wn to him, who questioned them closely as to what force was holding
Spring Hill. The general was probably Forrest, for he was personally
directing the attack on the 64th, but may have been Hood himself, for he
was on the Rally Hill road, less than a mile away, soon after the men
were captured. They all declared that they knew the Fourth corps was at
Spring Hill, and they believed all the rest of the army. Their
declaration must have carried greater weight on account of their own
faith in what they were telling, for at that time the whole regiment
believed that all the rest of the army had followed to Spring Hill close
on the heels of Wagner's division.

Eventually the 64th was driven back across the Rally Hill road, where a
last stand was made in a large woods covering a broad ridge abutting on
the road about three-fourths of a mile southeast of Spring Hill. While
in these woods, occurred a bit of exciting personal experience. A
bullet, coming from the right, passed through my overcoat, buttoned up
to my chin, in a way to take along the top button of my blouse
underneath the coat. That big brass button struck me a stinging blow on
the point of the left collar-bone, and, clasping both hands to the spot,
I commenced feeling for the hole with my finger tips, fully convinced
that a bullet coming from the front had gone through me there and had
inflicted a serious and possibly a mortal wound. It was not until I had
opened the coat for a closer investigation that I found I was worse
scared than hurt. Some of the enemy had secured a position on our right
flank, where they opened an enfilading fire, and it was one of their
bullets that had hit me. To get out of that fire the regiment fell back
towards the interior of the woods, where it was so close to our main
line that it was called in.

It was then about 3:30 o'clock, and by that time the situation of our
army had become so critical that nothing short of the grossest
blundering on the part of the enemy could save it from a great disaster,
and there was a fine possibility for destroying it.

Wagner's division had so much property to protect that it was stretched
out on a line extending from the railway station, nearly a mile
northwest of Spring Hill, where two trains of cars were standing on the
track, around by the north, east and south, to the Columbia pike on the
southwest. Behind this long line the village streets and the adjacent
fields were crammed with nearly everyth