There was a fierce and terrible fight. The Californians rushed forward to save the body of their beloved commander. They fell upon the enemy with the fury of madmen. They thought not of life or death. They had no fear. Each man was a host in himself. There was a close hand-to-hand contest, bayonet-thrusts, desperate struggles, trials of strength. Men fell, but rose again, bleeding, yet still fighting, driving home the bayonet, pushing back the foe, clearing a space around the body of the fallen hero, and bearing it from the field.
While this contest was going on, some one said, "Fall back to the river." Some of the soldiers started upon the run.
"Stand your ground!" shouted Colonel Devens.
Some who had started for the river came back, but others kept on. The line was broken, and it was too late to recover what had been lost. They all ran to the bank of the river. Some halted on the edge of the bluff and formed in line, to make another stand, but hundreds rushed down the banks to the boats. They pushed off into the stream, but the overloaded flat-boat was whirled under by the swift current, and the soldiers were thrown into the water. Some sank instantly, others came up and clutched at sticks, thrust their arms towards the light, and with a wild, despairing cry went down. Some clung to floating planks, and floated far down the river, gaining the shore at Edward's Ferry. A few who could swim reached the island. All the while the Rebels from the bank poured a murderous fire upon the struggling victims in the water and upon the bank.
Lieutenant Bramhall ran his cannon down the bank into the river, to save them from falling into the hands of the enemy. Some of the officers and soldiers secreted themselves in the bushes till darkness came on, then sprung into the river and swam to the island, and thus escaped,—reaching it naked, chilled, exhausted, to shiver through the long hours of a cold October night. Of the seventeen hundred who crossed the Potomac, nearly one half were killed, wounded, or captured by the enemy.
There was great rejoicing at Leesburg that night. The citizens who had been so frightened in the morning when they heard that the Yankees were coming, now illuminated their houses, and spread a feast for the Rebel soldiers. When the Union prisoners arrived in the town, the men and women called them hard names, shouted "Bull Run," "Yankee Invaders," but the men who had fought so bravely under such disadvantages were too noble to take any notice of the insults. Indians seldom taunt or insult their captives taken in war. Civilized nations everywhere respect those whom the fortunes of war have placed in their hands; but slavery uncivilizes men. It makes them intolerant, imperious, and brutal, and hence the men and women of the South, who accepted secession, who became traitors to their country, manifested a malignity and fiendishness towards Union prisoners which has no parallel in the history of civilized nations.
There was great rejoicing throughout the South. It gave the leaders and fomenters of the rebellion arguments which they used to prove that the Yankees were cowards, and would not fight, and that the North would soon be a conquered nation.
It was a sad sight at Poolesville. Tidings of the disaster reached the place during the evening. The wounded began to arrive. It was heart-rending to hear their accounts of the scene at the river bank, when the line gave way. Hundreds of soldiers came into the lines naked, having thrown away everything to enable them to swim the river. The night set in dark and stormy. After swimming the river, they had crowded along the Maryland shore, through briers, thorns, and thistles, stumbling over fallen trees and stones in the darkness, while endeavoring to reach their encampments. Many were found in the woods in the morning, having fallen through exhaustion.