See yonder, where the colors of the regiment on our right—our sister regiment, the 149th—have been advanced a little, to draw the enemy's fire, while our line sweeps on to the charge. There ensues about the flags a wild mêlée and close hand-to-hand encounter. Some of the enemy have seized the colors and are making off with them in triumph, shouting victory. But a squad of our own regiment dashes out swiftly, led to the rescue of the stolen colors by Sergeant John C. Kensill, of Company F, who falls to the ground before reaching them, and amid yells and cheers and smoke, you see the battle-flags rise and fall, and sway hither and thither upon the surging mass, as if tossed on the billows of a tempest, until, wrenched away by strong arms, they are borne back in triumph to the line of the 149th.
See yonder, again! Our colonel is clapping his hand to his cheek, from which a red stream is pouring; our lieutenant-colonel, H. S. Huidekoper, is kneeling on the ground, and is having his handkerchief tied tight around his arm at the shoulder; Major Thomas Chamberlain and Adjutant Richard L. Ashurst both lie low, pierced with balls through the chest; one lieutenant is waving his sword to his men, although his leg is crushed at the knee; three other officers of the line are lying over there, motionless now forever. All over the field are strewn men wounded or dead, and comrades pause a moment in the mad rush to catch the last words of the dying. Incidents such as these the reader must imagine for himself, to fill in these swift sketches of how the day was won—and lost!
Ay, lost! For the balls which have so far come mainly from our front, begin now to sing in from our left and right, which means that we are being flanked. Somehow, away off to our right, a half-mile or so, our line has given way, and is already on retreat through the town, while our left is being driven in, and we ourselves may shortly be surrounded and crushed—and so the retreat is sounded.
Back now along the railroad cut we go, or through the orchard and the narrow strip of woods behind it, with our dead scattered around on all sides, and the wounded crying piteously for help.
"Harry! Harry!" It is a faint cry of a dying man yonder in the grass, and I must see who it is.
"Why, Willie! Tell me where you are hurt," I ask, kneeling down beside him; and I see the words come hard, for he is fast dying.
"Here in my side, Harry. Tell—mother—mother——"
Poor fellow, he can say no more. His head falls back, and Willie is at rest forever!
On, now, through that strip of woods, at the other edge of which, with my back against a stout oak, I stop and look at a beautiful and thrilling sight. Some reserves are being brought up; infantry in the centre, the colors flying and officers shouting; cavalry on the right, with sabres flashing and horses on a trot; artillery on the left, with guns at full gallop sweeping into position to check the headlong pursuit,—it is a grand sight, and a fine rally; but a vain one, for in an hour we are swept off the field, and are in full retreat through the town.
Up through the streets hurries the remnant of our shattered corps, while the enemy is pouring into the town only a few squares away from us. There is a tempest of shrieking shells and whistling balls about our ears. The guns of that battery by the woods we have dragged along, all the horses being disabled. The artillery-men load as we go, double-charging with grape and canister.