hemselves on our lines, and were repulsed; but our ranks were becoming
dangerously thinned. If a few thousand troops could have been brought
from Lew Wallace's division to our sorely-tried left the battle would
have been won. His failure to reach us was fatal.

Yet, during all this terrible ordeal through which our comrades on the
immediate right and the left of us were passing, we were left
undisturbed until about two o'clock. Then there came from the woods on
the other side of the field, to the edge of it, and then came trotting
across it, as fine looking a body of men as I ever expect to see under
arms. They came with their guns at what soldiers call right shoulder
shift. Lying on the ground there, with the rails of the fence thrown
down in front of us, we beheld them, as they started in beautiful line;
then increasing their speed as they neared our side of the field, they
came on till they reached the range of our smooth bore guns, loaded
with buck and ball. Then we rose with a volley right in their faces. Of
course, the smoke then entirely obscured the vision, but with eager,
bloodthirsty energy, we loaded and fired our muskets at the top of our
speed, aiming low, until, from not noticing any return fire, the word
passed along from man to man to stop firing. As the smoke rose so that
we could see over the field, that splendid body of men presented to my
eyes more the appearance of a wind-row of hay than anything else. They
seemed to be piled up on each other in a long row across the field.
Probably the obscurity caused by the smoke, as well as the slight slope
of the ground towards us, accounted for this piled up appearance, for
it was something which could not possibly occur. But the slaughter had
been fearful. Here and there you could see a squad of men running off
out of range; now and then a man lying down, probably wounded or
stunned, would rise and try to run, soon to tumble from the shots we
sent after him. After the action I went all over the field of battle,
visiting every part of it; but in no place was there anything like the
number of dead upon the same space of ground as here in this little
field. Our old fashioned guns, loaded as they were, and at such close
quarters, had done fearful execution. This is undoubtedly the same
field General Grant speaks of in the Century article, but he is
mistaken when he speaks of the dead being from both sides. There were
no Union dead in that field.

Our casualties