THE ELEVENTH CORPS AT CHANCELLORSVILLE.
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a &d reported in substance that he (Sickles) was glad to receive the help ; thathe was about to make a grand attack, having been for some time driving theenemy, and expected soon a brilliant result; that he desired to place my^enforcement upon his right flank in the forward movement.
Such was the state of things when, through Captain Moore, General Hookerdirected to Sickles’s attack, at the Furnace, all of my general infantry reserves,insisting of Barlow’s stanch brigade. Steinwehr and I, with Major Howardas guide, went far enough southward to see what was to be done with our
lri en, and to see if Steinwelir’s di-vision, as was probable, must swinghr to the left in support of Sickles’sPromised attack. There was no realbattle there, so we returned rapidlyto our post at the tavern and dis-counted.
Meanwhile the Confederate Gfen-ei ’al Bodes had been reaching hisPlace iu the Wilderness. At 4 p. m.
Ms men were in position; the line°f battle of his own brigade touchedMe pike west of us with its right andstretched away to the north; beyondMs brig ade came Iverson’s in thesame line. On the right of the pike^as Doles’s brigade, and to his rightColquitt’s. One hundred yards toMe rear was Trimble’s division (Col-ston commanding), with Ramseur on the right following Colquitt. AfterAnother interval followed the division of A. P. Hill . The advance Confeder-ate division had more men in it than there were in the Eleventh Corps, nowM position. Counting the ranks of this formidable column, beginning withMe enveloping skirmish line, we find 7, besides the 3 ranks of file-closers.Many of them were brought into a solid mass by the entanglements of theMrest, and gave our men the idea that battalions were formed in closecolumns doubled on the center. With as little noise as possible, a littleafter 5 p. m., the steady advance of the enemy began. Its first lively effects,M«; a cloud of dust driven before a coming shower, appeared in the startledfabbits, squirrels, quail, and other game flying wildly hither and thither inevident terror, and escaping, where possible, into adjacent clearings.
The foremost men of Doles’s brigade took about half an hour to stiike ouiaf lVance picket on the pike. This picket, of course, created no delay. . Fif-teen minutes later he reached our skirmishers, who seem to have resistedeffectively for a few minutes, for it required a main line to dislodge them.J °le,s says, concerning the next check he received, “ After a resistance ofMont ten minutes we drove him [Devens] from his position on the left andCai 'i'ied his battery of two guns, caissons, and horses.”