Читать книгу The Irish at the Front - Michael MacDonagh - Страница 20

[1] One is reminded of tributes to Meagher's Brigade at Fredricksburg in the American Civil War. "Braver men," writes Horace Greely, in his "American Conflict," "never smiled at death. Never did men fight better or die, alas! more fruitlessly than did Hancock's corps, especially Meagher's Irish Brigade, composed of the 63rd, 69th, and 88th New York, 28th Massachusetts, and the 116th Pennsylvania, which dashed itself repeatedly against those impregnable heights, until two-thirds of its numbers strewed the ground" (vol. ii., p. 345). In the same book Greely quotes the following from the correspondent of the London Times, watching the battle from the heights, and writing from Lee's headquarters: "To the Irish Division commanded by General Meagher was principally committed the desperate task of bursting out of the town of Fredricksburg and forming under the withering fire of the confederate batteries to attack Marye's Heights. Never at Fontenoy, Albuera, or at Waterloo was more undoubted courage displayed by the sons of Erin than during those six frantic attacks which they directed against the almost impregnable position of the foe."