Confederate wizards of the saddle /

by Bennett H. Young

The pace set by the Federal infantry was fierce, but Bell’s men made it fiercer. General Buford had come to join in the battle. Forrest trusted this Kentucky general as probably he trusted no other man under him. With an immense body, weighing three hundred pounds, he had a sharp, quick, active mind, a fearless soul and splendid military instincts. A West Point graduate, he won a brevet at Buena Vista and was in the Santa Fe expedition in 1848. He gave up a captaincy in the First United States Dragoons in 1854, and settled on a splendid blue-grass farm in Woodford County, Kentucky, the asparagus bed, as Tom Marshall called it, of the blue-grass. Made a brigadier in 1862, he led a few hundred Kentucky boys from the State with Bragg, and with General Joe Wheeler had thoroughly demonstrated his great ability as a cavalryman.

Those who kept pace with Wheeler and Forrest must not only be great fighters, but they must be great cavalrymen. He placed great store by three Kentucky regiments of infantry, whose longing to ride was at last gratified by the War Department at Richmond, and on mules and broken down artillery horses, they had come to fight with Forrest. These men with Buford had passed through the roughest military training as infantry, and when the romance and glamor of cavalry service came their way, with abounding gratitude for being allowed to become cavalrymen, they had the manliness and appreciation to show their government that they fully deserved the great favor that had been bestowed upon them.

The Federal men were sturdy Westerners. They were as brave as the bravest. They had trotted three miles, double-quicked another mile and marched four miles; and they had borne this severe punishment without a murmur. They longed for victory. To defeat Forrest would give them the approval of their government and the applause of their comrades; and they were very anxious to crown the conflict with one crushing blow at the hated Confederate chieftain who, with his followers, had not only evaded the Federal forces sent for his capture, but very often had dashed their hopes of victory and driven them discomfited from many fields of strife. These men in blue trusted that fate would now deliver him into their hands, and though they feared, they hoped, and this gave firmer tone to their onslaught.

There was no cleared space for maneuvering. Men who fought in this battle must go into thickets and through underbrush to find the foe they sought.

Forrest was too wary a general to allow the Federals to rest sufficiently long to recover from the depressing effects of their heated and wearying march. He well knew that in immediate and decisive attack lay his only hope of defeating his assailants, who so greatly outnumbered him. He had genius for finding the places where the fiercest fray would take place. Grierson’s cavalry had, like worsted gladiators, sought refuge behind the men whom they jocularly called “webfeet.” They had borne the brunt of the battle from ten to two, had been worsted, and were glad enough to let the walking men test the mettle of the foes they had failed to defeat.

Lyon, Johnson and Rucker had fought with the men under them, with vigor, against Waring and Winston, and they had longed for a breathing spell, but as Bell’s brigade, after their twenty-one mile ride, swung into line, tired though they were, they were yet indisposed to unload on the newcomers, and so gathering themselves together, they resolved not to be outdone by their comrades who had on that dreadful morning not felt battle’s grievous touch nor hunted through the heated thickets for those who sought their undoing.

Buford was ordered to slowly press the Federal right. Fronting Forrest and Bell the Federals were massing, and here Forrest realized must come the “tug of war.”

Cautiously, but quickly, Bell’s men sought the newly aligned Federal infantry under Colonel Hoge. As Bell’s men advanced, with acute vision, born of expected danger, they could not even see the men in blue as they stood with their guns cocked, waiting for a sight of those who so fearlessly were seeking them in the recesses of the jungle. They heard the silent, stealthy approach of the Confederates. The rustle of the leaves, the pushing aside of the bushes told them the Southern soldiers were coming. In an instant, without a single note of warning, the murderous, blazing fire of a thousand rifles flashed in their faces. Many brave men fell before this terrible discharge. The dead sank without noise to the earth and the unrepressed groans of the wounded for an instant terrorized the Confederate line. The instinct of safety, for a brief moment, led them to recoil from this gate of death, and a portion of Bell’s brave men gave way. The Federal officers quickly took advantage of the situation and made a strong and valiant rush upon the broken line. With a shout of victory upon their lips, they fixed their bayonets and rapidly pushed through the thicket to disorganize those who, under the dreadful shock of an unexpected fire, had momentarily yielded to fear. This was Forrest’s time to act. The expected had come. Tying his own horse to a tree, he bade his escort do likewise, and he and Bell, calling upon their men to follow, revolvers in hand, rushed upon the vanguard of the Federal line. Quick almost as thought itself, the Tennesseeans came back to the front. Wisdom, with two hundred and fifty of Newsom’s regiment, leaped also to the rescue, and those who for a brief space recoiled now turned with fury upon the line that had dealt them so sudden and so grievous a blow. Rucker, hard pressed, bade his men kneel, draw their trusty revolvers and stand firm. It was now brave infantry with bayonets against brave cavalry with revolvers. No charge could break such a line, and the men of the bayonet drew back from impact with this wall of revolver fire. Hesitating for a brief space, they recoiled before the charge of the gallant Confederates. Hoge’s men crumbled away in the face of the short range and effective aim of the Southern cavalry. A fierce dash of Forrest, Bell and Rucker completed their demoralization, and the men with the bayonets, vanquished, pulled away from further conflict with these revolver-firing cavalrymen.

At this moment, war’s sweetest music fell upon the ears of General Forrest. Away north he heard the sound of conflict. Miles away from the scene of battle, Forrest had ordered Barteau’s regiment to proceed west and strike the rear of the Federal forces. The Federal commanders deemed it wise to hold the colored brigade in reserve. They were about the wagon train. Forrest was again to astonish his enemies by a flank and rear attack. This was unexpected, but it was none the less decisive. No Federal cavalry could be spared to reach the front. Whipped in the morning, they were not even now, in the middle of the afternoon, ready for a second tussle with those who had vanquished them. Barteau had been well trained by his chieftain, for whom he had aforetime made daring assault under similar circumstances. The wagon train guard sought safety in flight, and the colored troopers began to tear from their breasts the badges printed with those fateful words, “Remember Fort Pillow. No quarter to Forrest’s men.” These boastful exhibits were good enough at Memphis on June 1st, but they became most unsatisfying declarations at Bryce’s Cross Roads on June 10th. It made a great difference where they were shown.

A stampede began among these black-skinned warriors. Vigorously they pulled the badges from their stricken breasts and trampled them in the dust, ere Barteau and his furious horsemen could reach their broken phalanxes. The Federal front was still stubborn and sullenly refused to yield further ground. To win it was necessary that this front be broken. With startling rapidity, Forrest again mounted his horse, rode the entire length of his line, declaring that the enemy was breaking, and that the hour of victory was at hand. Two hours of carnage and conflict had passed since Bell came. Finding his boy artillerist, Morton, he ordered him, at a signal, to hitch his horses to four guns, double shot the pieces with grape and canister, rush them down close to the enemy’s line, and deliver his fire. There were no reserves to protect the artillery, and Morton and Buford spoke a word of caution as to this extraordinary movement, but Forrest was firm in his resolve to test out the movement, if it cost him one-third of his artillery.