I CHAPTER XXXIII. FIGHTING ON THE RIVER. Then was felt the storm of war: IKE the Ogre in the fairy tale, the great river had eaten up Grand Gulf, and left only a narrow strip of bottom land, backed by a high hill, at the foot of which we had dug our rifle-pits, and on its slope planted our batteries. On the morning of the 28th of April, my regiment was ordered on picket duty, to fill and defend the entrenchments; but before we could reach them the enemy commenced shelling, and we were compelled to call a halt in a deep ravine, where we lay for six hours, while the shot and shell crashed and hurtled over our heads and among the tree-tops, with no harm to us save that occasioned by falling limbs. The enemy had seven large gunboats in action, carrying sixty guns of the heaviest calibre, to which we could only oppose five and one field battery. The boats formed themselves into a circle, around which they kept swinging, and by which arrangement they were enabled to keep up a constant discharge of four or five broadsides from two sides of the fiery ring. We lost but two men, besides the gallant Colonel William Wade, the commander of our light artillery- the result of useless exposure our earthworks of sand proving a most admirable shield, and rendered stronger by every ball and fragment of shell that settled in them. We were fortunate in disabling two vessels, which drew off to a respectful distance, apparently much crippled, if not entirely ruined. It was, from first to last, the most terrific cannonading I ever heard. Incessant and deafening, it almost seemed as if the very earth rocked beneath the thundering discharges, and that armies must be slain from their fatal effects. I crept up to the summit of the hill, and forgot my danger in the rugged grandeur of the scene. Huge shells would strike the surface of the high banks above our feeble batteries, explode, and cover guns and gunners with piles of sand, out of which the latter would work themselves like moles or gophers, and cheerily clear their pieces again for action. One audacious vessel circumscribed its circle to a limit barely large enough to turn in, keeping close to our shore, and maintaining a constant fire. At length I saw a wellaimed shell from our largest gun-" Crazy Bet," they called her tear through a central port-hole just as they raised its iron shield. There was silence for a few minutes as the uncouth monster drifted slowly down the river; then it began to emit black volumes of smoke, and steamed to the rear, amid the cheers of our men. The rest of them soon followed; and what seemed the silence of death brooded over the water and the land. It was two P. M. before I could assume my position in the breastworks, and we were hardly there before the Federal fleet came by with a rush, and, under a close fire on both sides, passed to a landing-place on Bayou Pierre, five miles below. That night was a sleepless one for all of us who were on the watch, looking and waiting for another naval attack and listening to a low confusion of sounds, as if of a distant army marching, for well were we aware that it betokened the deadly conflict of the coming day. As I lay there half-way dreaming, and gazed at the moon in the azure sky and the silent flow of the muddy waters, I thought of "Kubla Khan." "Five miles, meandering with a mazy motion, And then as I drew my breath, and the low rumblings swelled to a louder noise, Byron's stirring words recurred: "Hark to the trump and the drum, And the mournful sound of the barbarous horn, And the flap of the banners that flit as they're borne, And the neigh of the steed, and the multitudes hum, And the clash and the shout, they come, they come!' The silver moon was riding high, the middle hour of night was nigh, when the firing of distant guns awakened the silent echoes and obscured the sleepy music of the marching army that reached us in subdued cadences from over the river, when the ominous rattle of the long-roll was heard, and the battie cry of Bozarris rang over the cornfield: "To arms! to arms! they come! they come! The Yankees are on us!" With nervous haste the men were arranged in their longdrawn lines and prepared for the fray. A hasty march through tangled underbrush brought us near a forlorn little gunboat that had ascended a diminutive bayou and stuck fast in the mud. The little fellow, not much larger than a green turtle, had made a gallant fight of it, and it was this which had caused the false alarm. In no gentle humor we trudged the weary space back to camp, which we reached just before sunrise. As the day appeared from the summit of the hill behind us, we could see across the big river, and far in the distance discovered the white wagon-tops, the glancing sheen of gun-barrels and bayonets, the flitting of flags, and the dark coats of long strings of infantrymen as they moved along under a cloud of dust towards the South. Their boats had passed down and were awaiting them at the crossing, and it was evident that Grant was aiming to make a new movement for the capture of Vicksburg. Farragut and Porter had made a joint attack during the previous year, expending twenty-five thousand shells; the enemy had attempted to work their war vessels through the tortuous and drift-filled channels of the Tallahatchie and Yazoo rivers; Sherman, in his land assault on the north, had been foiled with bloody defeat; Grant had tried to dig a canal across the isthmus opposite Vicksburg, leav ing that city on dry land, and the Yankee engineers had endeavored to excavate a passage by way of Lake Providence, which was to change the bed of the Mississippi and turn its mighty current into the Atchafalaya on its strange and meandering journey to the Mexican Gulf. But all these plans had come to grief; and the only way left was to make a detour through Louisiana, flank us on the south, and overwhelm us with superior numbers and main force. And this it was we were girding up our loins to prevent. T HE generous and open-handed hospitality of the people of Port Gibson, Grand Gulf and vicinity had utterly demoralized our soldiers. As far as discipline was concerned, it was as fatal to us as Padua to Hannibal's army. Every private had his "home" and his circle of acquaintances, where he was always welcome; and to enable him to resort to it, every reason for a furlough, and every excuse for sickness that could be devised, was put forward with unblushing effrontery, failing which, they would desert for days at a time. In vain was every penalty of the army regulations enforced. Officers might rage and storm, and put them to policing the camp, or on double guard duty, the evil remained unabated, and dress parades were but meagre affairs. The "old soldier" would pull the wool over the eyes of the doctors with their manifold ailments and excessive weaknesses; and that night, perhaps, walk miles to attend a party or a frolic. But the punishment could not be severe, for whenever an alarm occurred, or a fight was in prospect, every man was at his post. It was a panacea for all the ills which baffled our best medical skill-the roar of Federal guns. On the morning of the first day of May, 1863, the regiment was ordered out for action. Some of our little army of seven thousand men had been engaged since midnight, and we could distinctly hear the roll of musketry. Adjutant Greenwood formed the battalions; and as I rode out, I asked him fretfully why he had lined them with the "Third." He smiled audibly. A hundred men, all told, constituted the strength of our last parade; and before me were over three hundred and fifty-the sick and lame and halt, the rheumatic and the infirm-not only those who had been "shamming," but those really unfit for duty, had hobbled into line. Could such men be punished? The dying Saxe at Fontenoy, transported in his litter from point to point of the battle, did not exhibit more heroism than these sick soldiers. It was early in the day when we moved through Port Gibson; and the noble people of the old town were up and out to cheer us to the contest. Already it could be heard, the sounds at times almost dying away, as if it were the last breath of some struggling giant, and then, trebly thundering, the mingling echoes of cannon and musket "would swell the gale," and we would hurry faster forward. Soft-eyed women looked at us through their tears, and strong old men sobbed their farewells, knowing it was the last day for many of us. The soldiers themselves were as gay as if repairing to a review. That character of bravery which is concealed beneath the festal robe of some gay Polemon, I believe to be not only more elastic, but much more reliable than that which adorns the stern austerities of a Xenocrates, or the gloomy virtues of some rigid Cato. I remember thinking of Mirza's vision: What a blessed thing it was that each one of the throng of travelers that passed over the bridge was happy in the belief that the trap-door which was to let him through into the dark flood below was clear on toward the other end. About two miles beyond the town we struck the unsightly hills that bristle all along this portion of the Mississippi, and climbing up and down one rugged acclivity after another, we at length came to a halt in an old corn-field in front of a thick canebreak and at the foot of a steep, canecovered hill. Here we lay for some hours waiting for orders and listening to the semi-circle of firing that appeared to be enlarging, as if about to enclose us completely. Colonel Gause, with the "Third," and my regiment, the Fifth, comprised our force; and we had almost concluded we were forgotten, and began to feel like Casabianca, on the "burning deck," when we were suddenly and very disagreeably undeceived. Bayou Pierre, a deep and turbid stream with impassable banks and partly filled by back-water, passes Port Gibson |