The Rock of Chickamauga Part 11

While the fires sprang up about them and they ate and talked of the victory, Washington was knowing its darkest moments. Lee had already been marching thirteen days toward Gettysburg, and he seemed unbeatable. Grant, who had won for the North about all the real success of which it could yet boast, was lost somewhere in the Southern wilderness. The messages seeking him ran to the end of the telegraph wires and no answer came back. The click of the key could not reach him. Many a spirit, bold at most times, despaired of the Union.

But the old and hackneyed saying about the darkest hour just before the dawn was never more true. The flame of success was already lighted in the far South, and Lincoln was soon to receive the message, telling him that Grant had not disappeared in the wilderness for nothing. Thereafter he was to trust the silent and tenacious general through everything.

They were up and away at dawn. d.i.c.k was glad enough to leave the hill, on which many of the dead yet lay unburied, and he was eager for the new field of conflict, which he was sure would be before Vicksburg. Warner and Pennington were as sanguine as he. Grant was now inspiring in them the confidence that Lee and Jackson inspired in their young officers.

"How big is this city of Vicksburg?" asked Pennington.

"Not big at all," replied Warner. "There are no big cities in the South except New Orleans, but it's big as a fortress. It's surrounded by earthworks, Frank, from which the Johnnies can pot you any time."

"Well, at any rate, I'll be glad to see it-from a safe distance. I wouldn't mind sitting down before a town. There's too much wet country around here to suit me."

"It's likely that you'll have a chance to sit for a long time. We won't take Vicksburg easily."

But the time for sitting down had not yet come. The confidence of the soldiers in their leader was justified continually. He advanced rapidly toward Vicksburg, and in pursuit of Pemberton's defeated men. The victory at Champion Hill had been so complete that the Southern army was broken into detached fragments, and the Southern generals were now having the greatest difficulty in getting them together again.

Grant, with his loyal subordinate, Sherman, continued to push upon the enemy with the greatest vigor. Sherman had not believed in the success of the campaign, had even filed his written protest, but when Grant insisted he had cooperated with skill and energy. He and Grant stood together on a hill looking toward the future field of conflict, and he told Grant now that he expected continued success.

It was the fortune of the young officers of the Winchester regiment sitting near on their horses to see the two generals who were in such earnest consultation, and who examined the whole circle of the country so long and so carefully through powerful gla.s.ses.

The effects of the victory deep in the South were growing hourly in d.i.c.k's mind, and the two figures standing there on the hill were full of significance to him. He had a premonition that they were the men more than any others who would achieve the success of the Union, if it were achieved at all. They had dismounted and stood side by side, the figure of Grant short, thick and st.u.r.dy, that of Sherman, taller and more slender. They spoke only at intervals, and few words then, but nothing in the country about them escaped their attention.

d.i.c.k had gla.s.ses of his own, and he, too, began to look. He saw a region much wooded and cut by deep streams. Before them lay the sluggish waters of Chickasaw Bayou, where Sherman had sustained a severe defeat at an earlier time, and farther away flowed the deep, muddy Yazoo.

"See the smoke, George, rising above that line of trees along the river?" said d.i.c.k.

"Yes, d.i.c.k," replied Warner, "and I notice that the smoke rises in puffs."

"It has a right to go up that way, because it's expelled violently from the smoke-stacks of steamers. And those steamers are ours, George, our warships. Our navy in this war hasn't much chance to do the spectacular, but we can never give it enough credit."

"That's right, d.i.c.k. It keeps the enemy surrounded and cuts off his supplies, while our army fights him on land. Whatever happens the waters are ours."

"And the Mississippi has become a Union river, splitting apart the Confederacy."

"Right you are, d.i.c.k, and we're already in touch with our fleet there. The boats do more than fight for us. They're unloading supplies in vast quant.i.ties from Chickasaw Bayou. We'll have good food, blankets, tents to shelter us from the rain, and unlimited ammunition to batter the enemy's works."

The investment of Vicksburg had been so rapid and complete that Johnston, the man whom Grant had the most cause to fear, could not unite with Pemberton, and he had retired toward Jackson, hoping to form a new army. Only three days after Champion Hill Grant had drawn his semicircle of steel around Vicksburg and its thirty thousand men, and the navy in the rivers completed the dead line.

d.i.c.k rode with Colonel Winchester and took the best view they could get of Vicksburg, the little city which had suddenly become of such vast military importance.

Now and then on the long, lower course of the Mississippi, bluffs rise, although at far intervals. Memphis stands on one group and hundreds of miles south Vicksburg stands on another. The Vicksburg plateau runs southward to the Big Bayou, which curves around them on the south and east, and the eastern slope of the uplift has been cut and gulleyed by many torrents. So strong has been the effect of the rushing water upon the soft soil that these cuts have become deep winding ravines, often with perpendicular banks. One of the ravines is ten miles long. Another cuts the plateau itself for six miles, and a permanent stream flows through it.

The colonel and d.i.c.k saw everywhere rivers, brooks, bayous, hills, marshes and thickets, the whole turned by the Southern engineers into a vast and most difficult line of intrenchments. Grant now had forty thousand men for the attack or siege, but he and his generals did not yet know that most of the scattered Confederate army had gathered together again, and was inside. They believed that Vicksburg was held by fifteen thousand men at the utmost.

"What do you think of it, Colonel?" asked d.i.c.k, as they sat horseback on one of the highest hills.

"It will be hard to take, despite the help of the navy. Did you ever see another country cut up so much by nature and offering such natural help to defenders?"

"I've heard a lot of Vicksburg. I remember, Colonel, that, despite its smallness, it is one of the great river towns of the South."

"So it is, d.i.c.k. I was here once, when I was a boy before the Mexican war. Down on the bar, the low place between the bluffs and the river, was the dueling ground, and it was also the place for sudden fights. It and Natchez, I suppose, were rivals for the wild and violent life of the great river."

"Well, sir, it has a bigger fight on its hands now than was ever dreamed of by any of those men."

"I think you're right, d.i.c.k, but the general means to attack at once. We may carry it by storm."

d.i.c.k looked again at the vast entanglement of creeks, bayous, ravines, forests and thickets. Like other young officers, he had his opinion, but he had the good sense to keep it to himself. He and the colonel rejoined the regiment, and presently the trumpets were calling again for battle. The men of Champion Hill, sanguine of success, marched straight upon Vicksburg. All the officers of the Winchester regiment were dismounted, as their portion of the line was too difficult for horses.

Their advance, as at Champion Hill, was over ground wooded heavily and they soon heard the reports of the rifles before them. Bullets began to cut the leaves and twigs, carrying away the bushes, scarring the trees and now and then taking human life. The Winchester men fired whenever they saw an enemy, and with them it was largely an affair of sharpshooters, but on both left and right the battle rolled more heavily. The Southerners, behind their powerful fortifications at the heads of the ravines and on the plateau, beat back every attack.

Before long the trumpets sounded the recall and the short battle ceased. Grant had discovered that he could not carry Vicksburg by a sudden rush and he recoiled for a greater effort. He discovered, too, from the resistance and the news brought later by his scouts that an army almost as numerous as his own was in the town.

The Winchester regiment made camp on a solid, dry piece of ground beyond the range of the Southern works, and the men, veterans now, prepared for their comfort. The comrades ate supper to the slow booming of great guns, where the advanced cannon of either side engaged in desultory duel.

The distant reports did not disturb d.i.c.k. They were rather soothing. He was glad enough to rest after so much exertion and so much danger and excitement.

"I feel as if I were an empty sh.e.l.l," he said, "and I've got to wait until nature comes along and fills up the sh.e.l.l again with a human being."

"In my school in Vermont," said Warner, "they'd call that a considerable abuse of metaphor, but all metaphors are fair in war. Besides, it's just the way I feel, too. Do you think, d.i.c.k, we'll settle down to a regular siege?"

"Knowing General Grant as we do, not from what he tells us, since he hasn't taken Pennington and you and me into his confidence as he ought to, but from our observation of his works, I should say that he would soon attack again in full force."

"I agree with you, Knight of the Penetrating Mind, but meanwhile I'm going to enjoy myself."

"What do you mean, George?"

"A mail has come through by means of the river, and my good father and mother-G.o.d bless 'em-have sent me what they knew I would value most, something which is at once an intellectual exercise, an entertainment, and a consolation in bereavement."

d.i.c.k and Pennington sat up. Warner's words were earnest and portentous. Besides, they were very long, which indicated that he was not jesting.

"Go ahead, George. Show us what it is!" said d.i.c.k eagerly.

Warner drew from the inside pocket of his waist coat a worn volume which he handled lovingly.

"This," he said, "is the algebra, with which I won the highest honors in our academy. I have missed it many and many a time since I came into this war. It is filled with the most beautiful problems, d.i.c.k, questions which will take many a good man a whole night to solve. When I think of the joyous hours I've spent over it some of the tenderest chords in my nature are touched."

Pennington uttered a deep groan and buried his face in the gra.s.s. Then he raised it again and said mournfully: "Let's make a solemn agreement, d.i.c.k, to watch over our poor comrade. I always knew that something was wrong with his mind, although he means well, and his heart is in the right place. As for me, as soon as I finished my algebra I sold it, and took a solemn oath never to look inside one again. That I call the finest proof of sanity anybody could give. Oh, look at him, d.i.c.k! He's studying his blessed algebra and doesn't hear a word I say!"

Warner was buried deep in the pages of a plus b and x minus y, and d.i.c.k and Pennington, rising solemnly, walked noiselessly from the presence around to the other side of the little opening where they lay down again. The bit of nonsense relieved them, but it was far from being nonsense to Warner. His soul was alight. As he dived into the intricate problems memories came with them. Lying there in the Southern thickets in the close damp heat of summer he saw again his Vermont mountains with their slopes deep in green and their crests covered with snow. The sharp air of the northern winter blew down upon him, and he saw the clear waters of the little rivers, cold as ice, foaming over the stones. That air was sharp and vital, but, after a while, he came back to himself and closed his book with a sigh.

"Pardon me for inattention, boys," he said, "but while I was enjoying my algebra I was also thinking of old times back there in Vermont, when n.o.body was shooting at anybody else."

d.i.c.k and Pennington walked solemnly back and sat down beside him again.

"Returned to his right mind. Quite sane now," said Pennington. "But don't you think, d.i.c.k, we ought to take that exciting book away from him? The mind of youth in its tender formative state can be inflamed easily by light literature."

Warner smiled and put his beloved book in his pocket.

"No, boys," he said, "you won't take it away from me, but as soon as this war is over I shall advance from it to studies of a somewhat similar nature, but much higher in character, and so difficult that solving them will afford a pleasure keener and more penetrating than anything else I know."

"What is your greatest ambition, Warner?" asked Pennington. "Do you, like all the rest of us, want to be President of the United States?"

"Not for a moment. I've already been in training several years to be president of Harvard University. What higher place could mortal ask? None, because there is none to ask for."

"I can understand you, George," said d.i.c.k. "My great-grandfather became the finest scholar ever known in the West. There was something of the poet in him too. He had a wonderful feeling for nature and the forest. He had a remarkable chance for observation as he grew up on the border, and was the close comrade in the long years of Indian fighting of Henry Ware, who was the greatest governor of Kentucky. As I think I've told you fellows, Harry Kenton, Governor Ware's great-grandson and my comrade, is fighting on the other side."

"I knew of the great Dr. Cotter long before I met you, d.i.c.k," replied Warner. "I read his book on the Indians of the Northern Mississippi Valley. Not merely their history and habits, but their legends, their folk lore, and the wonderful poetic glow so rich and fine that he threw over everything. There was something almost Homeric in his description of the great young Wyandot chieftain Timmendiquas or White Lightning, whom he acclaimed as the finest type of savage man the age had known."

"He and Henry Ware fought Timmendiquas for years, and after the great peace they were friends throughout their long lives."

"And I've studied, too, his wonderful book on the Birds and Mammals of North America," continued Warner with growing enthusiasm. "What marvelous stores of observation and memory! Ah, d.i.c.k, those were exciting days, and a man had opportunities for real and vital experiences!"

d.i.c.k and Pennington laughed.

"What about Vicksburg, old praiser of past times?" asked Frank. "Don't you think we'll have some lively experiences trying to take it? And wasn't there something real and vital about Bull Run and Shiloh and Perryville and Stone River and all the rest? Don't you worry, George. You're living in exciting times yourself."

"That's so," said Warner calmly. "I had forgotten it for the moment. We've been readers of history and now we're makers of it. It's funny-and maybe it isn't funny-but the makers of history often know little about what they're making. The people who come along long afterward put them in their places and size up what they have done."

"They can give all the reasons they please why I won this war," said Pennington, "but even history-makers are ent.i.tled to a rest. Since there's no order to the contrary I mean to stretch out and go to sleep. d.i.c.k, you and George can discuss your problems all night."

But they went to sleep also.

CHAPTER IX. THE OPEN DOOR

"d.i.c.k," said Colonel Winchester the next morning, "I think you are the best scout and trailer among my young officers. Mr. Pennington, you are probably the best on the plains, and I've no doubt, Warner, that you would do well in the mountains, but for the hills, forests and rivers I'll have to choose d.i.c.k. I've another errand for you, my boy. You're to go on foot, and you're to take this dispatch to Admiral Porter, who commands the iron-clads in the river near the city. Conceal it carefully about you, but I antic.i.p.ate no great danger for you, as Vicksburg is pretty well surrounded by our forces."

The dispatch was written on thin, oiled paper. d.i.c.k hid it away in the lining of his coat and departed upon another important mission, full of pride that he should be chosen for it. He had all the pa.s.swords and carried two good pistols in his belt. Rich in experience, he felt able to care for himself, even should the peril be greater than Colonel Winchester had expected.

The sun was not far above the horizon but it was warm and brilliant, and it lighted up the earth, throwing a golden glow over the plateau of Vicksburg, the great maze of ravines and thickets and the many waters.

He pa.s.sed along the lines, walking rapidly southward, and saw more than one officer of his acquaintance. Hertford's cavalry were in a field, and the colonel himself sat on a portion of the rail fence that had enclosed it. He hailed the lad pleasantly.

"Into the forest again, d.i.c.k," he said.

"Not this time, sir," d.i.c.k replied. "It's just a little trip, down the river."

"Success to the trip and a speedy return."

d.i.c.k nodded and walked on. He was quite sure that his dispatch was an order from Grant for Porter to come up the stream and join in a general attack which everybody felt sure was planned for an early date.

As he pa.s.sed through the regiments and brigades he received much good-humored chaff. The great war of America differed widely from the great wars of Europe. The officers and men were more nearly on a plane of equality. The vast majority of them had been volunteers in the beginning and perhaps this feeling of comradeship made them fight all the better. North and South were alike in it.

"Which way, sonny?" called a voice from a group. "You don't find the fighting down there. It's back toward Vicksburg."

d.i.c.k nodded and smiled.

"Maybe he's out walking for exercise. These officers ride too much."

d.i.c.k walked on with a steady swinging step. He regarded the sunbrowned, careless youths with the genuine affection of a brother. Many of them were as young as he or younger, but they were now veterans of battle and march. Napoleon's soldiers themselves could not have boasted of more experience than they.

He was coming to the last link in the steel chain, and the colonel of a regiment, an old man, warned him to be careful as he approached the river.

"Southern sharpshooters are among the ravines and thickets," he said. "They fired on our lads about dawn and then escaped easily in the thick cover."

"Thank you, sir," said d.i.c.k, "I'll be on my guard." Yet he did not feel the presence of danger. Youth perhaps becomes more easily hardened in war than middle age, or perhaps it thinks less of consequences. The Union cannon, many of great weight and power, had begun already to fire upon Vicksburg. Huge sh.e.l.ls and shot were rained upon the city. Pemberton had two hundred guns facing the river and the army, but to spare his ammunition they made little reply.

d.i.c.k looked back now and then. He saw flakes of fire on the northern horizon, puffs of smoke and the curving sh.e.l.ls. He felt that Vicksburg was no pleasant place to be in just now, and yet it must be full of civilians, many of them women and children. He was sorry for them. It was d.i.c.k's nature to see both sides of a quarrel. He could never hate the Southerners, because they saw one way and he another.

It was a pa.s.sing emotion. It was too fine a morning for youth to grieve. At the distance the plumes of smoke made by the sh.e.l.ls became decorative rather than deadly. From a crest he saw upon the plateau of Vicksburg and even discerned the dim outline of houses. Looking the other way, he saw the smoke of the iron-clads down the river, and he also caught glimpses of the Mississippi, gold in the morning sun over its vast breadth.

Then he entered the thickets, and, bearing in mind the kindly warning of the old colonel, proceeded slowly and with extreme caution. The Southerners knew every inch of the ground here and he knew none. He came to a ravine and to his dismay found that a considerable stream was flowing through it toward the bayou. It was yellow water, and he thought he might find a tree, fallen across the stream, which would serve him as a foot log, but a hunt of a few minutes disclosed none, and, hesitating no longer, he prepared to wade.

He put his belt with the pistols in it around his neck and stepped in boldly. His feet sank in the mud. The water rose to his knees and then to his waist. It was, in truth, deeper than he had expected-one could never tell about these yellow, opaque streams. He took another step and plunged into a hole up to his shoulders.

Angry that he should be wet through and through, and with such muddy water too, he crossed the stream.

He looked down with dismay at his uniform. The sun would soon dry it, but until he got a chance to clean it, it would remain discolored and yellow, like the jeans clothes which the poorer farmers of the South often wore. And yet the accident that he bemoaned, the bath in water thick with mud, was to prove his salvation.

d.i.c.k shook himself like a big dog, throwing off as much of the water as he could. He had kept his pistols dry and he rebuckled his belt around his waist. Then he returned to his errand. Among the thickets he saw but little. Vicksburg, the Mississippi, and the Union camp disappeared. He beheld only a soft soil, many bushes and scrub forest. After going a little distance he was compelled to stop again and consider. It was curious how one could lose direction in so small a s.p.a.ce.

He paused and listened, intending to regain his course through the sense of hearing. From the north and east came the thunder of the siege guns. It had grown heavier and was continuous now. Once more he was sorry for Vicksburg, because the Union gunners were unsurpa.s.sed and he was sure that bombs and sh.e.l.ls were raining upon the devoted town.

Now he knew that he must go west by south, and he made his way over difficult country, crossing ravines, climbing hills, and picking his path now and then through soft ground, the most exhausting labor of all. The sun poured down upon him and his uniform dried fast. He had just crossed one of the ravines and was climbing into the thicket beyond when a voice asked: "See any of the Yanks in front?"

d.i.c.k's heart stood still, and then all his presence of mind came back. Not in vain had the kindly colonel warned him of the Southern sharpshooters in the bush.

"No," he replied. "They seem to be farther up. One of our fellows told me he saw a whole regiment of them off there to the right."

He plunged deeper into the bush and walked on as if he were among his own comrades. He realized that his faded uniform with its dye of yellow mud had caused him to be mistaken for one of Pemberton's men. His accent, which was Kentuckian and therefore Southern, had helped him also. He pa.s.sed three or four other men, bent over, rifle in hand and watching, and he nodded to them familiarly. In such a crisis he knew that boldness and ease were his best cards, and he said to one of the men, with a laugh: "You'll have to tell us Tennesseeans about all your bayous and creeks. I've just fallen into one that had no right to be there."

"You Tennesseeans need a bath anyhow," replied the man, chuckling.

"We'd never choose a Mississippi stream for it," said d.i.c.k in the same vein, and pa.s.sed on leaving the rifleman in high good humor. How wonderfully these Southerners were like the Northerners! He noticed presently a half-dozen other sharpshooters in the Confederate b.u.t.ternut, prowling among the bushes, and through an opening he saw his own people to the west, but too far away to be reached by anything but artillery. The slow, deep music of the Northern guns came steadily to his ear, but their fire was always turned toward Vicksburg.

d.i.c.k knew that his position was extremely critical. Perhaps it was growing more so all the while, but he was never cooler. A quiet lad, he always rose wonderfully to an emergency. He was quite sure that he was among Mississippi troops, and they could not possibly know all the soldiers from the other states gathered for the defense of Vicksburg. He did not differ from those around him in any respect, except that he did not carry a rifle.

He paused and looked back thoughtfully at the distant Union troops.

"Can you tell me how they're posted?" he said to a tall, thin middle-aged man who had a chew of tobacco in his cheek. "I carry dispatches to General Pemberton, and the more information I can give him the better."