The Guns of Bull Run: A Story of the Civil War's Eve by Joseph A. Altsheler (ebook reader for pc txt) 📗

"I feel that dust and burned gunpowder are thick all over me."

He stood up, his face now clean, and began to arrange his uniform. Then he carefully dusted his coat and trousers.

"Hope you are all ready for another battle, Arthur," said Tom.

"Not yet," replied St. Clair laughing. "That will do me for quite a while."

St. Clair had his wish. The enemy seemed to have enough for the time. The hot, breathless day passed without any further advance. Now and then they heard the Northern bugles, and the scouts reported that the foe was still gathering heavily not far away, but the Invincibles, from their camp, saw nothing.

"I suppose the colonel was right," said Happy Tom, "and this must have been a sort of prologue. But if the prologue was so hot what's the play going to be?"

"Something hotter," said Harry.

"A vague but true answer," said Langdon.

Yet the delay was long. They lay all that day and all that night along the banks of Bull Run, and a hundred conflicting reports ran up and down their ranks. The Northern army would retreat, it would attack within a few hours; the Southern army would retreat, it would hold its present position; both sides would receive reinforcements, neither would receive any fresh troops. Every statement was immediately denied.

"I refuse to believe anything until it happens," said Harry, when night came. "I'm getting hardened to this sort of thing, and as soon as my time off duty comes I'm going to sleep."

Sleep he did in the shot-torn woods, and it was the heavy sleep of exhaustion. Nerves did not trouble him, as he slept without dreams and rose to another windless, burning day. The hours dragged on again, but in the night there was a tremendous shouting. Johnston, with eight thousand men, had slipped away from Patterson in the mountains, and the infantry had come by train directly to the plateau of Manassas, where they were now leaving the cars and taking their place in the line of battle. The artillery and cavalry were coming on behind over the dirt road. The Southern generals were already showing the energy and decision for which they were so remarkable in the first years of the war. Johnston was the senior, but since Beauregard had made the battlefield, he left him in command.

The Invincibles were moved off to the left along Bull Run, and were posted in front of a stone bridge, where other troops gathered, until twelve or thirteen thousand men were there. But Harry and his comrades were nearest to the bridge, and it seemed to him that the situation was almost exactly as it had been three nights before. Again they faced Bull Run and again they expected an attack in the morning. There was no change save the difference between a ford and a bridge. But the Invincibles, hardened by the three days of skirmishing and waiting, took things more easily now.

They lay in the woods near the steep banks, and the batteries commanded the entrance to the bridge. The night was once more hot and windless and they were so quiet that they could hear the murmur of the waters. Far across Bull Run they saw dim lights moving, and they knew that they were those of the Northern army.

"I think things have changed a lot in the last three days," said Harry. "Then the Yankees didn't know much about us. They charged almost blindfolded into our ambush. Now we don't know much about them. We don't know by any means where the attack is coming. It is they who are keeping us guessing."

"But there are only two fords and two bridges across Bull Run," said Langdon, "and they have got to choose one out of the lot."

"Which means that we've got to accumulate our forces at some one of four places, one guess out of four."

Harry did not speak at all in a tone of discouragement, but his intelligent mind saw that the Northern leaders had profited by their mistakes and that the Southern general did not really know where the great impact would come. The Northern scouts and skirmishers swarmed on the other side of Bull Run, and even in the darkness this cloud of wasps was so dense that Beauregard's own scouts could not get beyond them and tell what the greater mass behind was doing. Harry was summoned at midnight by Colonel Talbot. Behind a clump of trees some distance back of the bridge, Beauregard, Johnston, Evans, who was in direct command at the ford, Early, and several other important officers were in anxious consultation. Colonel Talbot told Harry that he would be wanted presently as a messenger, and he stood on one side while the others talked. It was then that he first heard Jubal Early swear with a richness, a spontaneity and an unction that raised it almost to the dignity of a rite.

Harry gathered that they could not agree as to the point at which the Northern attack would be delivered, but the balance of opinion inclined to the bridge, before which the command of Evans was encamped. Hence he was sent farther down the stream, with a message for a North Carolina regiment to move up and join Evans.

The regiment lay about a mile away, but Harry walked almost the whole distance among sleeping men. They lay on the grass by thousands, and exhausted by the movement and marching of recent days they slept heavily. In the moonlight they looked as if they were dead. It was so quiet now that some night birds in the trees uttered strange moaning cries. But far across Bull Run lights still moved and Harry had no doubt that the great battle, delayed so long, was really coming in the morning.

The North Carolina regiment rose sleepily and marched with him to the bridge, where it was incorporated into the force of Evans. Beauregard, Johnston and Early had gone to other points, and Harry knew that they were still anxious and of divided opinions. Colonel Talbot and Lieutenant-Colonel St. Hilaire, to whom he had to report, and who moved their own regiment down near Evans, did not conceal the fact from him.

"Harry," said the colonel, "we're all sure that we'll have to fight on the morrow, and it looks as if the battle would come in the greatest weight here at the bridge, but the Invincibles must be prepared for anything. You lads are fit and trim, and I hope that all of you will do your duty tomorrow. Remember that we have brave foes before us, and I know most of their officers. All who are of our age have been the comrades of Lieutenant-Colonel St. Hilaire and myself."

"It is true, and it is a melancholy phase of this war," said Hector St. Hilaire.

They walked away together and Harry rejoined those of his own age near the banks of Bull Run. But Langdon and St. Clair were sound asleep on their blankets, and so were all the rest of the Invincibles, save those who had been posted as sentinels. But Harry did not sleep that night. It was past midnight now, but he was never more awake in his life, and he felt that he must watch until day.

He had no duties to do, and he sat down with his back to a tree and waited. Far in his front, three or four miles, perhaps, he thought he saw lights signaling to each other, but he had no idea what they meant, and he watched them merely with an idle curiosity. Once he thought he heard the distant call of a trumpet, but he was not sure. Woods and fields were flooded with the brightness of moon and stars, but if anything was passing on the other side of Bull Run, it was too well hidden for him to see it. His senses were soothed and he sank into a state of peace and rest. In reality it was a physical relaxation coming after so much tension and activity, and the bodily ease became mental also.

Resting thus, motionless against the trunk of the tree, time passed easily for him. The warm air of the night blew now and then against his face and only soothed him to deeper rest. The last light far across Bull Run went out and the darker hours came. Nothing stirred now in the woods until the hot dawn came again, and the brazen sun leaped up in the sky.

CHAPTER XVI BULL RUN

Harry rose to his feet and shook St. Clair and Langdon.

"Up, boys!" he said. "The enemy will soon be here. I can see their bayonets glittering on the hills."

The Invincibles sprang to their feet almost as one man, and soon all the troops of Evans were up and humming like bees. Food and coffee were served to them hastily, but, before the last cup was thrown down, a heavy crash came from one of the hills beyond Bull Run, and a shell, screaming over their heads, burst beyond them. It was quickly followed by another, and then the round shot and shells came in dozens from batteries which had been posted well in the night.

The Southern batteries replied with all their might and the riflemen supported them, sending the bullets in sheets across Bull Run. The battle flamed in fifteen minutes into extraordinary violence. Harry had never before heard such a continuous and terrific thunder. It seemed that the drums of his ears would be smashed in, but over his head he heard the continuous hissing and whirring of steel and lead. The Northern riflemen were at work, too, and it was fortunate for the Invincibles that they were able to lie down, as they poured their fire into the bushes and woods on the opposite bank.

The volume of smoke was so great that they could no longer see the position of the enemy, but Harry believed that so much metal must do great damage. Although he was a lieutenant he had snatched up a rifle dropped by some fallen soldier, and he loaded and fired it so often that the barrel grew hot to his hand. Lying so near the river, most of the hostile fire went over the heads of the Invincibles, but now and then a shell or a cluster of bullets struck among them, and Harry heard groans. But he quickly forgot these sounds as he watched the clouds of smoke and the blaze of fire on the other side of Bull Run.

"They are not trying to force the passage of the bridge! Everything is for the best!" shouted Langdon.

"No, they dare not," shouted St. Clair in reply. "No column could live on that bridge in face of our fire."

It seemed strange to Harry that the Northern troops made no attempt to cross. Why did all this tremendous fire go on so long, and yet not a foe set foot upon the bridge? It seemed to him that it had endured for hours. The sun was rising higher and higher and the day was growing hotter and hotter. It lay with the North to make the first movement to cross Bull Run, and yet no attempt was made.

Colonel Talbot came repeatedly along the line of the Invincibles, and Harry saw that he was growing uneasy. Such a great volume of fire, without any effort to take advantage of it, made the veteran suspicious. He knew that those old comrades of his on the other side of Bull Run would not waste their metal in a mere cannonade and long range rifle fire. There must be something behind it. Presently, with the consent of the commander, he drew the Invincibles back from the river, where they were permitted to cease firing, and to rest for a while on their arms.

But as they drew long breaths and tried to clear the smoke from their throats, a rumor ran down the lines. The attack at the bridge was but a feint. Only a minor portion of the hostile army was there. The greater mass had gone on and had already crossed the river in face of the weak left flank of the Southern army. Beauregard had been outwitted. The Yankees were now in great force on his own side of Bull Run, and it would be a pitched battle, face to face.

The whole line of the Invincibles quivered with excitement, and then Harry saw that