As the noise of battle died away, from away up the run we heard shouts and cheers, at first scarcely audible, then louder and nearer came the cheers, rolling along down the valley of Bull Run in seeming waves of mingled voices, each wave rising higher and more distinct. Messengers mounted on fleet-footed steeds, which that day had become war horses that sniffed the smoke of battle, not "from afar," but on the very field of strife and carnage, hurried down the lines along the run, shouting, "Victory! victory! victory; complete victory!" Each detachment took up the joyous shout and wafted it on to those below. From Mitchell's Ford, just above us, where Bonham and his South Carolinians on the 18th held the fort and let fly the dogs of war on the enemy's flank, Longstreet's Brigade caught the inspiration and raised its first "Rebel yell" that made the welkin ring, and sent the glad and glorious news on down to Jones and his men at McLean's Ford, and quickly came the echo back in ringing peals.
Then details of the victory began to come in. The enemy was completely routed; many prisoners and many guns had been captured. Then it came that "Long Tom," a noted Yankee cannon, was captured; then that Sherman's Battery, the crack artillery of the United States Army, was taken; then that Rickett's, another noted battery, and also Griffin's, had all been captured. The first mentioned battery, with Capt. W. T. Sherman in command, won laurels in the Mexican War, and had been known ever since as Sherman's Battery.
Longstreet at once led his brigade forward into the open field, at the farther side of which was a redoubt with abattis in front, where had been stationed the Yankee guns that shelled us all day. How different were our feelings now from what they would have been if we had entered this field during the day, and been met by a shower of shot, shell, grape and canister! Now, we were without fear, exultant and in high spirits; before, we would have been rent with missiles of death, great gaps would have been torn through the column of regiments, and many would have been left wounded and dead on the field.
The brigade marched on into the woods beyond the field towards Centreville, bivouacking on the ground of a Yankee camp, which the enemy had just abandoned, leaving evidences of hasty departure; coffee, sugar, hard-tack, and many articles of food and equipments lay scattered around. Some of the men shouted, "Don't eat them things, they may be pizened." Later on the "pizen" was not for a moment considered when a Yankee camp was raided, and when many a hungry Rebel ate to his full once more.
As the Eleventh Regiment was taking position in camp for the night, General Longstreet, "Old Pete," as he was sometimes called, rode close by, when Colonel Garland called on the men of the Eleventh to give three cheers for General Longstreet, which were given with a will, then some one, Captain Clement, I think, called out, "Three cheers for Colonel Garland," and again the shouts were raised. Warnings were sent not to use the water from Bull Run; it was said the stream up about the stone bridge was filled with dead Yankees and overflowing its banks from the obstructions of the bodies. This was a great exaggeration; in fact, few, if any, Yankees were dead in the stream.
The Yankee army was in full retreat, and more; the larger part of it was in complete rout and panic. The cry of "On to Richmond" was quickly changed to "Back to Washington."
A soldier, unless panic stricken, will hold on to his gun to the last; only when completely demoralized does he cast away his weapon of offense and defense, then he is little more than a frightened animal. The army of Northern Virginia was never panic stricken. General Lee said, "My men sometimes fail to drive the enemy, but the enemy does not drive my men," which was literally true up to the very beginning of the end, or rather, if the expression is permissible, up to the very ending of the end. Let the mind run back over the long list of desperate encounters that this army had with the enemy during those four bloody years, and this will be found to be literally true.
THE ENEMY NOT PURSUED
Much has been said about the failure of a vigorous pursuit of the enemy at and immediately after this battle of Manassas. Without going into details or giving reasons in in extenso for my opinion, I have always contended that Johnston and Beauregard acted wisely and prudently under all the circumstances. No one in the Confederate army at the close of that day knew or had any means of knowing how panic stricken the Yankee soldiers really were. There were several thousand soldiers in and around Centreville, who had not been engaged, in position and condition to resist a pursuit by any force the Confederates could have sent against them that night; it's a very risky business to pursue a retreating army in the night time; traps, ambuscades, and surprises are easily planned and executed, into which the rash pursuers are sure to fall. A large majority of the Confederate troops had been marching or fighting, or both, all day, many without rations, and were in no condition to pursue the enemy ten, fifteen or twenty miles that night. The bulk of the fleeing enemy had gotten several miles away, and was still going, before it could have been possible to organize anything like a systematic and immediate pursuit. Even if the enemy had had no organized rear guard, it would have been one mob pursuing another mob.
The Confederate army could not have possibly reached the vicinity of the Potomac River opposite Washington City before the next day, and then not before noon. Here all approaches were well fortified, mounted with siege guns and manned, and the capture of Washington would have been an impossibility.