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Page 33
I had just filled my canteen at a spring, and as I turned from it my
eye met the uplifted gaze of a Federal officer, I think a colonel of
an Illinois regiment, who was lying desperately wounded, shot
through the body and both legs, his dead horse lying on one of his
shattered limbs. A cannon-ball had passed through his horse and both
of his own knees. He looked pleadingly for a drink, but hesitated to
ask it of an enemy, as he supposed me to be. I came up to him, and
said, "You seem to be badly wounded, sir; will you have some water?"
"Oh, yes," said he; "but I feared to ask you for it."
"Why?"
"Because I expected no favor of an enemy."
Two other men coming by, I called them to aid in removing the dead
horse from his wounded limb. They did so, and then passed on; but I
seemed bound to him as by a spell. His manly face and soldierly
bearing, when suffering so terribly, charmed me. I changed his
position, adjusted his head, arranged his mangled legs in an easy
posture, supporting them by leaves stuffed under the blanket on
which we had laid him. In the mean time he took out his watch and
money, and requested me to hand him his pistols from the
saddle-holsters, and urged me to take them, as some one might rob
him, and I was the only one who had shown him kindness. I declined,
and wrapping them up in a blanket, placed them under his head,
telling him the fortunes of war might yet bring his own troops to
his side. He seemed overcome, and said, "My friend, why this
kindness to an enemy?"
As I gave him another draught of water, I said, "_I am not the enemy
I seem_;" and pressing his hand, I walked quickly on.
He could not live long, but I hope his friends found him as they
swept back over the ground the next day.
I soon found a splendid horse, and rode to General Beauregard for
orders, and reached my own general about four o'clock P.M. I found
that the Federal troops had fallen back more than a mile, but were
still fiercely contending for the ground. The Rebels were confident
of victory, and pressed them at every point. I had scarce time to
mark the condition of things however, until I was again dispatched
to the commander-in-chief. I had but fairly started, when I was
struck on the right side by a piece of a shell almost spent, which
yet came near ending my earthly career. My first feeling after the
shock was one of giddiness and blindness, then of partial recovery,
then of deathly sickness. I succeeded in getting off rather than
falling from my horse, near the root of a tree, where I fainted and
lay insensible for nearly an hour. At length, I recovered so far as
to be able to remount my horse, whose bridle I had somehow held all
the time, though unconsciously. I had ridden but a few rods when a
musket-ball passed through the neck of this, my second horse, but,
to my surprise, he did not fall immediately. A tremor ran through
his frame which I felt, convincing me that he was mortally wounded.
I dismounted, and stood watching him. He soon sank on his knees, and
then slowly lay down on his side. As his life-blood ebbed away, his
eye glazed, and making a last futile effort to rise, he fell back
again and died with a groan almost like the last agony of a human
being. The pain of my side and my knee, which was never entirely
free from pain, grew worse, and I saw that unless I found surgical
attendance and rest, I would soon be exhausted. In making my way to
the general hospital which was established on the ground where the
battle commenced, I met one of Forrest's cavalry, wounded in the
foot, and very weak from loss of blood. With my handkerchief and a
short stick, I made a simple tourniquet, which stopped the bleeding,
when I accompanied him to the hospital. After the dressing of my
wound, which was an extensive bruise, about five inches in diameter,
I took the cavalryman's horse, and started back to my command. When
I had reached the camp of the 71st Ohio Volunteers, my strength
failed, and after getting something to eat for myself and horse, and
a bucket of water to bathe my side during the night, I tied my horse
near the door of a tent, and crept in to try to sleep. But the
shells from the gunboats, which made night hideous, the groans of
the wounded, and the pleadings of the dying, for a time prevented.
Weariness at length overcame me, and sleep followed more refreshing
and sound than I hoped for under the circumstances.
The sharp rattle of musketry awakened me early, announcing the
opening of the second day's battle. But before I speak of Monday the
7th, I will state why the Confederates ceased to fight at half-past
five P.M., on Sabbath evening, when they had another hour of
daylight. They had already driven back the Federal forces more than
three miles along their whole line, had taken 4000 prisoners,
including most of General Prentiss's brigade, had captured about
seventy pieces of artillery, according to their statement, had taken
an immense baggage-train, with vast quantities of commissary,
quartermaster's, and medical stores, and had driven Grant's forces
under the shelter of their gunboats. Had the battle ended here, the
victory would have been most triumphant for the Rebels. Generals
Bragg and Breckenridge urged that the battle should go on, that
Grant's force was terribly cut up and demoralized, that another hour
would take them all prisoners, or drive them into the river, and
that then the transport fleet of more than a hundred boats, would be
at the control of the Confederates, who could assume the offensive,
and in five days take Louisville. Other officers argued that half of
their own troops were disabled or scattered, that it would risk the
victory already gained to push the remainder of Grant's forces,
which now turned at bay, might make a desperate stand. They
estimated their own loss at ten or twelve thousand men, and knew
that many, thinking the battle was over, had left their commands and
were loading themselves with plunder, from the pockets of the dead
and the knapsacks lying over the field or found in the Federal
camps. Some expressed strong confidence that Price and Van Dorn
would arrive during the night, and the victory would be easily
completed on the morrow.
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