f Buell's army, and transported
them to Pittsburg. Few words were spoken as they marched up the hill in
the darkness, with the thousands of wounded on either hand, but there
were many silent thanksgivings that they had come. The wearied soldiers
lay down in battle line to broken sleep, with their loaded guns beside
them. The sentinels stood, like statues, in silence on the borders of
that valley of death, watching and waiting for the morning.
The battle-cloud hung like a pall above the forest. The gloom and
darkness deepened. The stars, which had looked calmly down from the
depths of heaven, withdrew from the scene. A horrible scene! for the
exploding shells had set the forest on fire. The flames consumed the
withered leaves and twigs of the thickets, and crept up to the helpless
wounded, to friend and foe alike. There was no hand but God's to save
them. He heard their cries and groans. The rain came, extinguishing the
flames. It drenched the men in arms, waiting for daybreak to come to
renew the strife, but there were hundreds of wounded, parched with
fever, restless with pain, who thanked God for the rain.
MONDAY.
Beauregard laid his plans to begin the attack at daybreak. Grant and
Buell resolved to do the same,--not to stand upon the defensive, but to
astonish Beauregard by advancing. Nelson's division was placed on the
left, nearest the river, Crittenden's next, McCook's beyond, and Lewis
Wallace on the extreme right,--all fresh troops,--with Grant's other
divisions, which had made such a stubborn resistance, in reserve.
In General Nelson's division, you see nearest the river Colonel Ammen's
brigade, consisting of the Thirty-sixth Indiana, Sixth and Twenty-fourth
Ohio; next, Colonel Bruer's brigade, First, Second, and Twentieth
Kentucky; next, Colonel Hazen's brigade, Ninth Indiana, Sixth Kentucky,
and Forty-first Ohio. Colonel Ammen's brigade arrived in season to take
part in the contest at the ravine on Sunday evening.
General Crittenden's division had two brigades: General Boyle's and
Colonel W. L. Smith's. General Boyle had the Nineteenth and Fifty-ninth
Ohio, and Ninth and Thirteenth Kentucky. Colonel Smith's was composed of
the Thirteenth Ohio, and Eleventh and Twenty-sixth Kentucky, with
Mendenhall's battery, belonging to the United States Regular Army, and
Bartlett's Ohio battery.
General McCook's division had three brigades. The first was commanded by
General Rousseau, consisting of the First
|