The Guns of Bull Run: A Story of the Civil War's Eve, Joseph A. Altsheler [best book series to read txt] 📗

may be slow in choosing he is bound to be in the very thick of events when he does choose. Colonel Talbot is at the front, and you'll probably find him closer than any other officer to the Yankee army. We need everybody whom we can get, especially lads of spirit and fire like you. You shall be a second lieutenant in his command. A train will leave here in four hours. Be ready. It will take you part of the way and you will march on for the rest."

Mr. Benjamin did not speak throughout the interview, but he watched Harry closely. Neither did he speak when he left, but he offered him a limp hand. The boy's view of Richmond was in truth brief, as before night he saw its spires and roofs fading behind him. The train was wholly military. There were four coaches filled with officers and troops, and two more coaches behind them loaded with ammunition.

Harry heard from some of the officers that the army was gathered at a place called Manassas Junction, where Beauregard had taken command on June 1st, and to which he would quickly return. But Harry did not know any of these officers and he felt a little lonely. He slept after a while in the car seat, awakened at times by the jolting or stopping of the train, and arrived some time the next day in a country of green hills and red clay roads, muddy from heavy rains.

They left the train, marched over the hills along one of the muddy roads, and presently saw a vast array of tents, fires, and earthworks, stretching to the horizon. Harry's heart leaped again. This was the great army of the South. Here were regiments and regiments, thousands and thousands of men and here he would find his friends, Colonel Talbot and Major St. Hilaire, and St. Clair and Langdon.

The whole scene was inspiring in the extreme to the heart of youth. Far to the right he saw cavalry galloping back and forth, and to the left he saw infantry drilling. From somewhere in front came the strains of a regimental band playing:

"The hour was sad, I left the maid,
A lingering farewell taking,
Her sighs and tears my steps delayed,
I thought her heart was breaking.
In hurried words her name I blessed,
I breathed the vows that bind me
And to my heart in anguish pressed
The girl I left behind me."

It was a favorite air of the Southern bands, and, much as it stirred Harry now, he was destined to hear it again in moments far more thrilling. He presented his order from General Beauregard to a sentinel, who passed him to an officer, who in turn told him to go about a quarter of a mile westward, where he would find the regiment of Colonel Talbot quartered.

"It's a mixed regiment," he said, "made up of Virginians, South Carolinians, North Carolinians, and a few Kentuckians and Tennesseeans, but it's already one of the best in the service. Colonel Talbot and his second in command, Lieutenant-Colonel St. Hilaire, have been thrashing it into shape in great fashion. They're mostly boys and already they call themselves 'The Invincibles.' You can see the tents of their commanding officers over there by that little creek."

Harry's eyes followed the pointing finger, and again his heart leaped. His friends were there, the two colonels for whom he had such a strong affection, and the two lads of his own age. Theirs looked like a good camp, too. It was arranged neatly, and by its side flowed the clear, cool waters of Young's Branch, a tributary of the little Manassas River. He walked briskly, crossed the brook, stepping from stone to stone, and entered the grounds of the Invincibles. A tall youth rushed forward, seized his hand and shook it violently, meanwhile uttering cries of welcome in an unbroken stream.

"By all the powers, it's our own Harry!" he exclaimed, "the new Harry of the West, whom we were afraid we should never see again. Everything is for the best, but we hardly hoped for this! How did you get here, Harry? And you didn't bring Kentucky rushing to our side, after all! Well, I knew it wasn't your fault, old horse! Ho, St. Clair, come and see who's here!"

St. Clair, who had been lying in the grass behind a tent, appeared and greeted Harry joyfully. But while Langdon was just the same he had changed in appearance. He was thinner and graver, and his intellectual face bore the stamp of rapid maturity.

"It's like greeting one of our very own, Harry," he said. "You were with us in Charleston at the great beginning. We were afraid you would have to stay in the west."

"The big things will begin here," said Harry.

"There can be no doubt of it. Do you know, Harry, that we are less than thirty miles from Washington! If there were any hill high enough around here we could see the white dome of the Capitol which we hope to take before the summer is over. But we'll take you to the Colonel and Major Hector St. Hilaire, that was, but Lieutenant-Colonel Hector St. Hilaire that is."

Colonel Talbot was sitting at a small table in a tent, the sides of which had been raised all around, leaving only a canvas roof. Lieutenant-Colonel St. Hilaire sat opposite him across the table, and they were studying intently a small map of a region that was soon to be sown deep with history. They looked up when Harry came with his two friends, and gave him the welcome that he knew he would always receive from them.

"I've had a letter from your father," said Colonel Leonidas Talbot, "and I've been expecting you. You are to be a lieutenant on my staff, and the quartermaster will sell you a new uniform as glossy and fine as those of which St. Clair and Langdon are so proud."

He asked him a few more questions about Kentucky and his journey over the mountains, and then, telling St. Clair and Langdon to take care of him, he and Lieutenant-Colonel St. Hilaire went back to the study of their map. Harry noted that both were tanned deeply and that their faces were very serious.

"Come along, Harry," said Langdon. "Let the colonel and the major bear all the troubles. For us everything is for the best. We've got you on our hands and we're going to treat you right. See that deep pool in the brook, where the big oak throws its shade over the water? It's partly natural and it's partly dammed, but it's our swimming hole. You are covered with dust and dirt. Pull off your clothes and jump in there. We'll protect you from ribald attention. There are other swimming holes along here, but this swimming hole belongs to the Invincibles, and we always make good our rights."

Harry was more than willing. In three minutes he jumped into the deep, cool water, swimming, diving, and shaking himself like a big dog. He had enjoyed no such luxury in many days, and he felt as if he were being re-created. Langdon and St. Clair sat on the bank and gave him instructions.

"Now jump out," Langdon said at the end of five minutes. "You needn't think because you've just come and are in a way a guest, that you can keep this swimming hole all to yourself. A lot more of the Invincibles need bathing and here come some for their chance."

Harry came out reluctantly, and in a few minutes they were on the way to the quartermaster, where the needed uniform, one that appealed gloriously to his eye, was bought. St. Clair was quiet, but Langdon talked enough for all three.

"The Yankee vanguard is only a few miles away," he said. "You don't have to go far before you see their tents, though I ought to say that each side has another army westward in the mountains. There's been a lot of fighting already, though not much of it here. The first shots on Virginia soil were fired on our front the day General Beauregard arrived to take command of our forces."

"How about those troops in the hills?" asked Harry.

"They've been up and doing. A young Yankee general named McClellan has shown a lot of activity. He has beat us in some skirmishes and he has organized troops as far west as the Ohio. Then he and his generals met our general, Garnett, at Rich Mountain. It was the biggest affair of the war so far, and Garnett was killed. Then a curious fellow of ours named Jackson, and Stuart, a cavalry officer, lost a little battle at a place called Falling Waters."

"Has the luck been against us all along the line?"

"Not at all! A cock-eyed Massachusetts politician, one Ben Butler, a fellow of energy though, broke into the Yorktown country, but Magruder thrashed him at Big Bethel. All those things, though, Harry, are just whiffs of rain before the big storm. We're threatening Washington here with our main army, and here is where they will have to meet us. Lincoln has put General Scott, a Virginian, too, in command of the Northern armies, but as he's so old, somebody else will be the real commander."

Harry felt himself a genuine soldier in his new uniform, and he soon learned his new duties, which, for the present, would not be many. The two armies, although practically face to face, refused to move. On either side the officers of the old regular force were seeking to beat the raw recruits into shape, and the rival commanders also waited, each for the other to make the first movement.

Harry and St. Clair were sent that night far toward the front with a small detachment to patrol some hill country. They marched in the moonlight, keeping among the trees, and listening for any sounds that might be hostile.

"It's not likely though that we'll be molested," said St. Clair. "The men on both sides don't yet realize fully that they are here to shoot at one another. This is our place, along a little brook, another tributary of the Manassas."

They stopped in a grove and disposed the men, twenty in number, along a line of several hundred yards, with instructions not to fire unless they knew positively what they were shooting at. Harry and St. Clair remained near the middle of the line, at the edge of the brook, where they sat down on the bank. The country was open in front of them, and Harry saw a distant light.

"What's that?" he asked.

"The campfire of a Yankee outpost. I told you they were very near."

"And that, I suppose, is one of their bugles."

A faint but musical note was brought to them by the light wind blowing in their faces.

"That's what it is. It may be the signal of some movement, but they can't attempt anything serious without showing themselves. Our sentinels are posted along here for miles."

The sound of the bugle continued faint and far away. It had a certain weird effect in the night and the loneliness. Harry wished to know who they were at that far campfire. His own cousin, Dick Mason, might be there.

"Although we're arrayed for war," said St. Clair, "the sentinels are often friendly. They even exchange plugs of tobacco and news. The officers have not been able to stop it wholly. Our sentinels tell theirs that we'll be in Washington in a month, and theirs tell ours that they've already engaged rooms in the Richmond hotels for July."

"When two prophets disagree both can't be right," said Harry. "How far away would you say that light is, Arthur?"

"About a mile and a half. Let's scout a little in that direction. There are no commands against it. Enterprise is encouraged."

"Just what I'd like," said Harry, who was eager for action.

Leaving their own men under the command of a reliable sergeant named Carrick, the two youths crossed the brook and advanced over a fairly level stretch of country toward the fire. Small clusters of trees were scattered here and there, and beyond them was a field of