The Guns of Shiloh: A Story of the Great Western Campaign by Joseph A. Altsheler (portable ebook reader txt) 📗

defense, firing, drawing back, reloading and firing again. In front, the woods swarmed with the Southern troops who drove incessantly upon them.

Dick snatched up a rifle—plenty were lying upon the ground, where the owners had fallen with them—and fired into the attacking ranks. Then he reloaded swiftly, and pressed on toward the Union center.

“What troops are these?” he asked of an officer who was knotting a handkerchief about a bleeding wrist.

“From Illinois. Who are you?”

“I'm Lieutenant Richard Mason of Colonel Arthur Winchester's Kentucky regiment. I was taken prisoner by the enemy last night, but I escaped this morning. Do you know where my regiment is?”

“Keep straight on, and you'll strike it or what's left of it, if anything at all is left. It's a black day.”

Dick scarcely caught his last words, as he dashed on through bullets, shell and solid shot over slain men and horses, over dismantled guns and gun carriages, and into the very heart of the flame and smoke. The thunder of the battle was at its height now, because he was in the center of it. The roar of the great guns was continuous, but the unbroken crash of rifles by the scores of thousands was fiercer and more deadly.

The officer had pointed toward the Kentucky regiment with his sword, and following the line Dick ran directly into it. The very first face he saw was that of Colonel Winchester.

“Dick, my lad,” shouted the Colonel, “where have you come from?”

“From the Southern army. I was taken prisoner last night almost within sight of our own, but when they charged this morning they forgot me and here I am.”

Colonel Winchester suddenly seized him by the shoulders and pushed him down. The regiment was behind a small ridge which afforded some protection, and all were lying down except the senior officers.

“Welcome, Dick, to our hot little camp! The chances are about a hundred per cent out of a hundred per cent that this is the hottest place on the earth today!”

The long, thin figure of Warner lay pressed against the ground. A handkerchief, stained red, was bound about his head and his face was pale, but indomitable courage gleamed from his eyes. Just beyond him was Pennington, unhurt.

“Thank God you haven't fallen, and that I've found you!” exclaimed Dick.

“I don't know whether you're so lucky after all,” said Warner. “The Johnnies have been mowing us down. They dropped on us so suddenly this morning that they must have been sleeping in the same bed with us last night, and we didn't know it. I hear that we're routed nearly everywhere except here and where Sherman stands. Look out! Here they come again!”

They saw tanned faces and fierce eyes through the smoke, and the bullets swept down on them in showers. Lucky for them that the little ridge was there, and that they had made up their minds to stand to the last. They replied with their own deadly fire, yet many fell, despite the shelter, and to both left and right the battle swelled afresh. Dick felt again that rain of bark and twigs and leaves. Sometimes a tree, cut through at its base by cannon balls, fell with a crash. Along the whole curving line the Southern generals ever urged forward their valiant troops.

Now the courage and skill of Sherman shone supreme. Dick saw him often striding up and down the lines, ordering and begging his men to stand fast, although they were looking almost into the eyes of their enemies.

The conflict became hand to hand, and assailant and assailed reeled to and fro. But Sherman would not give up. The fiercest attacks broke in vain on his iron front. McClernand, with whom he had quarreled the day before as to who should command the army while Grant was away, came up with reinforcements, and seeing what the fearless and resolute general had done, yielded him the place.

The last of the charges broke for the time upon Sherman, and his exhausted regiment uttered a shout of triumph, but on both sides of him the Southern troops drove their enemy back and yet further back. Breckinridge, along Lick Creek, was pushing everything before him. The bishop-general was doing well. Many of the Northern troops had not yet recovered from their surprise. A general and three whole regiments, struck on every side, were captured.

It seemed that nothing could deprive the Southern army of victory, absolute and complete. General Johnston had marshalled his troops with superb skill, and intending to reap the full advantage of the surprise, he continually pushed them forward upon the shattered Northern lines. He led in person and on horseback the attack upon the Federal center. Around and behind him rode his staff, and the wild rebel yell swept again through the forest, when the soldiers saw the stern and lofty features of the chief whom they trusted, leading them on.

But fate in the very moment of triumph that seemed overwhelming and sure was preparing a terrible blow for the South. A bullet struck Johnston in the ankle. His boot filled with blood, and the wound continued to bleed fast. But, despite the urging of his surgeon, who rode with him, he refused to dismount and have the wound bound up. How could he dismount at such a time, when the battle was at its height, and the Union army was being driven into the creeks and swamps! He was wounded again by a piece of shell, and he sank dying from his horse. His officers crowded around him, seeking to hide their irreparable loss from the soldiers, the most costly death, with the exception of Stonewall Jackson's, sustained by the Confederacy in the whole war.

But the troops, borne on by the impetus that success and the spirit of Johnston had given them, drove harder than ever against the Northern line. They crashed through it in many places, seizing prisoners and cannon. Almost the whole Northern camp was now in their possession, and many of the Southern lads, hungry from scanty rations, stopped to seize the plenty that they found there, but enough persisted to give the Northern army no rest, and press it back nearer and nearer to the marshes.

The combat redoubled around Sherman. Johnston was gone, but his generals still shared his resolution. They turned an immense fire upon the point where stood Sherman and McClernand, now united by imminent peril. Their ranks were searched by shot and shell, and the bullets whizzed among them like a continuous swarm of hornets.

Dick was still unwounded, but so much smoke and vapor had drifted about his face that he was compelled at times to rub his eyes that he might see. He felt a certain dizziness, too, and he did not know whether the incessant roaring in his ears came wholly from the cannon and rifle fire or partly from the pounding of his blood.

“I feel that we are shaking,” he shouted in the ears of Warner, who lay next to him. “I'm afraid we're going to give ground.”

“I feel it, too,” Warner shouted back. “We've been here for hours, but we're shot to pieces. Half of our men must be killed or wounded, but how old Sherman fights!”

The Southern leaders brought up fresh troops and hurled them upon Sherman.