er the
remnant of Hood's Army (after Franklin) had aligned itself before
Nashville and entrenched somewhere about December 1st to 3rd, it
being perhaps a mile or more from extreme left of Hood's Army to the
Cumberland River. Gen. Chalmers with Cavalry, and the remnant of
Ector's Brigade of infantry as a support, guarding the gaps between
left of Hood's entrenchments at Hillsboro pike, to Cumberland River.
From the date of our arrival at fort location we had rain snow, and
sleet, and the ground frozen hard, so that it was impossible to make
any rapid progress on the redoubt laid off for 4 embrasures for our 4
Napoleon guns. Stretched blankets and the tarpaulins from for our
guns and ammunition were the only cover for officers or men. I well
remember that, the day before the battle of the 15th, my servant Jim
Bobbett brought me a change of clean under clothing, for which I had
to scrape off the snow on a log at Richland Creek, strip and bathe in
its icy waters to make a change.

By the 15th (the day of the battle) we had manerals so long. At my
gun we had lost private Horton and Corporal Gunner Ed. King. Hilen L.
Rosser at another gun had part of his head shot away. That night as I
was pouring some water for Lumsden to wash, he was picking something
out of his beard, and said: "Maxwell, that is part of Rosser's
brains", out of the 40 men that we had at guns, we had only 22 left,
balance having been killed or captured. A Federal officer rode around
Lieut. A. C. Hargrove and demanded his surrender, and cut down at his
head with his sabre. Hargrove caught the blow on his arm, but it beat
down his arm to his head enough to "hurt like thunder", as Hargrove
expressed it.

Hargrove grabbed a loose tree branch and struck at Yank's horse which
about that time got a bullet from our infantry line and ran away from
Hargrove, so that he made it to our new line.

That night we buried Horton near the Franklin pike, where we
bivouaced. I cut his name on a head board, and Command to which he
belonged.

A detail was sent to the house that had been used as a hospital to
bring his body. A long, tall, red-headed private, John Walker, was
one of that detail. He had been carrying a great long navy revolver
for months for use in such circumstances. When asked how many times
he shot it. He laughed and said it was as much as he could do to
persuade himself that he was