The Sword of Antietam: A Story of the Nation's Crisis Part 36

"Some one shouting for help," replied Colonel Winchester. "One could not neglect him at such a time."

"No, that is so."

"It's the voice of Lieutenant Warner, colonel," whispered the sergeant.

Colonel Winchester nodded. "Say nothing as yet," he whispered.

They walked a dozen steps farther and the colonel, swinging high the lantern, disclosed Warner sitting on the trunk of a tree that had been cut through by cannon b.a.l.l.s. Warner, as well as they could see, was not wounded, but he seemed to be suffering from an overpowering weakness.

The colonel, the sergeant and the boy alike dreaded to see what lay beyond the log, but the two women did not know Warner or that his presence portended anything.

The Vermonter saw them coming, and raised his hand in a proper salute to his superior officer. Then as they came nearer, and he saw the white woman who came with them, he lifted his head, tried to straighten his uniform a little with his left hand, and said as he bowed:

"I think this must be Mrs. Mason, d.i.c.k's mother."

"It is," said Colonel Winchester, and then they waited a moment or two in an awful silence.

"I don't rise because there is something heavy lying in my lap which keeps me from it," said Warner very quietly, but with deep feeling.

"After the Second Mana.s.sas, where I was badly wounded and left on the ground for dead, a boy named d.i.c.k Mason hunted over the field, found me and brought me in. I felt grateful about it and told him that if he happened to get hit in the same way I'd find him and bring him in as he had brought me.

"I didn't think the chance would come so soon. Curious how things happen as you don't think they're going to happen, and don't happen as you think they're going to happen, and here the whole thing comes out in only a few weeks. We were driven back and I missed d.i.c.k as the battle closed. Of course I came to hunt for him, and I found him. Easy, Mrs.

Mason, don't get excited now. Yes, you can have his head in your own lap, but it must be moved gently. That's where he's hurt. Don't tremble, ma'am. He isn't going to die, not by a long shot. The bullet meant to kill him, but finding his head too hard, it turned away, and went out through his hair. He won't have any scar, either, because it's all under the thickest part of his hair.

"Of course his eyes are closed, ma'am. He hasn't come around yet, but he's coming fast. Don't cry on his face, ma'am. Boys never like to have their faces cried on. I'd have brought him in myself, but I found I was too weak to carry him. It's been too short a time since the Second Mana.s.sas for me to have got back all my strength. So I just bound up his head, held it in my lap, and yelled for help. Along came a rebel party, bearing two wounded, and they looked at me. 'You're about pumped out,'

said one of them, 'but we'll take your friend in for you.' 'No, you won't,' I said. 'Why not?' said they. 'Because you're no account Johnnies,' I said, 'while my wounded friend and I are high-toned Yanks.'

'I beg your pardon,' said the Johnny, who was one of the most polite fellows I ever saw, 'I didn't see your uniform clearly by this dim light, but the parties looking for the wounded are mostly going in, and you're likely to be left here with your friend, who needs attention.

Better come along with us and be prisoners and give him a chance to get well.'

"Now, that was white, real white, but I thanked him and said that as soon as General Buell heard that the best two soldiers in his whole army were here resting, he'd come with his finest ambulance for us, driving his horses himself. They said then they didn't suppose they were needed and went on. But do you know, ma'am, every one of those Johnnies, as he pa.s.sed poor old unconscious d.i.c.k with his head in my lap, took off his hat."

"It was a fine thing for them to do," said Colonel Winchester, and then he whispered: "I'm glad you talked that way, Warner. It helps. You see, she's feeling more cheerful already."

"Yes, and you see old d.i.c.k's opening his eyes. Isn't it strange that the first thing he should see when he opens them here on the battlefield should be his mother?"

"A strange and happy circ.u.mstance," said Colonel Winchester.

d.i.c.k opened his eyes.

"Mother!" he exclaimed.

Her arms were already around him.

CHAPTER XIV. SEEKING BRAGG

They took d.i.c.k to the house of his relatives, the Careys, in Danville, and in a few days he learned the sequel of that sudden and terrible storm of death at Perryville. Buell had gathered all his forces in the night, and in the morning had intended to attack again, but the Confederate army was gone, carrying with it vast stores of supplies that it had gathered on the way.

The rains, too, had come. They had begun the morning after the battle, and they poured for days. In the southeast, among the mountains toward which Bragg had turned the head of his army, the roads were quagmires.

Nevertheless he had toiled on and was pa.s.sing through c.u.mberland Gap.

Buell had gone in the other direction toward the southwest, and then came the news that he was relieved of his command, and that Rosecrans would take his place.

d.i.c.k felt the call of the trumpet. He knew that his comrades were now down there in Tennessee with the army under Rosecrans, and he felt that he must join them. His mother begged him to stay. He had done enough for his country. He had fought in great battles, and he had narrowly escaped a mortal wound. He should come home, and stay safely at Pendleton until the war was over.

But d.i.c.k, though grieving with her, felt that he must go. He would stay with the army until the end, and he departed for Lexington, where he took the train for Louisville. Thence he went southward directly by rail to Bowling Green, where the Northern army was encamped, with lines stretching as far south as Nashville, and where he received the heartiest of greetings from his comrades.

"I knew you'd come," said Warner. "Perhaps a man with a mother like yours ought to stay at home, and again he ought to come. So there you are, and here you are!"

d.i.c.k was familiar with the country about Bowling Green. It was a part of the state in which he had relatives, and he had visited it more than once. He also saw the camps left by Buckner's men nearly a year ago, when they were marching southward to be taken by Grant at Donelson.

Since he had come back to this region it seemed to him that they were always fighting their battles over again. Grant and Rosecrans had fought a terrible but victorious battle at Corinth in Mississippi, and now Rosecrans had come north while Grant remained in the further south. He was sorry it was not Grant who commanded on that line. He would have been glad to be under his command again, to feel that strong and sure hand on the reins once more.

d.i.c.k stayed a while in Bowling Green, and he saw all his relatives in the little city. They were mostly on the other side, but they could not resist an ingenuous youth like d.i.c.k, and he pa.s.sed some pleasant hours with them. For his sake they also made Warner and Pennington welcome, but they freely predicted a great disaster for the North. Bragg would come out of East Tennessee with his veterans, and they would give Rosecrans the defeat that he deserved. The boys held good natured arguments with them on this point, but all finally agreed to leave it to the decision of the war itself.

The great dryness had now pa.s.sed so completely that it seemed impossible such a thing ever could have been. The rains had been heavy and almost continuous, and the earth soaked in water. But despite chill winds and chill rains rumors of Southern activity came to them, and in the last month of the year Rosecrans gathered his forces at Nashville in Tennessee.

d.i.c.k and his comrades enjoyed a few bright days here. The city was crowded with an army and those who supply it and live by it, and it was a center of vivid activity. d.i.c.k had letters from his mother and he also heard in a roundabout way that Colonel Kenton had gone through the battle of Perryville uninjured and was now with Bragg at Chattanooga.

But the boys soon heard that despite the winter there was great activity in the Southern camp. Undismayed by their loss of Kentucky, the Southern generals meant to fight Rosecrans in Tennessee. The Confederacy had not been cheered by Lee's withdrawal at Antietam and Bragg's retreat at Perryville, and meant to strike a heavy blow for new prestige. The whole Confederate army, they soon heard, had moved forward to Murfreesborough, where it was waiting, while Forrest and Morgan, the famous cavalry leaders, were off on great raids.

It was this absence of Forrest and Morgan with the best of the cavalry that put it into the mind of Rosecrans to attack at once. The thousands of lads in the army who were celebrating Christmas received that night the news that they were to march in the morning.

"I've fought three great battles this year," said Warner, "and I don't think they ought to ask any more of me."

"Be comforted," said d.i.c.k. "We start to-morrow, the 26th, which leaves five days of the year, and I don't think we can arrange a battle in that time. You'll not have to whip Bragg before the New Year, George."

"Well, I'm glad of it. You can have too many battles in one year. I didn't get rest enough after my wound at the Second Mana.s.sas before I had to go in and save our army at Antietam, and then it was but a little time before we fought at Perryville. That wasn't as big a battle as some of the others, but d.i.c.k, for those mad three hours it seemed that all the demons of death were turned loose."

"It certainly looked like it, George, you stiff old Vermonter, and I don't forget that you came to save me."

"Shut up about that, or I'll hit you over the head with the b.u.t.t of my pistol. I merely paid back, though I only paid about half of what I was owing to you. The chance luckily came sooner than I had hoped. But, d.i.c.k, what a morning to follow Christmas."

A chilly rain was pouring down. A cold fog was rising from the c.u.mberland, wrapping the town in mists. It was certainly a dreary time in which to march to battle, and the young soldiers rising in the gloom of the dawn and starting amid such weather were depressed.

"Pennington," said Warner, "will you help me in a request to our Kentucky friend to join us in three cheers for the Sunny South, the edge of which he has the good fortune to inhabit? I haven't seen the real sun for about a month, and I suppose that's why they call it sunny, and I'm informed that this big river, the c.u.mberland, often freezes over, which I suppose is the reason why they call it Southern. I hear, too, that people often freeze to death in North Georgia, which is further south than this. After this bit of business is over I'm going to forbid winter campaigns in the south."

"It does get mighty cold," said d.i.c.k. "You see we're not really a southern people. We just lie south of the northern states and in Kentucky, at least, we have a lot of cold weather. Why, I've seen it twenty-three degrees below zero in the southern part of the state, and it certainly can get cold in Tennessee, too."

"I believe I'd rather have it than this awful rain," said Pennington. "I don't seem to get used to these cold soakings."

"Good-bye, Nashville," said d.i.c.k, turning about. "I don't know when we will have to come back, and if we do I don't know what will have happened before then. Good-bye, Nashville. I regret your roofs and your solid walls, and your dry tents and floors."

"But we're going forth to fight. Don't forget that, d.i.c.k. Remember how in Virginia we pined for battle, and the use of our superior numbers.

Anyhow Rosecrans is going out to look for the enemy, but all the same, and between you and me, d.i.c.k, I wish it was Grant who was leading us. I saw a copy of the New York Times a while back, and some lines in it are haunting me. Here they are:

"Back from the trebly crimsoned field Terrible woods are thunder-tost: Full of the wrath that will not yield, Full of revenge for battles lost: Hark to their echo as it crost The capital making faces wan: End this murderous holocaust; Abraham Lincoln give us a man."

"Sounds good," said d.i.c.k, "and, George, you and Frank and I know that what we want is a man. We've lost big battles, because we didn't have a big man, who could see at once and think like lightning, to lead us. But we'll get him sooner or later! We'll get him. Did any other troops ever bear up like ours under defeats and drawn battles? Listen to 'em now!"