The Rock of Chickamauga by Joseph A. Altsheler (best love novels of all time txt) 📖
- Author: Joseph A. Altsheler
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stood beside the Rock of Chickamauga, refusing to yield any further to
the terrible pressure.
The line of Thomas' army was now almost a semicircle. Polk was leading
violent attacks upon his left and center. Longstreet, used to victory,
was upon his right and behind him, and the veterans from the Army of
Northern Virginia had never fought better.
Dick saw the enemy all around him, and he began to lose hope. How could
they stand against such numbers? And if they tried to retreat there was
Longstreet to cut off the way. He bumped against Sergeant Whitley in the
smoke and gasped out:
"We're done for, Sergeant! We're done for!"
"No, we're not!" shouted the sergeant, firing into the advancing mass.
"We'll beat 'em back. They can't run over us!"
The sergeant, usually so cool, was a little mad. He was wounded in the
head, and the blood had run down over his face, dyeing it scarlet. His
brain was hot as with fire, and he hurled epithets at the enemy. His
life on the plains came back to him, and, for the time, he was like a
hurt Sioux chief who defies his foes. He called them names. He dared
them to come on. He mocked them. He told them how they had attacked
in vain all day long. He counted the number of their repulses and then
exaggerated them. He reminded them it was yet a long time until dark,
and asked them why they hesitated, why they did not come forward and
meet the death that was ready for them.
Dick gazed at him in astonishment. He heard many of his words through
the roar of the guns, and he saw his ensanguined face, through which
his eyes burned like two red-hot coals. Was this the quiet and kindly
Sergeant Whitley whom he had known so long? No, it was a raging tiger.
Still waters run deep, and, enveloped, at last, with the fury of battle
the sergeant welcomed wounds, death or anything else it might bring.
He shouted and fired his rifle again. Then he fell like a log. Dick
rushed to him at once, but he saw that he had only fainted from loss of
blood. He bound up the sergeant's head as best he could, and, easing him
against a bank, returned to the battle front.
A shout suddenly arose. Officers had seen through their glasses a column
of dust rising far behind them. It was so vast that it could only be
made by a great body of marching troops. But who were the men that were
making it? In all the frightful din and excitement of the battle the
question ran through the army of Thomas. If fresh enemies were coming
upon their rear they were lost! If friends there was yet hope!
But they could not watch the tower of dust long. The enemy in front gave
them no chance. Polk was still beating upon them, and Longstreet,
having seized a ridge, was pouring an increased fire from his advanced
position.
"If that cloud of dust encloses gray uniforms we're lost!" shouted
Warner in Dick's ear.
"But it mustn't enclose 'em," Dick shouted back. "Fate wouldn't play us
such an awful trick! We can't lose, after having done and suffered so
much!"
Fate would not say which. They could not send men to see, but as they
fought they watched the cloud coming nearer and nearer, and Dick,
whose lips had been moving for some time, realized suddenly that he was
praying. "O God, save us! save us!" he was saying over and over. "Send
the help to us who need it so sorely. Make us strong, O God, to meet our
enemies!"
He and all his comrades wore masks of dust and burned gunpowder, often
stained with scarlet. Their clothing was torn by bullets and reddened
by dripping wounds. When they shouted to one another their voices came
strained and husky from painful throats. Half the time they were blinded
by the smoke and blaze of the firing. The crash did not seem so loud to
them now, because they were partly deafened for the time by a cannonade
of such violence and length.
Dick looked back once more at the great cloud of dust which was now much
nearer, but there was nothing yet to indicate what it bore within, the
bayonets of the North or those of the South. His anxiety became almost
intolerable.
Thomas himself stood at that moment entirely alone in a clump of trees
on the elevation called Horseshoe Ridge, watching the battle, seeing the
enemy in overpowering numbers on both his flanks and even in his
rear. Apparently everything was lost. Taciturn, he never described his
feelings then, but in his soul he must have admired the magnificent
courage with which his troops stood around him, and repelled the
desperate assaults of a foe resolved to win. Although his face
grew grimmer and his teeth set hard, he, too, must have watched the
approaching cloud of dust with the most terrible anxiety. If it bore
enemies in its bosom, then in very truth everything would be lost.
Down a road some miles from the battlefield a force of eight thousand
men had been left as a reserve for one of the armies. They had long
heard the terrific cannonade which was sending shattering echoes through
the mountains, and both their chief and his second in command were eager
to rush to the titanic combat. They could not obtain orders from their
commander, but, at last, they marched swiftly to the field, all the
eight thousand on fire with zeal to do their part.
It was the eight thousand who were making the great cloud of dust,
and, as they came nearer and nearer, the suspense of Thomas' shattered
brigades grew more terrible. Dick, reckless of shell and bullets, tried
to pierce the cloud with his eyes. He caught a glimpse of a flag and
uttered a wild shout of joy. It was the stars and stripes. The eight
thousand were eight thousand of the North! He danced up and down on the
stump, and shouted at the top of his voice:
"They're our own men! Help is here! Help is here!"
A vast shout of relief rose from Thomas' army as the eight thousand
still coming swiftly joined them. Granger was their leader, but
Steedman, his lieutenant, galloped at once to Thomas, who still stood in
the clump of trees, and asked him what he wanted him to do. The general,
calm and taciturn as ever, pointed toward a long hill that flamed with
the enemy's guns, and said three words:
"Take that ridge!"
Steedman galloped back and the eight thousand charged at once. The
battle in front sank a little, as if the others wished to watch the new
combat. Dick had been dragged down from the stump by Warner, but the two
stood erect with Pennington, their eyes turned toward the ridge. Colonel
Winchester was near them, his attention fixed upon the same place.
The eight thousand firing their rifles and supported by artillery
charged at a great pace. The whole ridge blazed with fire, and the
dead and wounded went down in sheaves. But Dick could not see that they
faltered. Hoarse shouts came again from his dry and blackened lips:
"They will take it! they will take it! Look how they face the guns!" he
was crying.
"So they will!" said Warner. "See what a splendid charge! Now they're
hidden! What a column of smoke! It floats aside, and, look, our men are
still going on! Nothing can stop them! They must have lost thousands,
but they reach the slope, and as sure as there's a sun in the heavens
they're going up it!"
That tremendous cheer burst again from the beleaguered Union army.
Granger and Steedman, with their fresh troops, were rushing up the
slopes of the formidable ridge, and though three thousand of the eight
thousand fell, they took it, hurling back the advancing columns of the
South, and securing the rear of Thomas.
Then the Winchester men and others about them went wild with joy. They
leaped, they danced, they sang, until they were commanded to make ready
for a new attack. Rosecrans in Chattanooga, with the most of his army
there also in wild confusion, had sent word to Thomas to retire, to
which Thomas had replied tersely: "It will ruin the army to withdraw it
now; this position must be held till night."
And he made good his resolve. The Southern masses attacked once more
with frightful violence, and once more Thomas withstood them. The field
was now darkening in the twilight, and, having saved the Union army
from rout and wreck, Thomas, impervious to attack, fell back slowly to
Chattanooga.
The greatest battle of the West, one of the most desperate ever fought,
came to a close. Thirty-five thousand men, killed or wounded, had fallen
upon the field. The South had won a great but barren victory. She had
not been able to reap the fruits of so much skill and courage, because
Thomas and his men, like the Spartans at Thermopylae, had stood in the
way. Never had a man more thoroughly earned the title of honor that he
bore throughout the rest of his life, "The Rock of Chickamauga."
Chickamauga, though, was a sinister word to the North. Gettysburg and
Vicksburg had stemmed the high tide of the Confederacy, and many had
thought the end in sight. But the news from "The River of Death" told
them that the road to crowning success was still long and terrible.
CHAPTER XV. BESIDE THE BROOK
When the slow retreat began Dick looked for the sergeant. But a stalwart
figure, a red bandage around the head, rose up and confronted him. It
was Sergeant Whitley himself, a little unsteady yet on his feet, but
soon to be as good as ever.
"Thank you for looking for me, Mr. Mason," he said, "but I came to, some
time ago. I guess the bullet found my skull too hard, 'cause it just ran
'roun' it, and came out on the other side. I won't even be scarred, as
my hair covers up the place."
"Can you walk all right?" asked Dick, overjoyed to find the sergeant was
not hurt badly.
"Of course I can, Mr. Mason, an' I'm proud to have been with General
Thomas in such a battle. I didn't think human bein's could do what our
men have done."
"Nor did I. It was impossible, but we've done it all the same."
Colonel Winchester rejoiced no less than the lads over the sergeant's
escape. All the officers of the regiment liked him, and they had an
infinite respect for his wisdom, particularly when danger was running
high. They were glad for his own sake that he was alive, and they were
glad to have him with them as they retreated into Chattanooga, because
the night still had its perils.
The moon, though clouded, was out as they withdrew slowly. On their
flanks there was still firing, as strong detachments skirmished with one
another, but the Winchester men as yet paid little attention to it. They
said grimly to one another that two days in the infernal regions were
enough for one time. They looked back at the vast battlefield and the
clumps of pines burning now like funeral torches, and shuddered.
The retreat of Thomas was harried incessantly. Longstreet and Forrest
were eager to push the attack that night and the next day and make the
victory complete. They and men of less rank dreamed of a triumph which
should restore the fortunes of the Confederacy to the full, but Bragg
was cautious. He did not wish to incur the uttermost risk, and the roll
of his vast losses might well give him pause also.
Nevertheless Southern infantry and cavalry hung on the flanks and rear
of the withdrawing Union force. The cloudy moon gave sufficient light
for the sharpshooters, whose rifles flashed continuously. The lighter
field guns moved from the forests and bushes, and the troops of Thomas
were compelled to turn again and again to fight them off.
The Winchester regiment was
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