A Blaze of Glory

by Jeff Shaara

  He rode quickly, avoiding the bursts of incoming artillery, maneuvering his horse through shattered trees, past clusters of men who were hunkered down in whatever cover the woods provided them. For the past hour, he had heard what many of his officers had heard, their attention directed eastward, toward the river. The sound was unmistakable, so different from the artillery shells the rebels were throwing toward them. From near the landing, one of the Federal gunboats had begun shelling what their crews must have presumed to be the vanguard of the rebel advance. It was an honest attempt to hold the rebels away by launching the enormous shells of the naval guns onto the enemy’s position. Instead, as Prentiss could see now, the shells were falling more into his own lines than doing anything to hold back the enemy. Besides cursing the navy, the Federal troops had absorbed the incoming fire the only way they could, by keeping low, and holding to the desperate hope that the shells would fall on someone else, or that someone in command might inform the gunboat that the enemy was over there.

  Prentiss had heard the distinctive explosions from the beginning, but the ongoing assaults from the enemy had kept his attention focused more on what was happening to his front. But still the shells came, and he heard another one, much closer, stared up helplessly, the shell arcing down, the men shouting out their warnings, their voices quickly drowned out by the blast. It impacted in the woods a hundred yards to his front, launching a fountain of dirt and debris, and he cursed along with his men, spurred the horse that way, knew there could be casualties. His staff followed closely behind him, and suddenly, in the midst of the dusty cloud, he saw the slow fall of a massive oak tree, dropping to one side with a thunderous crash. More dust and dirt rose up, showering men who made a desperate scramble to escape being crushed. Through it all the rebel artillery continued to scream overhead, their shells falling at random, most impacting far behind his men. He pushed the horse into the dust, knew that if anyone had been caught by the tree, there was little he could do to help them.

  The rebel batteries seemed to be shifting their ground, more shelling coming from the left, farther to the east. It confirmed what he already believed, that the enemy was changing their tactics, had perhaps chewed themselves up more than they had expected against the mass of his well-hidden troops. He turned the horse, moved around the great thicket of the fallen treetop, slow progress, the woods a jumble of shattered limbs, and now a crushed fence. Through it all were wounded men, many of those pulled back from the forward positions. He halted behind the fallen tree, doing as his men did, taking advantage of a three-foot-thick wall of impenetrable cover. He waited for his staff to gather close, looked around, sought out an officer, could see no one on horseback. He shouted back to his staff, “Have we heard anything from General Hurlbut?”

  There was no positive response, no surprise, and he stared out to the left, spurred the horse again. Farther out through the thick woods came a new burst of firing, not what he wanted to hear, that message too clear. The men he saw now were not his own units, and their volleys were aimed at an enemy who was clearly out beyond what had once been his left flank. He pressed the horse on, moved along a narrow trail, saw officers shifting their men into good cover, and Prentiss moved past, acknowledged those who acknowledged him, knew to let those men do their jobs. He was among Illinois men now, no mistaking Hurlbut’s command, saw a Wisconsin flag, then Indiana. One officer rode out to greet him, and Prentiss was surprised to see Ben Allen, of the 16th Wisconsin. Allen was trailed by a single aide, saluted him, and Prentiss said, “Colonel, I did not expect to find you down here. Are you holding up?” Allen seemed exhausted, and Prentiss saw the hint of a bandage beneath the colonel’s coat. “You’re wounded. Are you able to continue here?”

  “Yes, sir. No one will remove me from my men … with all respects, sir.”

  Prentiss appreciated the defiance in Allen’s voice, but there had been too much of that already.

  “Colonel, you may of course remain with your men, for now. But we have lost a great many officers today who were admirably stubborn. Colonel Peabody is down, and presumed to be dead.”

  Allen lowered his head for a brief second.

  “I had not heard that. He made a most favorable impression on my men.”

  To the east, a new burst of firing spread through the trees, and Prentiss felt the urgency of that, had no time now for conversation.

  “Colonel, have you spoken with General Hurlbut? Do you know his location?”

  “He placed us here, sir. The last I saw him, he was farther east. The general was able to summon ammunition wagons, to our great relief. My men have refilled their cartridge boxes. That has added considerably to our morale. We had been positioned in that peach orchard, out toward the enemy, but the rebel artillery compelled us to fall back.”

  Smoke blew past them now, some from the burning timber Prentiss could see in front of their lines. Allen pointed that way, said, “The brush-fires have been something of a blessing, sir. The enemy is reluctant to advance through burning grass. But that will not last.”

  “Hold your position, Colonel, as best you can. Maintain your connection to the units on either side of you.”

  Allen saluted him again, and Prentiss moved away, toward the direction where Hurlbut might be. Ammunition wagons, he thought. Hurlbut must have more influence than I do. Or perhaps my couriers never made it to their destination. If my men aren’t able to fill their cartridge boxes, the fires may be all I can rely upon to hold the enemy back. If I can find Hurlbut, perhaps he can send those wagons my way.

  A volley of musket fire opened out in the field nearest him, men closer to him, his men, returning fire. Behind him, an aide stammered aloud, “Sir, we must move back. This is not the place for you …”

  He ignored the man, his horse already in motion, chewed on the irony of the aide’s words. The question would go unasked. Just where is the place for me?

  He glanced back, saw his flag held low, a flash of good sense from the color bearer. He ducked beneath a cracked tree limb, heard voices, his staff, could hear urgency. He halted the horse, saw a rider to one side, a lieutenant, very young, one of Wallace’s men, and the man bounced close on the horse, saluted, said, “Sir! General Wallace … is down, sir. All I know is what Captain Luman saw, sir. The general was struck in the head, most probably by a musket ball, sir. This is a tragedy, a horrible tragedy.”

  Prentiss did not hesitate.

  “Is he alive?”

  The man lowered his head, feeling the impact of his own news.

  “It seems unlikely, sir. We could not retrieve the general’s body. The enemy was driving on our position … General Wallace was attempting to rally our troops.”

  “You did not retrieve his body?”

  There was fury in Prentiss’s words, disguising the horror of what the man was telling him.

  The man was clearly shaken, Prentiss’s anger not helping the man’s composure.

  “Sir, the enemy overran our position. There was no time.”

  Prentiss closed his eyes, tried not to see Wallace’s face. But the man’s words came to him, unavoidable, one of those jokes passed around the camps of the commanders, Wallace’s surname matched of course by another of Grant’s division commanders, Lew Wallace. Prentiss had laughed, as they all had, certain that in the army’s post office, there was confusion among the clerks, no doubt causing great waves of profanity. Prentiss looked at the lieutenant, a shine on the boy’s cheek, no hint of a beard.

  “Who is in command there? Who is senior brigadier?”

  “Colonel Tuttle, sir. He is attempting to re-form the men. But the enemy is driving us back. We are in danger of losing our own camps!”

  Prentiss looked hard at the man, no expression.

  “You are still in possession of your camps?”

  “Well, of course, sir.” The man seemed suddenly to understand the stupidity of his pride, was silent now.

  Prentiss held the thought to himself. Will Wallace died the only gener
al on this field who had his possessions, his trunk intact. I suppose … he would be pleased. He looked again at the lieutenant.

  “Return to Colonel Tuttle. Offer him my respects and instruct him to hold his lines at all cost. If he is unable to keep the enemy from disturbing your camps … I must be informed. He is my right flank … he is possibly the right flank of what remains of this army.”

  The lieutenant was quickly away, and Prentiss pushed away the grief, had no time for that, not now. Tuttle … not sure about him. Met him, maybe. Hope like hell he knows how to put men into line.

  He saw a pair of wagons, far back in the trees, rode that way, a clearing, and nearby, a cluster of officers, their color bearer holding the Stars and Stripes: Hurlbut. To one side, a single artillery shell came down with a monstrous splash, and he pulled up, absorbed that, realized he was at a pond, a place he had been before. It had been the anchoring point of his left flank, the peach orchard out beyond it, but any sense of order to that was long gone. He moved forward again, saw Hurlbut looking at him, a quick wave. He pushed the horse past the pond, the smoke giving way, and now he saw the pond itself, was surprised to see rows of wounded men on the ground, most close to the water’s edge, completely surrounding the murky rust-colored water. Doctors were moving among the fallen and Prentiss saw bodies to one side covered with cloth, those who had not survived. He halted the horse, forced himself to see this. Scattered around the men were a dozen or more horses, dead and broken animals, guts and limbs smeared over the open ground, blown into pieces by the artillery. Close to the pond, one horse lay among the men, the rows of wounded arranged around it, the horse mostly intact, one leg blasted away at the hip. The horse’s blood flowed out of the gaping wound directly into the pond, the water growing more red. The pond was a logical place to treat the wounded men, the doctors using the water to clean wounds. The blood of the soldiers was soaking into the muddy edges of the pond, mixing in with the blood of the horse. Close behind him, he heard a man retch, the sight too gruesome for one of his aides, and he tried to ignore that, fought the contagiousness of the nauseating sight.

  He felt an uncomfortable fury, not for the fallen men, the men who had chosen to make this fight. He had always felt far more disgusted by the death of the horses, the helpless innocence, regal beasts whose service was so crucial to everything they did. He had wondered about pain, if the animal felt it as man did, if there was suffering. So often, the wounded horses seemed strangely calm, as though accepting their fate with far more peace than the soldiers. It had been like this in Mexico, and he would never admit to General Taylor or anyone else that the horses affected him with far more grief than the men, even the men in his own command. The dead, he thought, are with God. That is the human way, the thing that gives us comfort. Is there salvation for the beasts? He had fought with this question in every fight he had seen, but there was no time for that luxury now, and he slapped the reins on his own horse’s neck, moved toward Hurlbut.

  Stephen Hurlbut was a few years older than Prentiss, seemed always to keep his hat on, as though hiding what everyone knew to be his baldness. Prentiss knew he had much in common with Hurlbut, both men coming out of the South, settling in Illinois, both men practicing law. Unlike Prentiss, Hurlbut’s military career had been brief and uneventful, serving for a time in Florida during the Second Seminole War. But Prentiss respected the man, as did Ulysses Grant, and already Hurlbut had proven himself capable, a part of Grant’s victory at Fort Donelson.

  Hurlbut moved out to meet him, his staff keeping back, and Prentiss saw no surprise on Hurlbut’s face. Hurlbut said, “Glad you’re here, Ben. We have a handful of slop out this way. The enemy is shifting to our left, and I don’t have the strength here to move with them, not without losing contact with your flank.”

  Prentiss could hear ongoing musket fire, could tell from the direction that Hurlbut’s flank was already turned. He paused, formed the words, said, “Will Wallace is down, Stephen. His staff thinks he’s dead.”

  “Oh, dear God. We cannot replace him.”

  Prentiss still tried to avoid the sadness of the loss, said, “Right now, we cannot replace anybody.” He paused, knew his tone had been harsh, but Hurlbut seemed to understand. Prentiss continued, “Do we know anything of Stuart’s Brigade? Can they be of help?”

  “I have heard nothing from Stuart, and I suspect he has chosen the wise path, and has withdrawn toward the landing. Or he has been driven back. Either way, my flank is not strong enough to hold away the enemy.”

  “We cannot fall back this way. It will open a direct route along the river.”

  Hurlbut showed his frustration now, a hard glance back to the east, said, “I already have, Ben. Had no choice. You hear that?” The thunder from distant artillery rolled past them, much of it coming east of where they were now. “I can make a stand back there, those woods that run behind this pond. It’s good high ground, and thick as the devil. The enemy won’t see us until they’re in our faces, and we can give them a pretty tough surprise. But I don’t know how many they are, or how many more are behind them. We heard from some prisoners that General Johnston is out there himself. Johnston knows what he’s doing, knows if we give way … well, I’d be doing the same thing he is. He gets between us and the river, and we have no place else to go.”

  The words came from Hurlbut in a matter-of-fact tone, and Prentiss knew he was right.

  “Stephen, we have one duty here. We have to hold as long as we can. That’s it. That’s all we can do.”

  Hurlbut reacted to a new series of volleys, turned that way, then back to Prentiss.

  “I have to get out that way, see to my Illinois boys on the flank. They’re veterans, but not sure how much of this they can take. We break out there … well, I’ll do what I can. Any chance we can get help from the landing?”

  “You mean, Buell? Haven’t heard a damn word about reinforcements. The last thing I heard from General Grant was that they were on their way. So far, I haven’t seen a single flag from Ohio.”

  Hurlbut shook his head, and both men knew they had little else to discuss. The task at hand was clear to both of them.

  Hurlbut said, “God be with you, Ben. Keep your head down.”

  Hurlbut moved back toward his staff, shouted an order, led them quickly away. Prentiss did the same, glanced back at the pond, saw more wounded coming in from the woods, men on stretchers, others walking slowly, drawn by the water in the bloody pond.

  He had gone back toward the center, and the couriers came one behind the other, Hurlbut keeping him informed of what was rapidly becoming a disaster on the left. Hurlbut’s lines had finally curled back, an arcing hook that had stretched out in a perpendicular formation to Prentiss’s own lines. But Prentiss could not hold his center position, either, some of his units forced back away from the protection of the wagon trail. On his right, with William Wallace gone, that command seemed to unravel, no one there with Wallace’s strength to hold the line. Facing a renewed assault by troops from Leonidas Polk’s Corps, the protection for Prentiss’s right flank soon collapsed. On the left, with the pressure from Breckinridge, and from the two brigades of Bragg’s troops under Chalmers and Jackson, even Hurlbut’s veterans gave way. By four o’clock, Prentiss was holding a fragile line that had virtually no flanks at all. The enemy was on three sides of him.

  PRENTISS COLLAPSES

  The word had come from the officers that something new was happening across Duncan Field. As he rode forward, he passed by the men who had held the line, could see the weariness, the worn faces, dirt and spent powder coating every man. Many of the wounded had been taken away, but many more had not, and they mingled with the dead, with troops who had taken the worst the enemy had given them, shattered bodies, pieces of men cut apart by artillery. Others lay where the musket balls had found them, some with no weapons anywhere near them, those muskets now in the hands of others who fought close by. The line was thinned as well by those who were gone, not wounded, but pani
cked, some of the men enduring as much as their courage would allow, the continuous assaults finally besting them. As he moved forward, the men who were left were watching him, empty stares, no cheers, no one seeming to care that their general had come up to see what it was that had so caught the attention of those few lieutenants who still stood with their men.

  He had left the horse behind, moved out toward Duncan Field with binoculars in his hand. Down to one side was a burned thicket, peppered with the charred bodies of men. Some of the grassy patches remained but not many, most of the cover obliterated by the advances of the enemy or by the swarms of musket fire that had sliced and chopped and ripped through any vegetation that rose up in the way. The officer who had led him forward had fallen back, and Prentiss looked behind him, saw the man drop down, slumping against the ragged stump of a fat tree, the man’s energy gone, his duty performed. Behind Prentiss, an aide stayed close, a young sergeant who seemed to absorb with a growing terror all that lay around him. Prentiss said nothing to the man, had seen too much of this himself, and by now he didn’t care if the sergeant ran away or not. Prentiss stepped forward over every kind of obstacle, was surrounded now by men with muskets, some sitting with their backs to the enemy, most in some kind of cover, stumps and broken timber, all that remained of the stands of hardwoods. Some curled up in man-made holes, dug with bayonets, seemed paralyzed with exhaustion, some of them actually sleeping.