IN FRONT OF THE STONE WALL AT FREDERICKSBURG.
125
us free; free from the fire that was galling and6 oituating us; free from the fear of guns on theand advance from the front; free fromf r Dl ' :)ness > and constraint, and irksomeness, andfrom the cold, wet earth. Also it would bringA Messengers from the town to call us back fromg 6 e xposed position and the field of dead bodies.a he lingered and stood upon the order of hisit seemed as if a Joshua of the Confed-had caused him to stand still,n'lien at last the great disc stood, large and red,^ Pon the horizon, every face was turned toward it,^getting constraint, thirst, tobacco, and rebelhad' ) U ea S erliess to see the end of a day thatand ^ u £ht us a new experience of a soldier’s life,the ■ ^ com bined the dangers of a battle-field anda 6 ^comfort of a winter’s bivouac with many^ horrors of its own.
tw lingering sun went down. December
f e ^hts are short; the Federal line sprang to itsgre a -* mos t a shout of relief. The reoel fire^Mker as they saw such a swarm of blue-t 0 8 rising from the ground, but it was too latea j Se ® the fore-sights on the rifles, and shots un-g 0 e( * We re not so terrible as the hated ground.
eoutem ptuously emptied our rifles at them,U 6gg 6 t°re the smoke rolled away the coming dark-^ Plotted out the wall and the hostile line,gha h ° Ur ^ ue rose a ^ so a f 0W men t rom the0tl y Pile of yesterday’s dead, who hobbled uphad vj’ s ^ e(;s used as crutches. These poor fellowshad U P their own wounds, and the coffee we
'p^g^Men them had cheered them in to life and hope.
c heerfulness grew into hilarity and merri-ly d 58 ^ e y foull£ l themselves clear, at last, fromb y eac *> an< l facing toward home, with a hope nots 9e y Means so impossible of realization as it hadW as n °t long before. Poor fellows! their joyMde®. 01>e touching than their sufferings,—which,p n ’ ^hey seemed to have forgotten.
150 a. Ur ° wn brigade we found we had lost nearlyIOoq ° ut a present-for-duty strength of aboutloss ir, m6n ' ^his would have been a fair averagean y ordinary battle, but we had suffered it
as
We
ft itetn ^ 011 hbe ground inactive, without the ex-to p 6 and dash of battle and without the chancean 0 g y; a strain upon nerves and physical endur-fchap ^Mh we afterward remembered as severerbuzz more fatal fields. In the midst of ourPeeted re ^ e: *' an£ i mutual congratulation, the ex-tent summons came for us to fall hack to the°nce
°Wn.
°attl e t u UCe More we formed an upright line ofen faced by the rear rank and marched
in retreat, with muffled canteens and many haltsand facings about toward a possible pursuit.Beaching a slight bank, we descended to themeadow through which the Fredericksburg race-way was dug, and here we changed to a flankmarch and filed into the highway. The highwaysoon became a street, and we were once more inFredericksburg .
We marched past the court-house, — pastchurches, schools, bank-buildings, private houses,— all lighted for hospital purposes, and all in use,though a part of the wounded had been transferredacross the river. Even the door-yards had theirlitter-beds, and were well filled with wounded men,and the dead were laid in rows for burial. Thehospital lights and camp-fires in the streets, andthe smoldering ruins of burned buildings, withthe mixture of the lawless rioting of the demor-alized stragglers, and the suffering and death inthe hospitals, gave the sacked and gutted townthe look of pandemonium.
In our new freedom we wandered about for thefirst half of the night, loath to lie 011 the earthagain after our day’s experience. At last wespread our blankets on a sidewalk and slept inthe lurid firelight with a sense of safety not war-ranted by our position. The next morning wemade our toilets in wanton plenty. Water from apump! and we bathed in the falling splash. Our‘ 1 contraband ” brought us a box of soap and anuncut, unhemmed bolt of toweling from the de-spised plunder of a store. The same source gaveus a table-cloth for our breakfast. This we spreadupon the sidewalk and furnished with variouslyassorted crockery from an ownerless pantry. Cab-bage fresh from a kitchen garden, with vinegarfrom the deserted kitchen, added a welcome andunusual luxury to the meal. And at the end werolled dishes and ddbris together into the pavedgutter by a comprehensive pull at the table-cloth.Then we smoked the emblem of peace, tilted backagainst the buildings in borrowed chairs, and werevery comfortable and happy. This was the holidayof war,— vastly better than yesterday! But wewere hardly safer here, though more comfortable.Lee might open his guns at any moment. Thedrum-beat made ns tip down our chairs and fallinto line. We had roll-call and something like adress parade without music, then stacked armsalong the curb-stone and mounted sentinels overthem. A bright, beautiful day and the freedomof an uninhabited and plundered city were be-fore us.
\Th e
Official Records ” (Vol. XXI., Pt. I., p. 136) give the loss as 12 killed, 114 wounded, 14 missing ;
total, 140.— Editors.