The Star of Gettysburg Part 14

Men who were present have told vivid stories of that scene at the Phillips House. Hooker, his face covered with dust and sweat, galloping up, leaping from his horse, and rushing to Burnside; the commander-in-chief striding up and down, looking toward Marye's Hill, enveloped in smoke, and repeating to himself, as if he were scarcely conscious of what he was saying: "That height must be taken! That height must be taken! We must take it!"

He turned to Hooker with the same words, "That height must be taken to-day," repeating it over and over again, changing the words perhaps, but not the sense. The gallant but unfortunate man had not wanted to be commander-in-chief, foreseeing his own inadequacy, and now in his agony at seeing so many of his men fall in vain he was scarcely responsible.

Hooker, his heart full of despair, but resolved to obey, galloped back and prepared for the last desperate charge up Marye's Hill. The advancing mists in the east were showing that the short winter day would soon draw to a close. He planted his batteries and opened a heavy fire, intending to batter down the stone wall. But the wall, supported by an earthwork, did not give, and Longstreet's riflemen lay behind it waiting.

At a signal the Union cannon ceased firing and the bugles blew the charge. The Union brigades swarmed forward and then rushed up the slopes. The volume of fire poured upon them was unequalled until Pickett led the matchless charge at Gettysburg. Pickett himself was here among the defenders, having just been sent to help the men on Marye's Hill.

Up went the men through the winter twilight, lighted now by the blaze of so many cannon and rifles pouring down upon them a storm of lead and steel, through which no human beings could pa.s.s. They came near to the stone wall, but as their lines were now melting away like snow before the sun, they were compelled to yield and retreat again down the slopes, which were strewed already with the bodies of so many of those who had gone up in the other attacks.

Every charge had broken in vain on the fronts of Jackson and Longstreet, and the Union losses were appalling. Harry knew that the battle was won and that it had been won more easily than any of the other great battles that he had seen. He wondered what Jackson would do. Would he follow up the grand division of Franklin that he had defeated and which still lay in front of them?

But he ceased to ask the question, because when the last charge, shattered to pieces, rolled back down Marye's Hill, the magnificent Northern artillery seemed to Harry to go mad. The thirty guns of the heaviest weight that had been left on Stafford Heights, and which had ceased firing only when the Northern men charged, now reopened in a perfect excess of fury. Harry believed that they must be throwing tons of metal every minute.

Nor was Franklin slack. Hovering with his great division in the plain below and knowing that he was beaten, he nevertheless turned one hundred and sixteen cannon that he carried with him upon Jackson's front and swept all the woods and ridges everywhere. The Union army was beaten because it had undertaken the impossible, but despite its immense losses it was still superior in numbers to Lee's force, and above all it had that matchless artillery which in defeat could protect the Union army, and which in victory helped it to win.

Now all these mighty cannon were turned loose in one huge effort. Along the vast battle front and from both sides of the river they roared and crashed defiance. And the Army of the Potomac, which had wasted so much valor, crept back under the shelter of that thundering line of fire. It had much to regret, but nothing of which to be ashamed. Sent against positions impregnable when held by such men as Lee, Jackson and Longstreet, it had never ceased to attack so long as the faintest chance remained. Its commander had been unequal to the task, but the long roll of generals under him had shown unsurpa.s.sed courage and daring.

Harry thought once that General Jackson was going to attack in turn, but after a long look at the roaring plain he shrugged his shoulders and gave no orders. The beaten Army of the Potomac preserved its order, it had lost no guns, the brigadiers and the major-generals were full of courage, and it was too formidable to be attacked. Three hundred cannon of the first cla.s.s on either side of the river were roaring and crashing, and the moment the Southern troops emerged for the charge all would be sure to pour upon them a fire that no troops could withstand.

General Lee presently appeared riding along the line. The cheers which always rose where he came rolled far, and he was compelled to lift his hat more than once. He conferred with Jackson, and the two, going toward the left, met Longstreet, with whom they also talked. Then they separated and Jackson returned to his own position. Harry, who had followed his general at the proper distance, never heard what they said, but he believed that they had discussed the possibility of a night attack and then had decided in the negative.

When Jackson returned to his own force the twilight was thickening into night, and as darkness sank down over the field the appalling fire of the Union artillery ceased. Thirteen thousand dead or wounded Union soldiers had fallen, and the Southern loss was much less than half.

All of Harry's comrades and friends had escaped this battle uninjured, yet many of them believed that another battle would be fought on the morrow. Harry, however, was not one of these. He remembered some words that had been spoken by Jackson in his presence:

"We can defeat the enemy here at Fredericksburg, but we cannot destroy him, because he will escape over his bridges, while we are unable to follow."

Nevertheless the young men and boys were exultant. They did not look so far ahead as Jackson, and they had never before won so great a victory with so little loss. Harry, sent on a message beyond Deep Run, found the Invincibles cooking their suppers on a spot that they had held throughout the day. They had several cheerful fires burning and they saluted Harry gladly.

"A great victory, Harry," said Happy Tom.

"Yes, a great victory," interrupted Colonel Leonidas Talbot; "but, my friends, what else could you have expected? They walked straight into our trap. But I have learned this day to have a deep respect for the valor of the Yankees. The way they charged up Marye's Hill in the face of certain death was worthy of the finest troops that South Carolina herself ever produced."

"That is saying a great deal, Leonidas," said Lieutenant-Colonel Hector St. Hilaire, "but it is true."

Harry talked a little with the two colonels, and also with Langdon and St. Clair. Then he returned to his own headquarters. Both armies, making ready for battle to-morrow, if it should come, slept on their arms, while the dead and the wounded yet lay thick in the forest and on the slopes and plain.

But Harry was not among those who slept, at least not until after midnight. He and Dalton sat at the door of Jackson's tent, awaiting possible orders. Jackson knew that Burnside, with a hundred thousand men yet in line and no artillery lost, was planning another attack on the morrow, despite his frightful losses of the day.

The news of it had been sent to him by Lee, and Lee in turn had learned it from a captured orderly bearing Burnside's dispatches. But neither Harry nor Dalton knew anything of Burnside's plans. They were merely waiting for any errand upon which Jackson should choose to send them. Several other staff officers were present, and as Jackson wrote his orders, he gave them in turn to be taken to those for whom they were intended.

Harry, after three such trips of his own, sat down again near the door of the tent and watched his great leader. Jackson sat at a little table, on a cane-bottomed chair, and he wrote by the light of a single candle. His clothing was all awry and he had tossed away the gold-braided cap. His face was worn and drawn, but his eyes showed no signs of weariness. The body might have been weak, but the spirit of Jackson was never stronger.

Harry knew that Jackson after victory wasted no time exulting, but was always preparing for the next battle. The soldiers, both in his own division and elsewhere, were awakened by turns, and willing thousands strengthened the Southern position. More and deeper trenches were constructed. New abatis were built and the stone wall was strengthened yet further. Formidable as the Southern line had been to-day, Burnside would find it more so on the morrow.

After midnight, Jackson, still in his gorgeous uniform and with boots and spurs on, too, lay down on his bed and slept about three hours. Then he aroused himself, lighted his candle and wrote an hour longer. Then he went to the bedside of the dying Gregg and sat a while with him, the staff remaining at a respectful distance.

When they rode back-they were mounted again-they pa.s.sed along the battle front, and the sadness which was so apparent on Jackson's face affected them. It was far toward morning now and the enemy was lighting his fires on the plain below. The dead lay where they had fallen, and no help had yet been given to those wounded too seriously to move. It had been a tremendous holocaust, and with no result. Harry knew now that the North would never cease to fight disunion. The South could win separation only at the price of practical annihilation for both.

The night was very raw and chill, and not less so now that morning was approaching. The mists and fogs, which as usual rose from the Rappahannock, made Harry shiver at their touch. In the hollows of the ridges, which the wintry sun seldom reached, great ma.s.ses of ice were packed, and the plain below, cut up the day before by wheels and hoofs and footsteps, was now like a frozen field of ploughed land.

The staff heard enough through the fogs and mists to know that the Army of the Potomac was awake and stirring. The Southern army also arose, lighted its fires, cooked and ate its food and waited for the enemy. Before it was yet light Harry, on a message to Stuart, rode to the top of Prospect Hill with him, and, as they sat there on their horses, the sun cleared away the fog and mist, and they saw the Army of the Potomac drawn up in line of battle, defiant and challenging, ready to attack or to be attacked.

Harry felt a thrill of admiration that he did not wish to check. After all, the Yankees were their own people, bone of their bone, and their courage must be admired. The Army of the Potomac, too, was learning to fight without able chiefs. The young colonels and majors and captains could lead them, and there they were, after their most terrible defeat, grim and ready.

"The lion's wounded, but he isn't dead, by any means," said Harry to Stuart.

"Not by a great deal," said Stuart.

There was much hot firing by skirmishers that day and artillery duels at long range, but the Northern army, which had fortified on the plain, would not come out of its intrenchments, and the Southern soldiers also stuck to theirs. Burnside, who had crossed the river to join his men, had been persuaded at last that a second attack was bound to end like the first.

The next day Burnside sent in a flag of truce, and they buried the dead. The following night Harry, wrapped to the eyes in his great cloak, stood upon Prospect Hill and watched one of the fiercest storms that he had ever seen rage up and down the valley of the Rappahannock. Many of the Southern pickets were driven to shelter. While the whole Southern army sought protection from the deluge, the Army of the Potomac, still a hundred thousand strong, and carrying all its guns, marched in perfect order over the six bridges it had built, breaking the bridges down behind it, and camping in safety on the other side. The river was rising fast under the tremendous rain, and the Southern army could find no fords, even though it marched far up the stream.

Fredericksburg was won, but the two armies, resolute and defiant, gathered themselves anew for other battles as great or greater.

CHAPTER VI

A CHRISTMAS DINNER

After the great battle at Fredericksburg both armies seemed to suffer somewhat from reaction. Besides, the winter deepened. There was more snow, more icy rain, and more hovering of the temperature near the zero mark. The vast sea of mud increased, and the swollen Rappahannock, deep at any time, flowed between the two armies. Pickets often faced one another across the stream, sometimes firing, but oftener exchanging the news, when the river was not too wide for the shouted voice to reach.

Harry, despite his belief that the North would hold out, heard now that the hostile section had sunk into deep depression. The troops had not been paid for six months. Desertion into the interior went on on a great scale. One commander-in-chief after another had failed. After Antietam it had seemed that success could be won, but the South had come back stronger than ever and had won Fredericksburg, inflicting appalling loss upon the North. Yet he heard that Lincoln never flinched. The tall, gaunt, ugly man, telling his homely jokes, had more courage than anybody who had yet led the Union cause.

Harry often went down to Fredericksburg, where some houses still stood among the icy ruins. A few families had returned, but as the town was still practically under the guns of the Northern army, it was left chiefly to the troops.

The Invincibles were stationed here, and Harry and Dalton got leave to spend Christmas day with its officers. Nothing could bring more fully home to him the appalling waste and ruin of war than the sight of Fredericksburg. Mud, ice and snow were deeper than ever in the streets. Many of the houses had been demolished by cannon b.a.l.l.s and fire, and only fragments of them lay about the ground. Others had been wrecked but partially, with holes in the roofs and the windows shot out. The white pillars in front of colonnaded mansions had been shattered and the fallen columns lay in the icy slough. Long icicles hung from the burned portions of upper floors that still stood.

Used to war's ruin as he had become, Harry's eyes filled with tears at the sight. It seemed a city dead, but not yet buried. But on Christmas day his friends and he resolutely dismissed gloom, and, first making a brave pretence, finally succeeded in having real cheerfulness in a fine old brick house which had been pretty well shot up, but which had some sound rooms remaining. Its owner had sent word that, while he could not yet come back to it with his family, he would be glad if the Southern army would make use of it in his absence.

It was in this house that the little colony of friends gathered, everyone bringing to the dinner what he could. Colonel Leonidas Talbot and Lieutenant-Colonel Hector St. Hilaire occupied the great sitting room on the ground floor, and here the dinner would be spread, as a part of the dining-room had been shot away and was still wet from snow and rain.

But the sitting room gladdened the eye. A heavy imported carpet covered the central portion of the polished oaken floor. Old family portraits lined its walls and those of the parlor adjoining it. Curtains hung at the windows. They were more or less discolored by smoke and other agencies, but they were curtains. All about the chamber were signs of wealth and cultivation, and a great fire of wood was burning in a huge chimney under a beautifully carved oaken mantelpiece.

The room seemed to remain almost as it had been left by the owner, save that two one-hundred-pound cannon b.a.l.l.s, fired by the Union guns into Fredericksburg, were lying by either side of the door.

"Tickets, sir," said Langdon, as Harry appeared at the door.

Harry drew from under his cloak two boxes of sardines which he had taken from a deserted sutler's wagon on the field of Fredericksburg. He handed them to Langdon, who said:

"Pa.s.s in, most welcome guest."

Harry was the first arrival, but Dalton was next.

"Tickets double price to all Virginia Presbyterians," said Langdon.