FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   304   305   306   307   308   309   310   311   312   313   314   315   316   317   318   319   320   321   322   323   324   325   326   327   328  
329   330   331   332   333   334   335   336   337   338   339   340   341   342   343   344   345   346   347   348   349   350   351   352   353   >>   >|  
the ravine, and up, on the other side, steadily presses Quinby, till he reaches the crest. He opens fire. An advancing Rebel regiment retires, as he pushes up to where the Union batteries and cannoniers lie wounded and dying--the other three regiments following in line-of-battle until near the crest, when the fire of the Enemy's rifles and musketry, added to his heavy cannonading, grows so severe that the brigade is forced back to shelter in a roadway leading up the plateau. Peck's 2nd Wisconsin, now emerges from this sheltered roadway, and steadily mounts the elevation, in the face of the Enemy's severe fire --returning it, with spirit, as it advances. But the Rebel fire becomes too galling. The gray-clad Wisconsin boys return to the sheltered road again, while the cry goes up from Sherman's ranks: "Our own men are firing at them!" Rallying at the road, the 2nd Wisconsin again returns, with desperate courage, to the crest of the hill, delivers its fire, and then, unable to withstand the dreadful carnage, falls back once more, in disorder. At this, the 79th (Highland) Regiment springs forward, to mount the brow of the fatal hill, swept as it is, with this storm of shot and shell and musket-balls. Up, through the lowering smoke, lit with the Enemy's incessant discharges in the woods beyond, the brave Highlanders jauntily march, and, with Cameron and their colors at their head, charge impetuously across the bloody hill-crest, and still farther, to the front. But it is not in human nature to continue that advance in the teeth of the withering fire from Jackson's batteries, strengthened, as they are, by Pelham's and Kemper's. The gallant fellows fall back, rally again, advance once more, retire again, and at last,--the heroic Cameron being mortally wounded,--fall back, in confusion, under the cover of the hill. And now, while Quinby's Regiment, on another ridge, more to the left, is also again engaging the Enemy, the 69th New York, led by the fearless Corcoran, dashes forward, up the Henry House hill, over the forbidding brow, and beyond. As the brave Irishmen reach the abandoned batteries, the hoarse roar of cannon, the sharp rattle of musketry-volleys, the scream of shot and shell, and the whistling of bullets, is at once deafening and appalling, while the air seems filled with the iron and leaden sleet which sweeps across the scorched and blasted plateau of the Henry House. Nobly the Irish Regiment holds
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   304   305   306   307   308   309   310   311   312   313   314   315   316   317   318   319   320   321   322   323   324   325   326   327   328  
329   330   331   332   333   334   335   336   337   338   339   340   341   342   343   344   345   346   347   348   349   350   351   352   353   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

Regiment

 

batteries

 
Wisconsin
 

steadily

 

roadway

 

Quinby

 

severe

 

plateau

 

sheltered

 

advance


wounded
 

forward

 
Cameron
 

musketry

 

Pelham

 

colors

 

Kemper

 

discharges

 

jauntily

 

fellows


gallant
 

retire

 

impetuously

 

farther

 

continue

 

withering

 

bloody

 

nature

 
Highlanders
 
Jackson

strengthened

 
charge
 

bullets

 

whistling

 

deafening

 
appalling
 
scream
 

volleys

 
cannon
 
rattle

filled

 
blasted
 
scorched
 

sweeps

 
leaden
 
hoarse
 

abandoned

 

engaging

 
mortally
 

confusion