The Rock of Chickamauga by Joseph A. Altsheler (best love novels of all time txt) 📖
- Author: Joseph A. Altsheler
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Dick saw Grant walking over the field and he wondered what his feelings
were. Although its full result was beyond him he knew, nevertheless,
that Champion Hill was a great victory. At one stroke of his sword Grant
had cut apart the circle of his foes.
Dick came back from the pursuit with Colonel Winchester. He had lost
sight of Warner and Pennington in the turmoil, but he believed that they
would reappear unhurt. They had passed through so many battles now that
it did not occur to him that any of the three would be killed. They
might be wounded, of course, as they had been already, but fate would
play them no such scurvy trick as to slay them.
"What will be the next step, Colonel?" asked Dick, as they stood
together upon the victorious hill.
"Depends upon what Johnston and Pemberton do. Pemberton, I'm sure, will
retreat to Vicksburg, but Johnston, if he can prevent it, won't let his
army be shut up there. Still, they may not be able to communicate, and
if they should Pemberton may disobey the far abler Johnston and stay in
Vicksburg anyhow. At any rate, I think we're sure to march at once on
Vicksburg."
A figure approaching in the dusk greeted Dick with a shout of delight.
Another just behind repeated the shout with equal fervor. Warner and
Pennington had come, unharmed as he had expected, and they were exultant
over the victory.
"Come over here," said Warner to Dick. "Sergeant Whitley has cooked a
glorious supper and we're waiting for you."
Dick joined them eagerly, and the sergeant received them with his
benevolent smile. They were commissioned officers, and he gave them all
the respect due to rank, but in his mind they were only his boys, whom
he must watch and protect.
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. Dick 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 glasses.
The effects of the victory deep in the South were growing hourly in
Dick'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 sturdy, 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.
Dick had glasses 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 Dick.
"Yes, Dick," 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, Dick. 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, Dick, and we're already in touch with our fleet there.
The boats do more than fight for us. They're unloading supplies in vast
quantities 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.
Dick 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 Dick 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 Dick, 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, Dick. 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, Dick, but the general means to attack at once. We
may carry it by storm."
Dick 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 Dick. 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 shell," he said, "and I've got to wait
until nature comes along and fills up the shell 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, Dick, 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--God 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."
Dick 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 Dick 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, Dick, 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
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