TWO DREADFUL DAYS ON THE BATTLEFIELD. SHILOH.
THE hospital steamer on which myself and two other ladies took passage to Pittsburg Landing from Cairo, Ill., reaching Savannah, Tenn., eight miles below there, about four o’clock A.M., April 7. There we heard the news of the terrible battle that had been fought the day before. Some said: “The Union army is defeated and driven to the very banks of the river, and are all likely to be captured to-day.” We were soon out of our berths and on the outlook. The boat, with a full head of steam, made all possible speed to reach Pittsburg Landing.
Two gunboats, the Tyler and the Lexington, lay out in the stream, sending shot and shell over the heads of the Union Army into the Confederate ranks. As the boat steamed up to the Landing, where already a great fleet of steamers was lying, the shells went screaming over our heads with deafening fury. All was in seeming confusion at the Landing. The roadways, dug out of the steep bank, were insufficient for such an emergency. In the hard fight on the day before, a vast amount of ammunition had been used, and the officers all well knew that with the dawn of the coming day the battle would be renewed with desperate fury. Every teamster was, therefore, doing his utmost to get ammunition and provisions to the front. They would bring their mules to the steep, roadless bank, that stood at an angle of forty-five degrees; and while the driver held the lines with a strong, steady hand, and set his boot heels so as to keep a standing position as he ploughed his way to the bottom, his mules put their little front feet down, settled themselves on their haunches, on which the wagon rested, and skeeted to the bottom with the driver. It was a wild sight. Each teamster had an assistant who held a torch made of pine. Hundreds of torches lighted up the black night. There was a clamor that cannot be described in the loading up, and a steady stream of loaded wagons going up the hill by the regular roadways.
As soon as the first rays of the morning light made objects distinct, the firing began. Both armies had rested, face to face, on their arms, and a hasty breakfast had been snatched of what they could get before daylight, for all well knew that a bloody day was before them. Each man, as he lifted his head from the ground where he had pillowed it the night before, wondered if he should live to see the setting of another sun.
Our hospital boat was lying alongside of other steamers. The rain was falling steadily. We could hear the heavy guns, the screaming of the shells, the thunder of the battle going on near by. As the light increased, we shivered to see the wounded lying on bags of grain and out on the guards, and the dead, who had been carried from the boats, lying mangled and bloody along the shore of the river. At first we could only cover our faces with our hands in a shiver and chill of agony, in the attempt to hide the horrid sights of war from our eyes.
But as we stood there a feeble hand was lifted, and a feeble voice called out,—
“Say, lady! Can’t you bring me a drink of water?”
Immediately a hundred hands were lifted. We could scarcely see them in the faint light of the early morning, but we could hear the voices.
“Bring me some water.”
“Bring me something to eat.”
I called out cheerily,—
“Yes, yes; we’ll help you all we can.”
It was a great relief to have something to do. We went with gladness to our work. I was the pioneer, and went right onto the boat lying nearest.
The surgeon in charge of our hospital boat had gone off to the field. There was no one in authority left on the boat, and we took possession.
I had several boxes of canned oysters, and three or four barrels of crackers, but we soon exhausted these; then we began on the beef in the storeroom.
Barrels of soup were made and distributed. The other two ladies made the soup, and I distributed it from boat to boat, and from one to another. Oh, the sights and scenes I witnessed that day!
As I was carrying a bucket of soup across a gang-plank, an officer met me. He came bounding forward, with his sword clanging by his side.
“Madam,” he said, “what are you doing?”
I was startled nearly out of my wits, but I managed to say,—
“I am carrying soup to the wounded.”
“Why, you ought not to do that. See here, soldier, I detail you to carry soup for this woman.”
The soldier sprang forward and took the bucket of soup from my hand, and the officer went on. I never knew who he was. If this falls under his eyes, I want to thank him for his thoughtfulness. On and on, all day, I went with my assistant, while the two lady helpers worked as fast as they possibly could, to get the food ready.
The distribution of food was very rapid. Men with broken legs and arms and gashed faces would hold out their tin cups or canteens to be filled. The tin cups were easily filled, but the canteens took longer. When they saw us coming, they would pound on the floor or on the side of the boat, calling piteously,—
“Don’t pass me by. I am here, lady; please give me some soup.”
“Please, lady, pour some water on my arm, it is so dry and hot and the wound hurts so.”
Without a moment’s relaxation the day passed in this kind of work.
In the afternoon the gunboats stopped firing, and the news came that the Confederates were driven back.
Oh, how much that meant to us all; for through all that morning the boats had their full head of steam on, so that if the army was driven to the river, as many as possible could escape by that means.
Now and then I would help a surgeon who was dressing some of the worst wounds. My clothing was wet and muddy to the knees, and covered with blood, but I did not see it. I had not eaten a mouthful of food since the night before, but I did not know it. I was entirely unconscious of weariness and human needs.
It was about ten o’clock at night when some one asked,—
“Did you have supper?” This little question called me to the consciousness of my condition.
“No,” I answered; “I have not had a mouthful to eat since yesterday evening.”
A surgeon operating near by looked at me earnestly, and then said, with the voice of authority,—
“Madam, stop work immediately. We will have you on our hands next.”
I was cutting a fragment of a blue blouse away from the arm of a wounded young soldier. I continued my work till the bits of the blouse were gotten out, as far as I could see, then laid on a wet compress.
“Oh! thank you,” he said, with grateful tears in his eyes.
I went back to the cabin of the hospital boat and had my supper. After changing my clothes I sat down on a divan, feeling almost too weak and exhausted to stir. A chaplain came on the boat, inquiring for me. When he met me he seized my hand and began to bellow. I have never heard anything like it. When I saw him, I knew that he was crazy. The officers of the boat ran back to see what was the matter, and somehow the surgeon in charge managed to get him into a stateroom and lock him in, and place guards at the door, and the next day he was sent up with the other patients to St. Louis on that boat.
Early the next morning I was transferred with the little baggage I had to another boat set aside for hospital workers. My fine dress, which I had worn for the first time the day before, was wet and muddy, and I pitched it into the river.
Dr. Grinstead, now living in Washington City, was placed in charge of the boat.
The Confederates had retreated toward Corinth, Miss., but there was still firing in the distance. Early in the day I went up the steep bank and out on the battle-field.
The wounded had been gathered up as far as I could see, but many of the dead were still lying where they fell.
Not far from the landing there were some tents. In one of these tents a son of Sam Houston, of Texas, lay on the ground with others, the gray and the blue lying together. Young Houston was severely wounded in the thigh. I talked with him kindly of his grand, loyal father, and ministered to him as best I could. I saw him many times afterwards, the last time a prisoner at Camp Douglass, near Chicago. If this by any possibility passes under his notice, and he has not forgotten my treatment of him when he was a wounded prisoner, I will be glad to hear from him. I went toward a house on the right, but before I reached it I saw two men coming, carrying a wounded soldier.
They had made a seat by clasping their hands, and his arms were thrown about their necks. I went forward to meet them.
“Oh, set me down by that tree! I can go no farther,” he cried.
They carried him as tenderly as they could, and placed him between the great roots of a very large tree. His breast was bare, and the blood was slowly oozing out of a wound in his lungs.
“I am dying,” he said, “can’t somebody pray?” Both men were weeping. If he was not a brother, he was a friend; I answered promptly, “I can pray.” I knelt there on the damp ground, and taking one of his hands in my own, I asked in simple words the heavenly Father to forgive and bless. He responded to each petition. I kept on praying till he said, “The way is light now, I do not fear.” There was a little gasp, a shiver, and all was still. As I knelt there I closed his eyes and said,—
“He is dead.”
“Yes,” they answered with a sob.
“He is dead, and this is all we can do. We will report the case, and have the grave marked.” And we turned away and left him there. An hour afterwards I returned that way. It was a most impressive sight to see a dead man sitting there so calmly and peacefully, with eyes closed, dead and cold. When I passed that way again, they had taken him away.
The country can never pay those who went out and heroically defended the flag. Such scenes as these bring gray hairs before their time to those who looked on. What must it have been to those in the midst of the fight?