stone wall
in front, charging over the broad open fields. On the right was the
Thirtieth Ohio, Colonel Hugh Ewing, who was ordered to advance
against a battery on the crest which kept up a rapid and annoying
fire. It was now about nine o'clock, and Crook's column had come
into close support. Bayonets were fixed, and at the word the line
rushed forward with loud hurrahs. Hayes, being in the woods, was not
seen till he had passed over the crest and turned upon the enemy's
flank and rear. Here was a sharp combat, but our men established
themselves upon the summit and drove the enemy before them. White
and Ewing charged over the open under a destructive fire of musketry
and shrapnel. As Ewing approached the enemy's battery (Bondurant's),
it gave him a parting salvo, and limbered rapidly toward the right
along a road in the edge of the woods which follows the summit to
the turnpike near the Mountain House at Turner's Gap. White's men
never flinched, and the North Carolinians of Garland's brigade (for
it was they who held the ridge at this point) poured in their fire
till the advancing line of bayonets was in their faces when they
broke away from the wall. Our men fell fast, but they kept up their
pace, and the enemy's centre was broken by a heroic charge. Garland
strove hard to rally his men, but his brigade was hopelessly broken
in two. He rallied his right wing on the second ridge a little in
rear of that part of his line, but Hayes's regiment was here pushing
forward from our left. Colonel Ruffin of the Thirteenth North
Carolina held on to the ridge road beyond our right, near Fox's Gap.
The fighting was now wholly in the woods, and though the enemy's
centre was routed there was stubborn resistance on both flanks. His
cavalry dismounted (said to be under Colonel Rosser [Footnote:
Stuart's Report, Official Records, vol. xix. pt. i. p. 817.] ) was
found to extend beyond Hayes's line, and supported the Stuart
artillery, which poured canister into our advancing troops. I now
ordered Crook to send the Eleventh Ohio (under Lieutenant-Colonel
Coleman) beyond Hayes's left to extend our line in that direction,
and to direct the Thirty-sixth Ohio (Lieutenant-Colonel Clark) to
fill a gap between the Twelfth and Thirtieth caused by diverging
lines of advance. The only remaining regiment (the Twenty-eighth,
Lieutenant-Colonel Becker) was held in reserve on the right. The
Thirty-sixth aided by the Twelfth repulsed a stout effort of th