The Scouts of Stonewall: The Story of the Great Valley Campaign, Altsheler [best non fiction books of all time txt] 📗

peaceful rabbits popped up in the brush. Yet before they went much further they saw the dark masses of the Northern army under Shields moving slowly up the valley, and anxious for the junction with Fremont.

But the Northern generals were again at a loss. Jackson had turned suddenly and defeated Fremont's vanguard with heavy loss, but what had become of him afterward? Fremont and Shields were uncertain of the position of each other, and they were still more uncertain about Jackson's. He might fall suddenly upon either, and they grew very cautious as they drew near to the end of the Massanuttons.

Sherburne and Harry, after examining the Northern army through their glasses, rode back with a dozen men to the south base of the Massanuttons. Most of them were signal officers, and Harry and Sherburne, dismounting, climbed the foot of the mountain with them. When they stood upon the crest and looked to right and left in the clear June air, they beheld a wonderful sight.

To the south along Mill Creek lay Jackson's army. To the west massed in the wider valley was the army of Fremont, which had followed them so tenaciously, and to the east, but just separated from it by the base of the Massanuttons, were the masses of Shields advancing slowly.

Harry through his powerful glasses could see the horsemen in front scouting carefully in advance of either army, and once more he appreciated to the full Jackson's skill in utilizing the mountains and rivers to keep his enemies apart. But what would he do now that they were passing the Massanuttons, and there was no longer anything to separate Shields and Fremont. He dismissed the thought. There was an intellect under the old slouch hat of the man who rode Little Sorrel that could rescue them from anything.

“Quite a spectacle,” said Sherburne. “A man can't often sit at ease on a mountaintop and look at three armies. Now, Barron, you are to signal from here to General Jackson every movement of our enemies, but just before either Shields or Fremont reaches the base of the mountain, you're to slip down and join us.”

“We'll do it, sir,” said Barron, the chief signal officer. “We're not likely to go to sleep up here with armies on three sides of us.”

Sherburne, Harry and two other men who were not to stay slowly descended the mountain. Harry enjoyed the breathing space. On the mountainside he was lifted, for a while, above the fierce passions of war. He saw things from afar and they were softened by distance. He drew deep breaths of the air, crisp and cool, on the heights, and Sherburne, who saw the glow on his face, understood. The same glow was on his own face.

“It's a grand panorama, Harry,” he said, “and we'll take our fill of it for a few moments.” They stood on a great projection of rock and looked once more and for a little while into the valley and its divisions. The two Northern armies were nearer now, and they were still moving. Harry saw the sun flashing over thousands of bayonets. He almost fancied he could hear the crack of the teamsters' whips as the long lines of wagons in the rear creaked along.

They descended rapidly, remounted their horses and galloped back to Jackson.

They buried Ashby that day, all the leading Southern officers following him to his grave, and throughout the afternoon the silence was continued. But the signals on the mountain worked and worked, and the signalmen with Jackson replied. No movement of the two pursuing armies was unknown to the Southern leader.

Harry, with an hour's leave, visited once more his friends of the Invincibles. He had begged a package of fine West Indian cigarettes from Sherburne, and he literally laid them at the feet of the two colonels—he found them sitting together on the grass, lean gray men who seemed to be wholly reduced to bone and muscle.

“This is a great gift, Harry, perhaps greater than you think,” said Colonel Leonidas Talbot gravely. “I tried to purchase some from the commissariat, but they had none—it seems that General Stonewall Jackson doesn't consider cigarettes necessary for his troops. Anyhow, the way our Confederate money is going, I fancy a package of cigarettes will soon cost a hundred dollars. Here, Hector, light up. We divide this box, half and half. That's right, isn't it, Harry?”

“Certainly, sir.”

Harry passed on to the junior officers and found St. Clair and Happy Tom lying on the grass. Happy pretended to rouse from sleep when Harry came.

“Hello, old omen of war,” he said. “What's Old Jack expecting of us now?”

“I told you never to ask me such a question as that again. The general isn't what you'd call a garrulous man. How's your shoulder, Arthur?”

“About well. The muscles were not torn. It was just loss of blood that troubled me for the time.”

“I hear,” said Langdon, “that the two Yankee armies are to join soon. The Massanuttons won't be between them much longer, and then they'll have only one of the forks of the river to cross before they fall upon each other's breasts and weep with joy. Harry, it seems to me that we're always coming to a fork of the Shenandoah. How many forks does it have anyhow?”

“Only two, but the two forks have forks of their own. That's the reason we're always coming to deep water and by the same token the Yankees are always coming to it, too, which is a good thing for us, as we get there first, when the bridges are there, and when the Yankees come they are gone.”

But not one of these boys understood the feeling in the Northern armies. Late the day before a messenger from Shields had got through the Massanuttons to Fremont, and had informed him that an easy triumph was at hand. Jackson and his army, he said, fearing the onset of overwhelming numbers, was retreating in great disorder.

The two generals were now convinced of speedy victory. They had communicated at last, and they could have some concert of movement. Jackson was less than thirty miles away, and his army was now but a confused mass of stragglers which would dissolve under slight impact. Both had defeats and disappointments to avenge, and they pushed forward now with increased speed, Shields in particular showing the greatest energy in pursuit. But the roads were still deep in mud, and his army was forced to toil on all that day and the next, while the signalmen on the top of the Massanuttons told every movement he made to Stonewall Jackson.

The signals the second evening told Jackson that the two Northern armies were advancing fast, and that he would soon have before him an enemy outnumbering him anywhere from two to three to one. He had been talking with Ewell just before the definite news was brought, and Harry, Dalton and other officers of the staff stood near, as their duty bade them.

Harry knew the nature of the information, as it was not a secret from any member of the staff, and now they all stood silently on one side and watched Jackson. Even Ewell offered no suggestion, but kept his eyes fixed anxiously on his chief. Harry felt that another one of those critical moments, perhaps the most dangerous of all, had arrived. They had fought army after army in detail, but now they must fight