nd the forty guns of Early's artillery were
beginning their work in front, from the left toward the right,
successively the brigades of the Nineteenth Corps began to give
way; yet as they drifted toward the right and rear, in that stress
the men held well to their colors, and although there may and must
have been many that fell out, not a brigade or a regiment lost its
organization for a moment.

When the pressure reached Molineux and Davis on the reverse side
of the entrenchments, both brigades began moving off, under Emory's
orders, by the right flank to take position near Belle Grove on
the right of Ricketts's division of the Sixth Corps, which had come
up and was trying to extend its line diagonally to reach the valley
road. To cover this position and to hold off the onward rush of
Gordon, Emory had already posted the 114th and the 153d New York
on the commanding knoll five hundred yards to the southward
overlooking the road. When driven off these regiments rejoined
their brigade before Belle Grove. Thither also came the detached
regiments of Molineux, and there Neafie joined them with the 3d
brigade, after a strong stand at their breastworks, wherein Macauley
fell severely wounded, and the 156th and 176th had hard fighting
hand-to-hand to keep their colors, at the cost of the staves.
Birge retired along the line of works to the open ground beyond
Meadow Brook, where Shunk joined him.

In quitting their posts at the breastworks Haley, having lost
forty-nine horses killed in harness, had to abandon three guns of
his 1st Maine battery, and Taft lost three pieces of his 5th New
York battery at the difficult crossing of Meadow Brook. There, too,
from the same cause, three guns of the 17th Indiana and two of the
Rhode Island battery were abandoned. The losses of the infantry
were to be counted in thousands. Grover was slightly wounded;
Macauley, as has been said, severely. Emory had lost both his
horses, and was for a time commanding the corps afoot. Birge rode
a mule. Thus the Nineteenth Corps lost eleven guns. Crook had
already lost seven, and the Sixth Corps was presently to lose six.

With Gordon on his flank and rear, every moment drawing nearer to
the mastery of the valley road, Wright had to think, and to think
quickly, of the safety and the success of the army he commanded.
For it there was no longer a position south of Middletown. What
security was there that Custer and Powell would be able all da