“No! Sir,” shouted back Hood. “Charge them out! charge them out!”
Forrest turned and rode back with an oath of disgust. Years afterwards, Colonel John McGavock, whose fine plantation lay within the federal lines and who had ample opportunity for observation, says that when in the early evening a brigade of Forrest's cavalry deployed across the river as if opening the way for the confederate infantry to attack the federal army in flank and rear, hasty preparations were made by the federal army for retreat. And thus was Forrest's military wisdom corroborated. “Let me flank them out,” was military genius. “No, charge them out,” was dare-devil blundering!
The shock, the shout and the roar continued. The flash from the guns could now plainly be seen as night descended. So continuous was the play of flame around the entire breastwork that it looked to the general at headquarters like a circle of prairie fire, leaping up at intervals along the breastworks, higher and higher where the batteries were ablaze.
In a black-locust thicket, just to the right of the Columbia turnpike and near the Carter House, with abatis in front, the strongest of the batteries had been placed. It mowed down everything in front. Seeing it, General Hood turned to General Travis and said: “General, my compliments to General Cleburne, and say to him I desire that battery at his hands.”
The old man wheeled and was gone. In a moment, it seemed, the black smoke of battle engulfed him. Cleburne's command was just in front of the old gin house, forming for another charge. The dead lay in heaps in front. They almost filled the ditch around the breastworks. But the command, terribly cut to pieces, was forming as coolly as if on dress parade. Above them floated a peculiar flag, a field of deep blue on which was a crescent moon and stars. It was Cleburne's battle flag and well the enemy knew it. They had seen and felt it at Shiloh, Murfreesboro, Ringgold Gap, Atlanta. “I tip my hat to that flag,” said General Sherman years after the war. “Whenever my men saw it they knew it meant fight.”
As the old man rode up, the division charged. Carried away in the excitement he charged with them, guiding his horse by the flashes of the guns. As they rushed on the breastworks a gray figure on a chestnut horse rode diagonally across the front of the moving column at the enemy's gun. The horse went down within fifty yards of the breastwork. The rider arose, waved his sword and led his men on foot to the very ramparts. Then he staggered and fell, pierced with a dozen minie balls. It was Cleburne, the peerless field-marshal of confederate brigade commanders; the genius to infantry as Forrest was to cavalry. His corps was swept back by the terrible fire, nearly half of them dead or wounded.
Ten minutes afterwards General Travis stood before General Hood.
“General Cleburne is dead, General”—was all he said. Hood did not turn his head.
“My compliments to General Adams,” he said, “and tell him I ask that battery at his hands.”
Again the old man wheeled and was gone. Again he rode into the black night and the blacker smoke of battle.