"Bring all your guns to bear upon the city and batter it down," was the order issued to General Hunt, chief of artillery. Colonel Hays had eight batteries on the right; Colonel Tompkins had eleven batteries on the right centre, opposite the upper pontoons,—some of them in the yard of Mr. Lacey's house, near the river; Colonel Tyler had seven batteries a little farther down on the left centre; while Captain De Russey had seven batteries opposite the lower pontoons. There were in all thirty-five batteries, with a total of one hundred and seventy-nine guns, all bearing upon the town. The artillerymen received the orders to prepare for action with a hurrah. They had chafed all the morning, and longed for an opportunity to avenge the death of their gallant comrades.
The hour had come. They sprang to their pieces. The fire ran from the right to the left,—from the heavy twenty-four-pounders on the heights of Falmouth to the smaller pieces on the hills where Washington passed his boyhood. The air became thick with the murky clouds. The earth shook beneath the terrific explosions of the shells, which went howling over the river, crashing into the houses, battering down walls, splintering doors, ripping up floors. Sixty solid shot and shells a minute were thrown, and the bombardment was kept up till nine thousand were fired. No hot shot were used, but the explosions set fire to a block of buildings, which added terrible grandeur to the scene.
The Rebel army stood upon the heights beyond the town and watched the operations. Lee's Rebel artillery was silent, and the Mississippians concealed in the houses were alone participants in the contest.
The fog lifted at last and revealed the town. The streets were deserted, but the houses, the church-steeples, the stores were riddled with shot; yet no impression had been made on the Mississippians.
Burnside's artillerymen could not depress their guns sufficiently to shell them out. A working party went out upon the bridge, but one after another was killed or wounded.
The time had come for a bold movement. It was plain that the Mississippians must be driven out before the bridge could be completed, and that a party must go over in boats, charge up the hill, and rout them from their hiding-places. Who would go? Who attempt the hazardous enterprise? There were brave men standing on the bank by the Lacey House, who had watched the proceedings during the long hours. They were accustomed to hard fighting: Hall's brigade, composed of the Seventh Michigan, Nineteenth and Twentieth Massachusetts, and Forty-Second New York. They had fought at Fair Oaks, Savage Station, Glendale, Malvern, and Antietam. The Twentieth had been in all these battles, and also at Ball's Bluff.
"We will go over and clean out the Rebels," was the cry of this brigade.
"You shall have the privilege of doing so," said General Burnside.
There were not boats enough for all,—not enough for one regiment even. A portion of the Seventh Michigan was selected to go first, while the other regiments stood as a supporting force.
The men run down the winding path to the water's edge, jump into the boats, and push out into the stream. It is a moment of intense anxiety. No one knows how large the force opposing them. The Rebel sharpshooters are watching the movement from their hiding-places. They have a fair view and can pick their men. The men in the boats know it, yet they move steadily onward, steering straight across the stream, without a thought of turning back, though their comrades are falling,—some headlong into the river, others dropping into the boats. The oarsmen pull with rapid strokes. When one falls another takes his place. Two thirds the distance over,—the boats ground in shoal water. The soldiers wait for no word of command, but with a common impulse, with an ardor which stops not to count the cost, they leap into the water, wade to the shore, and charge up the bank. Some fall to rise no more, but their surviving comrades rush up the slippery slope. A loud hurrah rings out from the soldiers who watch them from the Falmouth shore. Up, up they go, facing death, firing not, intent only to get at the foe and win victory with the bayonet! They smash the windows, batter down doors, driving or capturing the foe.