It might have been midday when the six columns began their march and deployed masses of hussars and cavalry on both sides of Gross-Gorschen. Our artillery, placed behind the squares on the top of the ridge, opened a terrible fire on the Prussian cannoneers, who replied all along their line.
Our drums began to beat in the squares to warn that the enemy were approaching, but their rattle was like the buzz of a fly in the storm, while in the valley the Prussians shouted altogether, "Vaterland! Vaterland!"
Their fire, as they climbed the hill, enveloped us in smoke—as the wind blew towards us—and hindered us from seeing them. Nevertheless, we began our file-firing. We heard and saw nothing but the noise and smoke of battle for the next quarter of an hour, when suddenly the Prussian hussars were in our squares. I know not how it happened, but there they were on their little horses, sabring us without mercy. We fought with our bayonets; they slashed, and fired their pistols. The carnage was horrible. Zébédé, Sergeant Pinto, and some twenty of the company held together. There they fought the pale-faced, long-mustached hussars, whose horses reared and neighed as they dashed over the heaps of dead and wounded. I remember the cries, French and German in a horrid mixture, that arose; how they called us "Schweinpelz," and how old Pinto never ceased to cry, "Strike bravely, my children; strike bravely!"
I never knew how we escaped; we ran at random through the smoke, and dashed through the midst of sabres and flying bullets. I only remember that Zébédé every moment cried out to me, "Come on! come on!" and that finally we found ourselves on a hillside behind a square which yet held firm, with Sergeant Pinto and seven or eight others of the company.
We were covered with blood, and looked like butchers.
"Load!" cried the sergeant.
Then I saw blood and hair on my bayonet, and I knew that in my fury I must have given some terrible blows. Old Pinto told us that the regiment was totally routed; that the beggarly Prussians had sabred half of it, but we should find the remainder by and by. "Now," he cried, "we must keep the enemy out of the village. By file, left! March!"
We descended a little stairway which led to one of the gardens of Klein-Gorschen, and, entering a house, the sergeant barricaded the door leading to the fields with a heavy kitchen-table; then he showed us the door opening on the street, telling us that there lay our way of retreat. This done, we went to the floor above, and found a pretty large room, with two windows looking out upon the village, and two upon the hill, which was still covered with smoke and resounding with the crash of musketry and artillery. At one end was a broken bedstead and near it a cradle. The people of the house had no doubt fled at the beginning of the battle, but a dog, with ears erect and flashing eyes, glared at us from beneath the curtains.
The sergeant opened the window and fired at two or three Prussian hussars who were already advancing down the street. Zébédé and the others standing behind him stood ready. I looked toward the hill to see if the squares had yet remained unbroken, and I saw them retreating in good order, firing as they went from all four faces on the masses of cavalry which surrounded them on every side. Through the smoke I could perceive the colonel on horseback, sabre in hand, and by him the colors, so torn by shot that they were mere rags hanging on the staff.
Beyond, a column of the enemy were debouching from the road and marching on Klein-Gorschen. This column evidently designed cutting off our retreat on the village, but hundreds of disbanded soldiers like us had arrived, and were pouring in from all sides; some turning ever and anon to fire, others wounded, trying to crawl to some place of shelter. They took possession of the houses, and, as the column approached, musketry rattled upon them from all the windows. This checked the enemy, and at the same moment the divisions of Brenier and Marchaud, which the Prince of Moskowa had dispatched to our assistance, began to deploy to the right.