On March 17, 1863, he was visiting some friends at night, in Culpeper County, when the booming of guns at Kelly’s Ford fell on his ear. Excusing himself, he mounted his horse and rode rapidly to the scene of action. His own command had not yet arrived, but he found a regiment wavering in confusion. Spurring his horse quickly to the front of the confused mass, his cool ringing voice restored order, and, placing himself at their head to lead them to battle, a fragment of shell struck the brave youth in the head, and he was instantly killed. The news of the death of Pelham occasioned as much mourning in the army and throughout the Confederacy as there would have been had one of the great general chieftains fallen. Boy as he was, his fame had become proverbial. His body was sent home for burial, and his ashes repose today at Jacksonville, in his native county, Calhoun.
CULLEN A. BATTLE
While known chiefly as a soldier because of his brilliant record in the late war, General Cullen A. Battle was distinguished as a lawyer, orator, and statesman, as well. The Battles were among the leading families of the state, and were conspicuous in medicine, in law, in education, in theology, in authorship, and in war. The family record is a brilliant one, but our attention is now directed to a single member.
Graduating from the University of Alabama in the bud of manhood, General Battle entered on the practice of law at the age of twenty-two, after having read law in the office of the Honorable John Gill Shorter. Soon after the completion of his studies preparatory to his profession, he removed to Tuskegee and was diligently devoted to his profession for almost ten years. His first appearance in public life was when he canvassed the state in 1856 for Buchanan, being at the time a presidential elector.
An ardent Democrat, he was on the electoral ticket of Breckinridge and Lane in 1860, at which time he spoke throughout the state in company with Honorable William L. Yancey. As an orator, he was gifted with a freedom of utterance and a poetic imagination, while his delivery was one of gracefulness and magnetism. No one more admired the witchery of his oratory than Mr. Yancey himself, whom General Battle accompanied on his tour to the North, and spoke with the South’s peerless orator from the same platform in Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, St. Louis and Cincinnati.
At the outbreak of hostilities, in 1861, General Battle raised a company of volunteers at Tuskegee, which company became a part of the Third Alabama Regiment, of which Tennent Lomax became the colonel and Cullen A. Battle the lieutenant colonel. This regiment represented in part the pick and flower of the young chivalry of the South.
The Third Alabama Regiment was under fire at Drewry’s Bluff, but engaged first fiercely in battle at Seven Pines, where the brave Lomax fell, and Battle led the regiment through the fight. In the series of battles below Richmond he was at the head of the gallant Third Alabama, having been promoted meanwhile to the colonelcy of the regiment. He received a slight wound at Boonsboro, and at Fredricksburg was seriously injured by his horse falling on him. Later we find him serving on the staff of General Rodes in the battle of Chancellorsville. At Gettysburg the whole brigade was quickly repulsed with great loss, all giving way but the Third Alabama Regiment, but rallying later and fighting with renewed power. Under conditions like these Colonel Battle attached his regiment to General Ramseur’s command and rendered conspicuous service in checking the tide of temporary defeat.
So pleased was General Ewell with the timely gallantry of Colonel Battle that he promoted him to a brigadiership on the field, which act was soon after confirmed. To him were assigned, as the component parts of a brigade, the Third, Fifth, Sixth, Twelfth, and Sixty-first Alabama regiments. This brigade was the first to encounter General Grant in the Wilderness, and in his report on the battle of Spottsylvania General Ewell says: “Battle’s brigade was thrown across Hancock’s front and there occurred the hottest fighting of the war.” The contest was hand-to-hand fighting, the opposing forces using the bayonet. At Winchester, Battle’s brigade entered the action just in time to allow Evans’ brigade to rally, while driving the enemy before him. By this time “Battle’s brigade” had become so conspicuous a factor in the Army of Northern Virginia as to be signally named for its gallantry. At the battle of Cedar Creek, General Battle led his brigade with singular coolness and courage against the formidable front of the Eighth Army Corps of the federal forces, which corps was commanded by General Crook. In this action, General Battle was struck in the knee, which permanently disabled him so that he could not resume active duty on the field, but he was rewarded with a commission of major general, the commission bearing date of his wound, October 19, 1864.