On, on swept the brigade; a second battery was reached, and over one of the guns he saw Marsden fighting like a tiger. Then the smoke of battle hid him from view.
On the left Fred saw a mere boy spring from out an Indiana regiment, shoot down a Confederate color-bearer, snatch the colors from his dying grasp, wave them defiantly in the face of the enemy, and then coolly walk back to his place in the ranks.
General Nelson saw the act, and turning to Fred, said: "I want you to hunt that boy up, and bring him to me after the battle."
But the brigade paid dearly for its daring charge. A strong line, lying down, let the frightened fugitives pass over them; then they arose and poured a deadly volley into the very faces of the charging column. Cannon in front and on the flank tore great gaps through the line. The brigade halted, wavered, and then fled wildly back, leaving a third of its number dead and wounded.
By three o'clock the battle was over; the Confederates were in full retreat, and the bloody field of Shiloh won.
As the firing died away, Fred sat on his horse and shudderingly surveyed the field. The muddy ground was trampled as by the feet of giants. The forest was shattered as by ten thousand thunderbolts, while whole thickets had been leveled, as though a huge jagged scythe had swept over them.
By tree and log, in every thicket, on every hillside, dotting every field, lay the dead and wounded. Many of the dead were crushed out of all semblance of humanity, trampled beneath the hoof of the warhorse or ground beneath the ponderous wheels of the artillery. Over 20,000 men lay dead and wounded, Confederate and Federal commingled.
But Grant's army was saved. The fondest hopes of the Confederates had been blasted; instead of marching triumphantly forward to Nashville, as they hoped, they retreated sullenly back to Corinth.
But the battle brought the war to the hearts of the people as it had never been brought before. From the stricken homes of the North and the South there arose a great wail of agony—a weeping for those who would not return.