The Star of Gettysburg: A Story of Southern High Tide

by Joseph A. Altsheler

General Lee was in a fine uniform, his face shaded by the brim of the gray hat which pictures have made so familiar. His cavalry cape swung from his shoulders, but not low enough to hide the splendid sword at his belt. His face was grave and his whole appearance was majestic. If only Jackson were there, riding by his side! Harry choked again.

Lee sat on his white horse, Traveler, and above him on a lofty pole a brilliant Confederate flag waved in the light wind. Harry and Dalton, as the youngest, took their modest places in the rear of the group of staff officers, just behind Lee, and looked expectantly over the plain. They saw at the far edge a long line of horsemen, so long, in fact, that the eye did not travel its full distance. Nearer by, all the guns of "Stuart's Horse Artillery" were posted upon a hill.

Harry's heart began to beat at the sight—mimic, not real, war, but thrilling nevertheless. A bugle suddenly sounded far away, its note coming low, but mellow. Other bugles along the line sang the same tune, and then came rolling thunder, as ten thousand matchless horsemen, led by Stuart himself, charged over the plain straight toward the hill on which Lee sat on his horse.

The horsemen seemed to Harry to rise as if they were coming up the curve of the earth. It was a tremendous and thrilling sight. The hoofs of ten thousand horses beat in unison. Every man held aloft his sabre, and the sun struck upon their blades and glanced off in a myriad brilliant beams. Harry glanced at Lee and he saw that the blue eyes were gleaming. He, too, sober and quiet though he was, felt pride as the Murat of the South led on his legions.

The cavalrymen, veering a little, charged toward the guns on the hill, and they received them with a discharge of blank cartridges which made the plain shake. Back and forth the mimic battle rolled, charge and repulse, and the smoke of the firing drifted over the plain. But the wild horsemen wheeled and turned, always keeping place with such superb skill that the officers and the infantry looking on burst again and again into thunderous applause.

The display lasted some time. When it was over and the smoke and dust were settling, General Lee and his staff rode back to their quarters, the young officers filled with pride at the spectacle and more confident than ever that their coming invasion of the North would be the final triumph.

Northern cavalry, on the other side of the river, had heard the heavy firing and they could not understand it. Could their forces following Lee on the right bank be engaged in battle with him? They had not heard of any such advance by their own men, yet they plainly heard the sounds of a heavy cannonade, and it was a matter into which they must look. They had disregarded sharp firing too often before and they were growing wary. But with that wariness also came a daring which the Union leaders in the east had not usually shown hitherto. They had a strong cavalry force in three divisions on the other side of the river, and the commanders of the divisions, Buford, Gregg and Duffie, with Pleasanton over all, were forming a bold design.

Events were to move fast for Harry, much faster than he was expecting. He was sent that night with a note to Stuart, who went into camp with his ten thousand cavalry and thirty guns on a bare eminence called Fleetwood Hill. The base of the hill was surrounded by forest, and not far away was a little place called Brandy Station. Harry was not to return until morning, as he had been sent late with the message, and after delivering it to Stuart he hunted up his friend Sherburne.

He found the captain sitting by a low campfire and he was made welcome. Sherburne, after the parade and sham battle, had cleaned the dust from his uniform and he was now as neat and trim as St. Clair himself.

"Sit down, Harry," he said with the greatest geniality. "Here, orderly, take his horse, but leave him his blankets. You'll need the blankets to-night, Harry, because you bunk with us in the Inn of the Greenwood Tree. We've got a special tree, too. See it there, the oak with the great branches."