The Rock of Chickamauga: A Story of the Western Crisis, Joseph A. Altsheler [free children's ebooks online .txt] 📗
- Author: Joseph A. Altsheler
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While he was absorbed in watching, the colonel moved in the other direction, and Dick stood alone behind a bush. The fire in front had increased somewhat, although at no time was it violent. Occasional shots from his own side replied. The clouds that had drifted away were now drifting back, and he believed that darkness alone would soon end the combat.
Then he saw a bush only a dozen yards in his front move a little, and a face peered through its branches. There was yet enough light for him to see that the face was youthful, eager and handsome. It was familiar, too, and then with a shock he remembered. Woodville, the lad with whom he had fought such a good fight, nature's weapons used, was before him.
Dick raised his rifle. Young Woodville was an easy target. But the motion was only a physical impulse. He knew in his heart that he had no intention of shooting the young Southerner, and he did not feel the slightest tinge of remorse because he evaded this part of a soldier's work.
Yet Woodville, seeing nobody and hearing nothing, would come on. Dick, holding his rifle in the crook of his left arm, drew a pistol and fired it over the lad's head. At the same moment he dropped almost flat upon the ground. The bullet cut the leaves above Woodville and he sprang back, startled. A half-dozen Southern skirmishers fired at the flash of Dick's pistol, but he, too, lying on the ground, heard them cutting leaves over his head.
Dick saw the face of Woodville disappear from the bush, and then he crept away, rejoining Colonel Winchester and his comrades. Five minutes later the skirmish ceased by mutual consent, and each band fell back on its own army, convinced that both were on the watch.
They were to advance at four o'clock in the morning, but Pennington's prediction came true. After midnight, flashes of lightning cut the sky and the thunder rolled heavily. Then the rain came, not any fugitive shower, but hard, cold and steady, promising to last many hours.
It was still pouring when the advance began before dawn, but Grant's plans were complete. He had drawn up his forces on the chessboard, and they were converging closely upon Jackson. They must keep their cartridges dry and advance at all costs.
The Winchesters were in the van in a muddy road. Dick, Warner and Pennington were in the saddle, and they were wet through and through. The rain and dusk were so heavy that they could not see fifty feet, and they shivered with cold. But their souls were eager and high, and they were glad when the army toiled slowly forward to battle.
CHAPTER VII. THE LITTLE CAPITAL
Dick was bent down in his saddle, trying to protect himself a little from the driving rain which beat in his eyes and soaked through his clothing. Warner and Pennington beside him were in the same condition, and he saw just before him the bent back of Colonel Winchester, with his left arm raised as a shield for his face. Hoofs and wheels made a heavy, sticky sound as they sank in the mud, and were then pulled out again.
“Do you see any signs of daylight, Dick?” asked Pennington.
“Not a sign. I see only a part of our regiment, trees on either side of us bending before the wind, and rain, and mud, mud everywhere. I'll be glad when it's over.”
“So will I,” said Warner. “I wonder what kind of hotels they have in Jackson. I'd like to have a bath, good room and a big breakfast.”
“The Johnnies are holding breakfast for you,” said Pennington. “Their first course is gunpowder, their second bullets, their third shells and shrapnel, and their fourth bayonets.”
“They'll have to serve a lot at every course,” said Dick, “because General Grant is advancing with fifty thousand men, and so many need a lot of satisfying.”
The storm increased in violence. The rain, falling in a deluge, was driven by a wind like a hurricane. The horses strove to turn their heads from it, and confusion arose among the cavalry. The infantry mixed in the mud swore heavily. Staff officers had the utmost difficulty in keeping the regiments together. It was time for the sun, but it did not appear. Everything was veiled in clouds and driving rain.
Dick looked at his watch, and saw that it was seven o'clock. They had intended to attack at this hour, but further advance was impossible for the time, and, bending their heads, they sought to protect their ammunition. Presently they started again and toiled along slowly and painfully for more than two hours. Then, just as they saw the enemy ahead of them, the storm seemed to reach the very zenith of its fury.
Dick, in the vanguard, beheld earthworks, cannon and troops before Jackson, but the storm still drove so hard that the Union forces could not advance to the assault.
“This is certainly a most unusual situation,” said Colonel Winchester, with an effort at cheerfulness. “Here we are, ready to attack, and the Southerners are ready to defend, but a storm holds us both fast in our tracks. Our duty to protect our cartridges is even greater than our duty to attack the enemy.”
“The biggest rain must come to an end,” said Dick.
But it was nearly noon before they could advance. Then, as the storm decreased rapidly the trumpets sounded the charge, and horse, foot and artillery, they pressed forward eagerly through the mud.
The sun broke through the clouds, and Dick saw before them a wood, a ravine full of thickets, and the road commanded by strong artillery. The Northern skirmishers were already stealing forward through the wet bushes and grass, and soon their rifles were crackling. But the Southern sharpshooters in the thickets were in stronger force, and their rapid and accurate fire drove back the Northern men. Then their artillery opened and swept the road, while the Northern batteries were making frantic efforts to get up through the deep, sticky mud.
But the trumpets were still calling. The Winchester regiment and others, eager for battle and victory, swept forward. Dick felt once more the fierce thrill of combat, and, waving his revolver high above his head, he shouted with the others as they rushed on. The stream of bullets from the ravine thickened, and the cannon were crashing fast. But the Union masses did not check their rush for an instant. Although many fell they charged into the ravine, driving out the enemy, and pursued him on the other side.
But the Southern cannon, manned by daring gunners, still held the field and, aided by the thick mud which held back charging feet, they repulsed every attack. The Winchester regiment was forced to cover, and
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