Bold Sons of Erin

by Ralph Peters (as Owen Parry)

  He inched forward in his chair, bending toward me. “So you want to take him back to your Pottsville courthouse? To put him to rights with the law and see things settled?” He cracked the flat of his hand upon his knee. “Fine. I’m for it.”

  General Meagher turned to an aide, “Clancy, would you go out and get young Boland by the collar? Bring him in to us, would you?”

  Returning his eyes to me, he continued, “I’ll be glad to have him out of here, to tell you the truth of it. For the fight tomorrow’s going to be a cock-up. We should have been on them days—if not weeks—ago, but Burnside couldn’t screw up his courage or begin to make up his mind. If we reach the Confederate lines tomorrow, I’ll say my thanks to Jesus Christ and luck.” He paused to take a drink. Of aromatic brandy, not of whisky. “Best to get Boland out of here. He’d throw himself away, that’s sure. He’s thinking how he’d like to die, no doubt. The lad needs time to mourn her, then he’ll find his consolation elsewhere. Every broken heart comes right in the end.”

  He glanced toward a dark-haired, deep-eyed major. “Isn’t that right, O’Hanlon? Isn’t Sally Tomorrow every bit as lovely as Sheila Yesterday?” Without awaiting a reply, he returned his attentions to me. “Take young Boland out of here tonight. He’s the last of his line, and it’s too good a line to lose for a young man’s folly.” Of a sudden, he smiled. His teeth were imperfect, yet his grin lit up the room. Meagher had the gift so rare among men of inspiring even those who disapproved of him. “But I’m not the host I should be, am I? I’d shame a Belfast butcher with my heartlessness. Have you two gentlemen had your supper this evening? We’ve splendid hams the boys found in the cellar.”

  We did not get to the hams before Boland come in. At first sight, I thought him a hard boy, for, small though he was, he had some bulk and the square jaw of a brawler. But when he stepped closer, I saw that his strength was illusory. Muscles could not mask a gentle character. He had a poet’s eye and woman’s lips.

  “Private Boland,” Meagher said, in a hale, officious voice, “this is Major Abel Jones. He has arrived from Washington, along with Mr. Molloy—whom I believe you’ll recall from a previous visit? They’ve come to escort you back to that Pottsville of yours, to clear your name and set you right with the law.” He wheeled toward me. The sash at his waist fluttered handsomely. “Isn’t that right, Major Jones? Private Boland has nothing to fear from the law?”

  “That is correct,” I said, addressing the pair of them. Then I narrowed my interest. “Look you, Private Boland . . . we know that you have done no crime, and that you meant no ill. But you must come home and tell that to the judge, for the law must record your statement and speak you free. You must retract your confession. I will back you myself, son, and you have my word there will be no betrayals.”

  “You shall leave tonight,” General Meagher told him, as if it were a trivial consideration. “You’ll be back among us a week hence, I expect. Perhaps sooner.”

  “No,” Boland said.

  His voice was not loud, but it revealed a stubbornness that robbed the well-meant smiles from my face and the general’s.

  “Respecting your rank and position, sir,” Boland told his commander, “I won’t go. Not tonight. I won’t be seen as yellow-tailed.”

  “Nothing of the kind, nothing of the kind!” Meagher assured him. “I don’t expect we’ll have more than a minor scrap tomorrow . . .”

  But Boland knew better. The general’s charm fell short.

  “Me da was no coward, and I’ll be none,” the private told us. “Begging your pardon, I’d rather fight beside me own, than go skulking off with the Welshman who killed my wife.”

  The lad knew more than I had hoped, and much more than was good for him.

  “Show proper respect,” the general said sharply, “to Major Jones. Or you’ll spend tomorrow under arrest, and we’ll see how you like that. Nor do I understand such an absurd accusation. I’ve had communication with—”

  “I’m sorry for the choice of words,” Boland said. “But I’d rather go into arrest than run away.”

  He turned to me, then. With hatred burning deep down in his eyes. God only knows what his people had seen fit to tell him.

  “If the law would have me go, then, can’t it wait a day? No Boland ever ran from a fight, and I won’t be the first. Sir,” he added, as an afterthought.

  Meagher looked at me. Pretending to let me decide. But I saw that he had changed his mind with the fickleness of the Irish and would not force Boland to go. Not before the battle. For when the talk is of courage and fighting, or being thought a coward, the Irish discard their soundest resolutions. And without the general’s support, I could not separate Boland from his comrades.

  When I did not speak, Jimmy made an attempt to introduce common sense.

  “If it’s fighting ye want,” he told Boland, “I think ye may have it in plenty, and more besides. For tomorrow won’t be the end o’ the war, that’s a promise, and ye’ll have your chance to die a dozen times over, if that’s what you’re after. Go back and clear yourself with the law, man. Then ye can fight free and clean for the Union. Or for Ireland. Or just for the sport, if that’s the sort of man ye are.”

  Boland eyed him coldly. “If ye have such a great knowledge of fighting and war, Mr. Molloy, why aren’t ye in a uniform yourself?”

  I nearly cut into Boland then, to tell him that Jimmy Molloy was the bravest man he ever would meet and that he should be ashamed. For I saw his words had taken Jimmy aback. And I did not like what I saw on Jimmy’s face. He was a discontented man, see, unhappy in his marriage, a rover at heart. And war is too great a bait for such fish to resist.

  Meagher interposed. He had turned from backing me to supporting Boland, and that was the end of it.

  “Perhaps,” the general said, polite but wearied, “you might grant us a grace of one day, Major Jones?” Immediately, he turned to Daniel Boland. “How’s that then, lad? If Major Jones waits until the battle’s behind us, will you go along with him willingly? And behave as a gentleman should?”

  It may be that Boland saw he could ask no more. Or perhaps his thoughts were darker and more fateful. But he answered, “Yes, sir. Thereafter I’ll go, with no complaint against anyone. After the battle, I’ll go.”

  Meagher nodded, not without some sadness. He did not wait for my agreement, but told the lad, “Off with you, then. And get yourself to sleep. You’ll do us no good tomorrow, if you’re tired and lagging behind.”

  Boland saluted imperfectly, turned his back, and left. As if he were the general among us. That is how the lot of them were, see. Independent of mind and prone to division. The Irish could talk themselves into a feud over matters beneath a Welshman’s or Englishman’s notice. Perhaps it spoke best of Meagher’s genius that he managed to bind them together as well as he did.

  I felt worn out myself. With the exhaustion that comes over a man when he sees that he has failed. I had begun the business to uncover the facts of a general’s murder. But I had already left more death behind me than the murderess herself. Perhaps Donnelly and Kehoe—even Gowen—had been right. The best that might have been done for the Irish was simply to leave them alone.

  I had sought to do my duty. But even duty may leave a bitter taste.

  General Meagher sought to enliven me, and he did persuade me to take a bit of ham, which was smoked to a succulence honoring the pig. He offered me a corner in an upstairs room, where

  I might sleep warm and keep myself from the frost for the rest of the night. I did not make even a courteous protestation, but took myself off to sleep, guided by a tipsy aide who found all the world amusing, including me.

  As I climbed the stairs that discouraging night, I left Jimmy below with his countrymen, answering queries from General Meagher as to Irish prospects in Washington’s city government.

  IT WAS BUTCHERY, not a battle.

  With the morning mists heavy upon us, Jimmy and I took leave of General Meagher, whose demeanor h
ad grown sober in every respect. He knew what lay ahead. Although he sought to be jovial with us, his levity did not convince. Meagher wore a uniform of green, not blue, and now his sash was gold. Striking he was in his finery, but his countenance was that of a man bound over. We left him amid an assembly of grim-faced officers.

  We found a perch in the upper floor of a house near the edge of town, where we might watch the fight as it unfolded. After making certain that the building—looted, ravaged, soiled—harbored no sharpshooters who might excite our enemy’s attentions, we took command of a lookout, knocking the last shards of glass from shattered panes. We knew our business, God forgive us the cruelties of our service, and sat a bit back from the window, in the room’s shadows, where we might see without being seen from without.

  At first, there was little enough to view, for the winter fog adored the river valley and would not leave its bed. But we heard the army readying itself. Disembodied voices barked commands, the bootfalls of companies, regiments and full brigades clapped over the earth. Their drums remained silent, in a clumsy pretense at stealth, and the regimental bands, whose members soon would trade their horns for stretchers, were not allowed to disturb the Rebels’ breakfast.

  The efforts at secrecy, half-hearted, were of no use. The Confederates knew our army had come. They had watched it gather for days and even weeks. If they did not know the certain hour of attack, it mattered little. The only manner in which we might have surprised our enemies would have been to leave them unmolested.

  The town grew still more reverberant with the sounds of our preparations. Too many men crowded too little space and the noise of jouncing canteens alone was enough to alert the enemy. Sergeants snapped out heathen oaths as stray boys sought their comrades. Iron clanged on tin, steel rang on iron. And a low hum, a noise not akin to music, but to animals crammed in a pen, rose from soldiers packed into streets and alleys, awaiting orders to unfold their ranks in the fields beyond the town.

  I heard a horse’s hooves, but saw no horse.

  Just below our perch, men marched along. Judging there was no danger yet, we moved close to the window and looked down. Twas no parade, but a labored movement from somewhere in the rear, herding another thousand blue-clad boys to where the brigades would align to await the drumbeat that sounded them forward to battle. We saw only flashes of faces, even when we briefly leaned out of the windowframe. The tops of caps bobbed along the street, their insignia dulled by wear and the weather. The soldiers wore leather packs strapped over their greatcoats, but those would be set down before the attack. White hands gripped wooden rifle stocks, the tip of a mustache disappeared in a cloud of frozen breath, and a face turned up to find us—as if one lad of them all sensed we were watching. They clattered along and whispered, somber, nerve-ridden, excited and resigned. Their flags remained furled in gray cloth sheaths, waiting for the sun and the sight of the enemy.

  It took a long while for the mists to burn away, and then the sky cleared in patches. We heard a cannonade begin off to the left, followed by the popping of distant rifle shots. The battle had been joined on other fields. In the town there was only this marching to and fro, orders cried in impatient voices, and the galloping of individual horses, carrying messengers on their backs who must rush their puzzle pieces to the generals.

  Sudden as lightning, a battery opened up, much closer now, but still to the left of our vantage point. That was the provocation that brought us the battle. Union guns fired behind us, bombarding the Rebel lines from across the river, where the ranges allowed. They must have stood above the mists, with a clear view of the enemy.

  The fire slackened again, allowing the heated fight downriver to swell and fill the silence.

  The attack had not properly begun, yet wounded men already stumbled back through the streets or come borne along on stretchers. One bloody-faced fellow, beard all gore, tottered along with a look of flawless astonishment. He staggered past a clot of lads on the march. They revealed their rawness by stopping to look at the mess of him, until an officer rushed up and gave them the devil.

  The air brightened, infiltrated by sunlight, and the veil of mist burned away.

  I saw Death.

  The Confederates lined the ridge behind the town. I never had seen such a splendid defensive position. At the foot of the ridge, their infantry waited behind stone walls and earthworks, protected by sunken roads and all the barriers ingenuity, spades and muscles might provide. Behind them, rising up the slope, artillery pieces occupied beds dug level, with earth piled about to protect both guns and gunners. Above those stages of soldiers and smoothbore cannon, their rifled guns frowned just below the crest, where groups of officers stood about, gawking at maps and pointing, while horsemen cantered along with reports and orders. They had been given time to prepare a reception for our boys, and they had not wasted a moment. The Rebels’ tiered positions allowed them to strike us with concentrated artillery without a risk of harm to their own infantry. The foot soldiers themselves appeared to be ranked deep enough to fire volley upon volley in rotation.

  It was lunacy to attack those positions. No army in the world could have carried their lines.

  But there would be an attack, and no mistaking it. Perhaps General Burnside felt he had no choice, given the clamor for blood in Congress, where political men who would never fight themselves nor risk the lives of their sons demanded war to the death, no matter the cost. And the editors of too many of our newspapers had grown ferocious in their criticism of Mr. Lincoln’s conduct of the war, refusing to see from the safety of their offices that victories cannot be gained by wishes alone. I sometimes think those newspaper fellows killed more of our men with their ink than the Confederates did with their bullets.

  Perhaps Burnside hoped for a miracle. Maybe he was played-out and resigned. I cannot say. But any sergeant worth his salt might have told the general he was not engaging in battle, but simply sentencing thousands of men to death.

  Our brigades stood ready. With their loot discarded and packs set upon the ground in long brown ranks, lines of men in greatcoats waited just beyond the last houses, where fences gave way to fields. Only scattered outbuildings spoiled the beauty of their formations. A few regiments, whose commanders were confident they would reach the enemy, stood with bayonets fixed, though most remained prepared to exchange volleys. Officers turned their horses over to orderlies, patting the animals once or twice, then positioned themselves near their colors.

  Down the river valley, the fighting was hot. But here, before the town, only a few stray cannon shots reminded the waiting men of the morning’s purpose. But those harassing fires did damage enough. Some balls shattered a company’s front, leaving clots of dead and writhing wounded. But the lines closed up again, while medical sorts rushed forward to clear the casualties. We had grown skilled at looking after our wounded, though still unable to spare them needless wounds.

  The attack began with shouted commands, then drums. A band played in the distance, ineffectual and small against the spectacle of thousands of men stepping off. The first regiments rippled forward, with officers stretching out their swords to keep the men aligned, while sergeants pressed the slow men to keep pace. Some regiments appeared quick of foot and willing, while others plodded solemnly, waiting for the Rebel guns to open up en masse.

  Even before the gunners yank their lanyards, before the crackling of rifle volleys begins, a battle is noisy. A hundred commands are shouted at once, thousands of boots tramp the earth, and the soldiers’ kit clangs and chimes and jounces. Nor had the rest of the army paused to witness the attack. In the street below our lookout, more regiments moved up, crowding into the fields to take the place of the men who had gone before them.

  Some of our boys went forward that morning with shoulders bent, as if struggling against a headwind. But the breeze, chill though it was, blew at their backs. Mayhaps it was a normal response to the storm of death they expected.

  Folly, twas all folly. We had built a mass
ive army. But General Burnside had driven it into a narrow, fatal place, where our strength could not be brought to bear decisively. As so often our army had done, we would fight in bits and pieces, handing the Rebels advantages beyond those they had earned.

  Even allowing for the restrictions of the terrain, our opening attack was of insufficient strength. The brigades that went forward did not even fill up the fields, but diverged as they marched, opening gaps between themselves and letting the Rebels concentrate their fires. Could Burnside see his doings from his position across the river? We sent those men to be sacrificed, not to win.

  Our ranks of blue had not crossed a third of those broken fields when the Rebels opened with guns.

  A combination of ball and explosive shells tore into our lads. I never saw such a sudden loss of life. Where a solid shot ripped through the ranks, it painted red streaks in the air, splashes of blood from disintegrated bodies. Men and boys flew skyward as if they were circus performers. A few did turn to flee or threw themselves to the ground. But the miracle was that the rest of the soldiers went forward, marching onward, many a line with rifles still dressed on their shoulders.

  Flags fell down, then rose back up. Men closed the gaps where comrades had fallen away, contracting their lines toward a shifting center and thinning the rear ranks. In the intervals between company formations, and in the greater plots between echeloned regiments, the winter fields were pocked with corpses and wounded men—twitching, cowering, crawling. And still you heard the shouts, gone hoarser now, amid the roar of the guns. The moving lines lost their suppleness and order, just beginning to waver, as men misjudged the pace of unseen comrades. All staring straight ahead they went, into death, with the fixity that is a human utmost. Rare was the officer who bothered to dress his company’s ranks any longer.