post, he
goes into position, and prolongs Berry, south of the pike. It is long
after dark before he ascertains his bearings, and succeeds in massing
his division where it is needed.

Anxious as Jackson is to press on,--"Give me one hour more of daylight,
and I will have United-States Ford!" cries he,--he finds that he must
re-establish order in his scattered forces before he can launch this
night attack upon our newly formed but stubbornly maintained lines.

Nor is the darkness the most potent influence toward this end. Illy as
Sickles's advance has resulted thus far, it is now a sovereign element
in the salvation of the Army of the Potomac. His force at the Furnace,
Birney, Whipple, Barlow, and Pleasonton, amounts to fifteen thousand
men, and over forty guns. None of these officers are the men to
stand about idle. No sooner has Sickles been persuaded by a second
courier,--the first he would not credit,--that the Eleventh Corps has
been destroyed, and that Jackson is in his rear, than he comprehends
that now, indeed, the time has come to batter Jackson's flank. He
orders his column to the right about, and moves up with all speed to
the clearing, where Pleasonton has held his cavalry, near Birney's old
front.

Howard, upon being attacked, had sent hurriedly for a cavalry regiment.
Pleasonton, having received orders to send him one, instructed Major
Huey, commanding the Eighth Pennsylvania Cavalry, to march to Dowdall's
and report to Howard. Huey set out by the wood road which leads through
Hazel Grove into the plank road. From the testimony of the persons
chiefly concerned it would appear that, at the time this order was
given by Pleasonton to Huey, there was at Hazel Grove, where the cavalry
regiments were drawn up, no sign whatever of the disaster to Howard.
There were no fugitives nor any confusion. Nor does the evidence show
that Pleasonton ordered any charge on the enemy: it rather shows that
Huey was not directed to go at urgent speed. And he must have been very
deliberate in his movement, for by the time the cavalry had reached the
vicinity of the plank road, Jackson had demolished the Eleventh Corps,
and had advanced so far that the head of this cavalry column, marching
by twos, suddenly came upon the Confederate lines. The officers in the
lead at once gave the order to charge, and right gallantly did
these intrepid horsemen ride down into the seething mass of exultant
Confederate infantry. The shock was nobly