alling along the
line. I set to work helping the wounded to the rear. I had just been to
the hospital with a poor fellow from my company, and hastened back to
where I had last seen the regiment. They had made a flank movement to
the left, but I, supposing that they had advanced and were driving the
enemy like chaff before them, traveled straight on through the woods,
and out into an open field. What a sight was there! Dead and wounded
Confederates lay thickly strewn in every direction. I was really in what
had just been the Confederate lines, and was in imminent peril of being
shot or captured.

"Several of the wounded spoke to me, 'O Yank! for God's sake, give me a
drink of water,' I felt alarmed at my position, but I could not resist
the appeals of these poor fellows. So I gave water to many from the
canteens that I found scattered about the field. I spread blankets for
others who asked me; dragged some of them into the shade, for the sun
was very hot. And so I spent a considerable time among them, doing such
little offices as I could. For these services they were very grateful,
some of them calling down the blessings of heaven upon my head. I have
always been glad that I incurred this risk of life and liberty for these
dying men. But at last I felt that I dared not stop longer, and started
to retrace my steps to the woods, when I heard a terrible wailing and
moaning a few yards to my right. I rushed to the spot and saw a poor
Confederate boy, about my own age, at the foot of a great poplar tree,
in the midst of a brush heap, trying to spread his blanket. I did not at
first see what the cause of his terrible outcry was. 'What is the
matter, Johnnie?' I asked. He lifted his face to me, and I shall never
forget the awful sight! A bullet had shot away the anterior part of each
eye and the bridge of the nose, and in this sightless condition he was
trying in the midst of the brush heap to spread his blanket and lie down
to die! As he moved about upon his hands and knees the ends of the dry
twigs, stiff and merciless as so many wires, would jag his bleeding and
sightless eyeballs. I could not leave him in this condition, and so
helped him from the brush heap to a smooth, shady place, spread his
blanket for him, put a canteen of water by him, and then ran for the
Union lines, not a moment too soon.

"All day the battle raged with terrible fury until long after the shades
of night had fallen. Indeed, the heaviest musketry I