shake, making the scene jump wildly. I went over and gave Roebling his glasses. He took them without even glancing at me.
“Damn, I didn’t know they were this far south! We need men up here now,” said General Warren. “Mackenzie, get this message to Meade at once,” he said, scribbling a note and giving it to his aide.
I knew I ought to run back to the Weigel house and take refuge inside its fortlike stone walls. But the unfolding battle had seized my attention, rooting me to the spot against my better judgment. Artillery fire now came from all along the distant Confederate line as foot soldiers dashed toward the Emmitsburg Road. I could faintly hear them yelping like a pack of hunting dogs. Cannons in the wheat field and the boulder-strewn meadow flared in reply, and the rebels began to drop in their tracks. I covered my ears against the deafening noise. Soon smoke obscured the field, and I knew only that a blue and gray mass of men had melted together below me.
General Warren paced back and forth on the large rock. “Damn Sickles forever!” I heard him say as the rebel guns pounded exposed troops in the peach orchard. I couldn’t blame him for cursing. It looked as if the Union line might give way, letting the enemy sweep through the entire valley.
“Good God, Miss Allbauer, what are you doing here still?” Warren shouted at me. He was immediately distracted again. “Roebling, I think Law’s brigade is heading straight for that hill. I don’t know if our sharpshooters down there can hold them off.” He motioned to where the end of the Confederate line was approaching Big Round Top. “We’ve got to hold them there.” He pointed to the rocky field below, where hundreds of our soldiers hunkered down behind breastworks shooting at the rebels. Already bodies lay scattered on the ground.
“We call that the Devil’s Den,” I said, but my voice came out as a hoarse croak and no one heard me.
“If our men break and run from there, the rebels will be all over this hill, and once they get their batteries up here they’ll destroy this whole end of the line,” said General Warren grimly. “It’s darn near too late.”
I had decided it was time to take myself back to the Weigels’, when Mackenzie returned, reining in his foaming horse just short of the big rock.
“General Warren, sir!” he called out. “Meade has ordered General Sykes to cover this hill immediately. Colonel Strong Vincent is moving four regiments into place along the southwest slopes even now.”
The name Strong Vincent sounded familiar. I tried to recall where I had heard it.
“Now we have a fighting chance!” cried Warren, striking his fist into his palm. “Miss Allbauer?” he called, striding over to where I stood. “Allow me to thank you for your service to the Union today. Your information regarding this hill has been most valuable. I believe we can now keep the rebels from flanking us here.”
“You’re welcome, sir.” I smiled, glowing with importance, then forced a more sober expression, considering the serious situation. “And good luck today.”
“Roebling, take this young lady home or else give her a rifle, for we’ll be in the midst of it here before long.”
“Who is Colonel Strong Vincent?” I asked Roebling as we mounted his horse.
“He and his men arrived from Hanover this morning. They have been in reserve all day, so they’re rested up now and ready for action. Good thing, because a lot depends on them.”
He steered his horse to the side of the logging road to make way for a group of horsemen. The lead rider carried a banner printed with a square blue cross with flared ends. Roebling and the officers saluted each other.
“That was General Crawford and Colonel Vincent,” Roebling said to me. “With the vanguard of the Fifth Corps.”
Finally I remembered the letter from Luke. Our regiment is in the good hands of Colonel Strong Vincent, his courage matches his name. Despite the day’s heat, I felt a cold flash of fear.
I twisted around in the saddle to face Roebling.
“My brother Luke is serving under Colonel Vincent.”
“Well, indeed!” he said with a smile. A lock of dark hair fell over his forehead. “Then he’ll be fighting good and hard to hold this hill and keep the rebels out of your backyard, won’t he? He’ll want to make you proud of him.”
Lizzie
Chapter 36
Mr. Roebling deposited me at the farmhouse, tipped his hat, and galloped away again. With him went all my sense of security, all my pride in having helped the Union generals strengthen their defenses on Little Round Top. All I could think of was that my brother would soon join the battle, and if anything were to happen to him, it would be my fault.
“Gott in Himmel! I was worried to death about you!” I heard Mrs. Weigel cry out. “Where were you? Nein, tell me later. Go to the cellar where it’s safe.”
I glanced toward the barn, hoping to see Martin, while Mrs. Weigel shoved me toward the house.
“What would I tell deine Mutter if you hadn’t come back?” she scolded.
“You saw me go with the general. I was not in danger,” I said, annoyed by the fuss she was making.
In the cellar, Louisa and Bonnie were knitting by the light of an oil lamp. Grace, in a rocking chair, looked at me and raised her eyebrows. The sisters peppered me with questions, but I didn’t feel like talking. I admitted that I had seen General Meade and that there was fighting in the valley. I did not tell them everything I knew, and what I left unsaid weighed on me like a lie.
“Well, Little Round Top stands safely between us and the battle, Gott sei dank,” said Mrs. Weigel.
“But what if the cannonballs come over the hill and explode here on the roof?” asked Jack, sounding more eager than afraid.
“They can’t shoot that far,” I replied, though I was not at all certain. The sounds of artillery rumbled through the ground, entering my very bones. Clara covered her ears and whimpered. Hadn’t we left Gettysburg to avoid this?
I sat on the floor and let its coolness seep into me. My dress, damp from sweat, now felt cold on my skin, and I shivered. I picked up a toy that the children had been playing with, a maze of angled tunnels made from tin and supported by wooden struts. I dropped a marble in the funnel at the top and tipped the frame this way and that, watching the marble tumble downward. I tried to manuever it away from the wooden trap at the bottom and out the chute instead, but again and again the marble rolled into the trap.
Louisa Weigel cleared her throat reprovingly. I looked up to see that she had opened the Bible. With a sigh I put the toy aside and folded my hands in my lap.
Louisa leaned close to the pages and read aloud. “Your hand will find all your enemies. You shall make them as a fiery oven in the time of your anger; the Lord shall swallow them up in His wrath and the fire shall devour them.”
“Liebe Jesu! Sweet Jesus, read something else,” said Mrs. Weigel.
“The fall of Jericho, perhaps?” Louisa suggested.
“No,
ein Familiengeschichte, a story to take our minds away from battle. Perhaps Noah and his ark—”
An explosion made us all start and scream. It sounded like the house itself had been hit.
“I was right!” shouted Jack.
Mrs. Weigel jumped to her feet.
“Gott in Himmel! I’m fetching that boy in here right now!” she said, as if Martin were at fault for playing with fireworks and needed to be punished.
I heard the pounding of feet overhead, and Martin appeared at the cellar door.
“That was a close one,” he said. “Tore up the field beside the barn. Pa made us come back to the house.” He ducked to avoid the overhead beams, and a pale-looking Annie followed him down the stairs, steadying herself with a hand on his shoulder. Her hair no longer hung in neat ringlets, but was tied underneath a headcloth like a servant’s.
“Wo ist dein Vati?” Mrs. Weigel demanded of Martin
“In der Scheune, natürlich. Papa is taking down the stalls in the barn and using the wood to build more cots. He says he is not afraid for himself.”
Mrs. Weigel threw up her hands and began to complain in German. Martin came over and sat next to me, his long legs sprawled out in front of him.
“Where have you been all day?” he asked.
“If I told you, you would never believe me,” I said, even though I was eager to tell him. Was I actually flirting?
“Try me. If you can look me in the eye, I’ll believe everything you say.”
Was Martin now teasing me? I couldn’t see his expression because he was in the shadows. So I shifted, letting the dim light from Louisa’s lamp fall on his face. Then I told him about meeting General Warren and General Meade and showing them up the logging path. Our faces were less than a foot apart, but I was too intent on my story to let myself become flustered.
Martin’s eyebrows lifted until horizontal lines crossed his forehead.
“And you got to see General Meade and the battlefield because I was asleep?”
“Well, you said not to wake you unless the house was on fire,” I reminded him.
“And the reserves are on their way to the field now?”
I nodded and whispered, “I’m worried about Luke.”
“And Sam Pierpont and all the other fellows. Out there fighting while I’m hiding out in a cellar.” Martin leaped to his feet and bounded up the cellar stairs before I or his mother could stop him. The door slammed behind him.
“Martin?” Mrs. Weigel’s voice trembled. A look of pain crossed her face. She started to get up but changed her mind and sat down, squeezing her eyes shut. Louisa patted her hand.
Annie scuttled over to me on her hands and knees.
“I saw you two whispering together. What happened? He likes you, you know. Did he try to kiss you and you wouldn’t let him?”
I glared at Annie. “Don’t be a fool. His mother is right over there.”
“Well, if the boy I liked was sitting here, I wouldn’t go and say something to make him run off like that.”
“I didn’t,” I protested irritably. I decided not to tell Annie that my brother, the boy she supposedly liked, was fighting nearby.
“Luke is still writing to me, you know,” said Annie. “Rosanna hasn’t written at all, but she and I can swap nursing stories when she comes back—”
“She’ll never come back to Gettysburg,” I said knowingly.
Annie sighed and slid down until she was lying on her side, her head resting in the crook of her arm. I worried about Martin. Where had he gone so suddenly, and why?
“Lizzie, remember that huge flag we made at the beginning of the
war?” Annie said, touching my arm. “I also thought it was a bit useless. But I didn’t say anything because I wanted to be Rosanna’s friend. And then I didn’t even help her finish it.”
Annie’s confession astonished me. “That was a long time ago. Let’s just forget—” I heard a grunt and looked down to see that Annie had fallen asleep with her mouth wide open.
A lull came in the fighting. Jack and Clara fell asleep alongside Annie, and the rest of us ventured upstairs. Mrs. Weigel cleaned up a batch of bread dough that had risen beyond the bowl, spilled onto the table, and begun to dry out. I went outside to get fresh water from the pump near the porch. I figured that the rebels had been driven back, for if they had taken the hill, they would now be swarming the Weigel farm. Shadows crept across Taneytown Road until the sun lit only the distant fields, where white specks indicated the tents of a camp.
A sinking feeling came to me. Martin had gone off to join the soldiers there! He was ashamed of being at home while most young men were away fighting. It dismayed me to think that he was just like everyone else who thought that to be a man you had to be carrying a rifle in a war. “Please don’t get hurt!” I whispered.
“Ain’t gonna be long in comin’ now,” Grace said, interrupting my thoughts. Her words sounded like a prophecy of doom. Then with a start I realized she was referring to her baby.
“How can you tell?” I asked. “Don’t first babies come slow? Mama says Luke took forever and a day being born but I came out right after.”
“Feels like a rope tied aroun’ my middle.”
“Grace, just tell me when you need a doctor and I’ll fetch one.”
“You think the doctor will leave dyin’ soldiers to help a Negro gal have a baby?” Her tone was sharp, but not bitter.
“The Weigel sisters can help. A farmer’s wife always knows about giving birth,” I said.
I thought I heard Grace say, “I’ll bear it out myself,” but an empty artillery wagon rolled by at that moment. A few tattered soldiers stumbled toward the barn on makeshift crutches. The wounded were coming from Taneytown Road.
“I dreamed las’ night that Amos and Ben were somewhere safe,” Grace said softly.
Gazing out over the fields again, I nodded. “In your dream, was Luke with them?”
“No. Why you ask?”
“Because he might be out there now,” I said. “Oh, Grace, I showed the generals a path up Little Round Top, so they could hold back the rebels from coming over these hills.”
“Why, you are some kind of hero, Miz Lizzie,” Grace said with a smile.
I shook my head. “No! Luke’s regiment was one of those called to the battle. If something happens to him, it will be my fault!”
A hospital orderly came to fetch a bucket of water and we watched in silence as he pumped it and left again.
“I never tol’ you ‘bout my brother,” Grace said. She eased herself down onto the porch steps.
Full of curiosity, I sat down beside her, focusing all my attention on her face. She looked beyond me, into the past.
“Befo’ I belonged to Mastuh McCarrick an’ met Amos, I was a house Negro at a rice plantation. I looked after the young ‘uns of Mastuh Shelby an’ his missus. I also took care of my sister’s boy, Nate, who was raised in the big house too.” Grace paused. “Nate, he had lighter skin than my sister an’ had Mastuh Shelby’s blue eyes. You understand?”
I nodded, for I had heard of plantation owners fathering children with their slaves.
“I loved Nate like he was mine. When my sister died of a fever, I was all the boy had.”
“What about your brother?” I asked.
“Cyrus. He hated Mastuh Shelby for what he did to our sister an’ swore he’d run away. I begged him not to. I was scared he’d be caught by the dogs and tore to pieces.” Grace took a deep breath. “Then Mastuh Shelby heard that Cyrus were plannin’ an uprisin’. He demanded I tell him ever’thin’ I knowed an’ he’d go easy on Cyrus. He said if I lied to him he’d sell Nate an’ I’d never see the boy again.”
“What did you do?” I prompted. “Was your brother really planning a revolt?”
“He was, along with some others. I tol’ my mastuh where the guns was buried in the bean patch and rifles in the cemetery. But he went back on his word. He whipped Cyrus with a cat-o’-nine-tails till the blood r
un like a river, then hanged him from a tree. Said it was a lesson to anyone even thinkin’ ‘bout risin’ up.”
“Oh, how awful!” I reached toward Grace, but she leaned away from me.
“I betrayed my brother. Because of me, he was killed. An’ I live with that like a stone aroun’ my neck,” she said in a hard voice, without self-pity. “Lizzie, don’ you regret what you done. Your brother is fightin’ in a noble cause.”
“It wasn’t your fault that your master lied, Grace,” I said, trying to offer some comfort in return. “At least you had Nate.”
“No, I didn’t. Mastuh sold him anyway. He sold his own son!” Her voice rose with anguish. “So I ran away, not carin’ if I lived or died. But I was caught an’ taken back to Mastuh Shelby, who gave me forty lashes, then sold me to Mastuh McCarrick.”
“I’m so sorry, Grace,” I whispered through my tears. At last I understood the reason for Grace’s cool, reserved ways. Why she never talked about her family. And why she simply had to believe that Amos would find his way back. He was her savior. She had no one else.
I went to the pump and splashed water on my face, then wetted a corner of my apron and, crouching down, began to dab Grace’s face with it. She closed her eyes and did not resist my touch. The curves of her face were more gradual than my own, and her dark skin gleamed.
“Grace,” I said, “I’ve hated the war from the beginning.” I wiped her neck and she bent her head to the side. “But now I am proud of what Papa and Luke are fighting for.”
“Thank you,” she murmured. She patted her face dry with her own skirt.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw something move. I stood up to get a better look and noticed, at the edge of the grassy field that sloped into the wooded hillside, five or six rebels emerge from the brush. They held rifles across their chests and ran, hunched over, toward the house. A scream rose to my throat but stuck there. I moved in front of Grace. More gray-clad soldiers sprang from the bushes like rabbits. As they crossed the field to my right, a fife and drum sounded on my left, but the barn blocked my view of the approaching band. Were they leading more rebels? A standard-bearer suddenly ran into view from behind the barn, waving a tattered blue flag with a yellow fringe and a familiar seal. I recognized the flag of the Pennsylvania Reserves.