THE FIRST BATTLE OF BULL RUN.

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irregular directions and length, and studded with clumps and patches of youngpine and oaks. The general direction of the crest of the plateau is oblique tothe course of Bull Bun in that quarter and to the Sudley and turnpike roads,which intersect each other at right angles. On the north-western brow, over-looking Young’s Branch, and near the Sudley road, as the latter climbs overthe plateau, stood the house of the widow Henry, while to its right and for-ward on a projecting spur stood the house and sheds of the free negro Bobin-son, just behind the turnpike, densely embowered in trees and shrubbery andenvironed by a double row of fences on two sides. Around the eastern andsouthern brow of the plateau an almost unbroken fringe of second-growthpines gave excellent shelter for our marksmen, who availed themselves of itwith the most satisfactory skill. To the west, adjoining the fields that sur-rounded the houses mentioned, a broad belt of oaks extends directly acrossthe crest on both sides of the Sudley road, in which, during the battle, thehostile forces contended for the mastery. General Bee, with a soldier’s eye tothe situation, skillfully disposed his forces. His two brigades on either sideof Imboden’s battery — which he had borrowed from his neighboring reserve,Jackson’s brigade — were placed in a small depression of the plateau inadvance of the Henry house, whence he had a full view of the contest on theopposite height across the valley of Young’s Branch. Opening with hisartillery upon the Federal batteries, he answered Evans’s request by advisinghim to withdraw to his own position on the height; but Evans, full of thespirit that would not retreat, renewed his appeal that the forces in rearwould come to help him hold his ground. The newly arrived forces hadgiven the Federals such superiority at this point as to dwarf Evans’s meansof resistance, and General Bee, generously yielding his own better judgmentto Evans’s persistence, led the two brigades across the valley under the fireof the enemy’s artillery, and threw them into action — 1 regiment in the copseheld by Colonel Evans, 2 along a fence on the right, and 2 under GeneralBartow on the prolonged right of this line, but extended forward at a rightangle and along the edge of a wood not more than 100 yards from thatheld by the enemy’s left, where the contest at short range became sharp anddeadly, bringing many casualties to both sides. The Federal infantry,though still in superior numbers, failed to make any headway against thissturdy van, notwithstanding Bee’s whole line was hammered also by theenemy’s powerful batteries, until Heintzelman’s division of 2 strong brigades,arriving from Sudley Ford, extended the fire on the Federal right, while itsbattery of 6 10-pounder rifled guns took an immediately effective part from aposition behind the Sudley road. Against these odds the Confederate forcewas still endeavoring to hold its ground, when a new enemy came into thefield upon its right. Major Wheat , with characteristic daring and restless-ness, had crossed Bull Bun alone by a small ford above the Stone Bridge, inorder to reconnoiter, when he and Evans had first moved to the left, and, fall-ing on some Federal scouts, had shouted a taunting defiance and withdrawn,not, however, without his place of crossing having been observed. This dis-