CHAPTER VII.
The Great Battle of Shiloh and the South’s Irreparable Loss in the Death of General Johnston.
War, fifty years ago, was bad enough, but it wasn’t the plain, cold-blooded deviltry that it is to-day. When men met face to face and leaders led, in fact as well as theory, I can understand the inspiration, the enthusiasm, the wild love of glory, that invited the best blood to a military life. But now, when victories are to be won by pressing buttons, switching on or off electric currents or dropping bombs from the sky on the heads of helpless women and children, while it may attract those of a mechanical turn of mind, it has ceased to be a business that should interest a gentleman.
My recollection is of the old fighting days. I said that when I arrived in Corinth on April 4, 1862, not more than five thousand men were assembled there. But all that night and the next day troop trains were unloading enormous reinforcements and some were arriving by forced marches on foot. By the night of April 5, between twenty-five and thirty thousand soldiers were in camp, the flower of the fighting army of the South. General Albert Sidney Johnston, with his heroic figure and magnetic presence, roused the men to a height of martial exultation very hard to describe. Everyone knew that a great battle was impending. Most of them guessed that the morrow would be the day. But they hardly seemed able to wait. They were like war dogs tugging at the leash, confident in themselves, confident in their cause. One would have thought they were bound for a holiday excursion instead of a death grapple from which many would never emerge.
Very much to my disappointment, I was assigned to the staff of General Beauregard, second in command. I had hoped to be with General Johnston, where the fighting would be the fiercest. Nevertheless, I had enough.
The troops retired at an early hour on the night of April 5. But in the darkness flitted shadows of alert men, making busy preparations for a great event. At two o’clock in the morning, the troops were roused from their sleep, had hasty refreshment in the darkness, and then fell in, company after company, like so much clock work, and the march to Pittsburg Landing, or Shiloh, nine miles away, began. The infantry was well in front, separated by perhaps half a mile from the artillery and more noisy equipment.
The nature of the country was admirable for a secret movement. It was well wooded, with abundant cover to screen our presence, and it seemed almost uncanny how the thousands of men marched forward with scarce noise enough to stir the early morning air. Not a word was spoken.
MRS. CHAS. S. FAIRFAX
Wife of Lord Fairfax, niece of John C. Calhoun
[Reproduced from an
old photograph.]