Читать книгу Red-Tape and Pigeon-Hole Generals - William H. Armstrong - Страница 9

Table of Contents

The March to the River—Our Citizen Soldiery—Popularity of Commanders how Lost and how Won—The Rebel Dead—How the Rebels repay Courtesy.

An early call to arms was sounded upon the succeeding morning, and the Division rapidly formed. The batteries that had been posted at commanding points upon the series of ridges during the previous day and night were withdrawn, and the whole Corps moved along a narrow road, that wound beautifully among the ridges.

The Volunteer Regiments were unusually quiet; the thoughts of the night previous evidently lingered with them. The American Volunteer is no mere machine. Rigorous discipline will give him soldierly characteristics—teach him that unity of action with his comrades and implicit obedience of orders are essential to success. But his independence of thought remains; he never forgets that he is a citizen soldier; he reads and reflects for himself. Few observant officers of volunteers but have noticed that affairs of national polity, movements of military commanders, are not unfrequently discussed by men in blouses, about camp fires and picket stations, with as much practical ability and certainly quite as courteously, as in halls where legislators canvass them at a nation's cost. It has been justly remarked that in no army in the world is the average standard of intelligence so high, as in the American volunteer force. The same observation might be extended to earnestness of purpose and honesty of intention. The doctrine has long since been exploded that scoundrels make the best soldiers. Men of no character under discipline will fight, but they fight mechanically. The determination so necessary to success is wanting. European serfs trained with the precision of puppets, and like puppets unthinking, are wanting in the dash that characterizes our volunteers. That creature of impulse the Frenchman, under all that is left of the first Napoleon, the shadow of a mighty name, will charge with desperation, but fails in the cool and quiet courage so essential in seeming forlorn resistance. In what other nation can you combine the elements of the American volunteer? It may be said that the British Volunteer Rifle Corps would prove a force of similar character. In many respects undoubtedly they would; as yet there is no basis of comparison. Their soldierly attainments have not been tested by the realities of war.

There was ample food for reflection. On the neighboring hills heavy details of soldiers were gathering the rebel dead in piles preparatory to committing them to the trenches, at which details equally heavy, vigorously plied the pick and spade. Our own dead, with few exceptions, had already been buried; and the long rows of graves marked by head and foot boards, placed by the kind hands of comrades, attested but too sadly how heavily we had peopled the ridges.

While the troops were en route, the Commander-in-Chief in his hack and four, followed by a staff imposing in numbers, passed. The Regulars cheered vociferously. The applause from the Volunteers was brief, faint, and a most uncertain sound, and yet many of these same Volunteer Regiments were rapturous in applause, previous to and during the battle. Attachment to Commanders so customary among old troops—so desirable in strengthening the morale of the army—cannot blind the intelligent soldier to a grave mistake—a mistake that makes individual effort contemptible. True, a great European Commander has said that soldiers will become attached to any General; a remark true of the times perhaps—true of the troops of that day—but far from being true of volunteers, who are in the field from what they consider the necessity of the country, and whose souls are bent upon a speedy, honorable, and victorious termination of the war.

A glance at the manner in which our Volunteer Regiments are most frequently formed, will, perhaps, best illustrate this. A town meeting is called, speeches made appealing to the patriotic, to respond to the necessities of the country; lists opened and the names of mechanics, young attorneys, clerks, merchants, farmers' sons, dry-goods-men and their clerks, and others of different pursuits, follow each other in strange succession, but with like earnestness of purpose. An intelligent soldiery gathered in this way, will not let attachments to men blind them as to the effects of measures.

About 10 a. m., our brigade was drawn up in line of battle on a ridge overlooking the well riddled little town of Sharpsburg. Arms were stacked, and privilege given many officers and men to examine the adjacent ground. A cornfield upon our right, along which upon the north side ran a narrow farm road, that long use had sunk to a level of two and in most places three feet, below the surface of the fields, had been contested with unusual fierceness. Blue and grey lay literally with arms entwined as they fell in hand to hand contest. The fence rails had been piled upon the north side of the road, and in the rifle pit formed to their hand with this additional bulwark, they poured the most galling of fires with comparative impunity upon our troops advancing to the charge. A Union battery, however, came to the rescue, and an enfilading fire of but a few moments made havoc unparalleled. Along the whole line of rebel occupation, their bodies could have been walked upon, so closely did they lie. Pale-faced, finely featured boys of sixteen, their delicate hands showing no signs of toil, hurried by a misguided enthusiasm from fond friends and luxurious family firesides, contrasted strangely with the long black hair, lank looks of the Louisiana Tiger, or the rough, bloated, and bearded face of the Backwoodsman of Texas. A Brigadier, who looked like an honest, substantial planter, lay half over the rails, upon which he had doubtless stood encouraging his men, while lying half upon his body were two beardless boys, members of his staff, and not unlikely of his family. Perhaps all the male members of that family had been hurried at once from life by that single shell. The sight was sickening. Who, if privileged, would be willing to fix a limit to God's retributive justice upon the heads of the infamous, and in many instances cowardly originators of this Rebellion!

Cavalry scouting parties brought back the word that the country to the river was clear of the rebels, and in accordance with what seemed to be the prevailing policy of the master-mind of the campaign, immediate orders to move were then issued. The troops marched through that village of hospitals—Sharpsburg—and halted within a mile and a half of the river, in the rear of a brick dwelling, which was then taken and subsequently used as the Head-Quarters of Major-General Fitz John Porter. A line of battle was again formed, arms stacked, and an order issued that the ground would be occupied during the night.

In the morning the march was again resumed by a road which wound around the horseshoe-shaped bend in the river. When approaching the river, firing was heard, apparently as if from the other side, and a short distance further details were observed carrying wounded men and ranging them comfortably around the many hay and straw stacks of the neighborhood. Inquiry revealed that a reconnoitring party, misled by the apparent quiet of the other side, had crossed, fallen into an ambuscade, and under the most galling of fires, artillery and musketry, kept up most unmercifully by the advancing rebels, who thus ungraciously repaid the courtesy shown them the day after Antietam—had been compelled to recross that most difficult ford. Our loss was frightful—one new and most promising regiment was almost entirely destroyed.

The men thought of the dead earnestness of the rebels, and as they moved forward around the winding Potomac—deep, full of shelving, sunken rocks, from the dam a short distance above the ford, that formerly fed the mill owned by a once favorably known Congressman, A. R. Boteler, to where it was touched by our line—they reviewed with redoubled force, the helplessness of the rebels a few days previously, and to say the least, the carelessness of the leader of the Union army.

The regimental camp was selected in a fine little valley that narrowed into a gap between the bluffs, bordering upon the canal, sheltered by wood, and having every convenience of water. The rebels had used it but a few days previously, and the necessity was immediate for heavy details for police duty. And here we passed quite unexpectedly six weeks of days more pleasant to the men than profitable to the country, and of which something may be said in our two succeeding chapters.