Drummer Boy at Bull Run (13 page)

As soon as he drew up, he said, “General Jackson. General Johnston has arrived from the Shenandoah. The Yankees are attacking over on the left. He commands you to take your brigade at once to engage them there.”

General Jackson’s eyes seemed to glow with a pale blue light. He nodded. “Yes, Lieutenant.” Then he raised his voice and called out to his staff officers, “Move at once to the left. The enemy is attacking there.”

Tom was waiting impatiently, and Jeff came to stand beside him. Jeff was apprehensive and nervous.

Suddenly Tom said, “Look, there’s Pa—I mean, there’s the lieutenant.”

They hurried forward to hear their father cry, “Company A, prepare to march. We’re moving to our left. No stragglers now.” He glanced over, saw
his sons, and said, “Let’s hear those drums, drummer boy, and get the men at once to moving.”

Jeff called out, “Yes, sir,” and began to sound the appropriate drum rolls. Bugles blew, men shouted, and soon it seemed the whole brigade was running toward the left. Ahead he could see General Jackson and his staff as they moved in that direction.

“Shoot!” he gasped as he stumbled along over the rough ground. “I guess we’re into it this time!”

Curly Henson’s face was rather pale under his sunburn. He had been boastful all night about what he would do to the Yankees, but now he muttered, “I’d just as soon them Yankees turned around and went back to Washington!”

As they approached the left of the Confederate line, the sound of combat swelled. Officers called out orders, and the men were thrown into a battle formation.

Jeff stood close to his father, who continually barked out commands. “Move to the right!” “Get the strikers together!” “Watch them, sergeant! Don’t let them shoot until we’ve got something to shoot at.”

Jeff would never forget his first exposure to enemy fire. It sounded as though a giant were breaking huge sticks—
crack! crack! crack! crack!

The Confederate cannons stationed nearby almost deafened him with their roar as they threw their missiles across Bull Run Creek. All was noise and fire and smoke—and then suddenly, just down the line from him, a soldier coughed loudly, then fell. Two or three of his comrades moved to him, and one looked up with a white face and whispered, “He’s dead! Got him right in the heart!”

Jeff’s breath seemed to stop. It was as if an iron band were tightened around his chest. He had known the soldier, a young man named Tim Eberly, who came from Mississippi. He had shared a plate of beans once with him and listened to the young man tell about a fox hunt he’d been on.

Fearfully, Jeff looked over at him. There was an awful stillness about him, and his white face frightened Jeff.
Tim’s never going to get to go back to Mississippi
, he thought numbly and swallowed hard.

Then amid the booming of cannons and the rattle of musket fire, he heard his father call, “Look out—here they come! Every man load, but don’t fire until I give the signal!”

Jeff crouched down at his sergeant’s command as blue-clad figures emerged from the battle smoke. They were running as fast as they could, it seemed, and Jeff had the impulse to turn and run away. When they were no more than fifty feet away, Jeff’s father shouted, “Fire!”

A crash of rifle fire echoed his words, and Jeff saw a huge gap suddenly appear in the blue line. Some men fell. Others were driven back, dropping their muskets. The whole line of unharmed men wavered. Looking around and seeing their predicament, suddenly they whirled and ran back into the smoke.

“We stopped them that time!” Curly Henson gasped. “We sure stopped them Yankees, didn’t we?”

But that was merely the first charge. Time and again the blue waves came rushing into the battle, and slowly the Confederates were driven back.

“We can’t stand this long,” Jeff muttered to the sergeant. “Lots of our men have gone down.”

The sergeant nodded. “I know it.” He paused, then said, “Look! Who’s that officer?”

Lieutenant Majors stood up to see more clearly. “I know him. That’s General Bee. Looks like they’ve been taking a beating.” Jeff watched as General Bee rode up.

“General Jackson—they’re driving us back!”

Jackson, mounted on his horse, looked over at the fury of the battle and shook his head firmly. His eyes blazed. “Then we will give them the bayonet. Stand your ground, sir!”

General Bee seemed to take courage from this. He whirled his horse around, rode back a few yards, and Jeff could hear him call, “Men, don’t run!—rally behind the Virginians! There stands Jackson like a stone wall!”

And that was the way General Jackson got his nickname. “I guess now he’ll always be Stonewall Jackson,” Jeff heard his father say as the Virginians moved forward. He added to Jeff, “I’m glad you’re all right. I’ve got to go forward now. You stay up as much as you can.”

“All right, Pa,” Jeff said with a swallow. “I’ll do like you say. But you be careful, will you?”

But Jeff’s father could not be careful. There was no way to be careful in the battle that followed. All afternoon long the cannons roared, and the muskets crackled. Charges and countercharges took place on ground close to a house owned by a family named Henry. Guns were brought into place and began a withering fire. Some were captured and turned upon the enemy.

During one charge, Jeff found himself suddenly left behind as the Confederates were beaten back. He looked up to see a blue-clad Yankee rushing
right at him with a bayonet. The man’s eyes were insane with battle madness, and Jeff knew that he could never get away. Nevertheless, he whirled and tried to run. His drum thumped against him.

Then, almost in his ear, a rifle exploded. He turned to see the Union soldier fall—and Curly Henson lower his musket. Curly’s face was black with gunpowder.

“You OK, boy?” he asked huskily.

“Sure. I am now.” Jeff looked at the Union soldier, then back to Curly. “I guess you saved my bacon that time, Curly. I owe you one.”

Curly Henson had given the boy nothing but problems, but somehow that had all changed now. He laid a large, rough hand on Jeff’s shoulder and grinned. “Aw, we Rebels got to stick together, don’t we? Come on, Jeff, let’s get out of this.”

T
he Battle of Bull Run developed into a contest for possession of the plateau surrounding the Henry house.

When Lieutenant Nelson Majors climbed to the top of the slight ridge, he had a clear view of the whole line. “Look, there,” he said to Sergeant Mapes, “you can see the enemy like bees in a hive.”

They watched as the officers rode about and their columns moved about everywhere. Some batteries on the left and right were masked by trees, but the lieutenant could see puffs of smoke and knew that the shells were falling on the North’s own lines.

“Not much order over there, is there, Sergeant? Look, those regiments are scattered, and the lines aren’t even.”

“No, sir, but I guess we’ve got about as many stragglers as they have.” Mapes looked around. “I ain’t never seen anything quite this bad. Lots of men have fallen, and that makes some others run away.”

“And a lot of men are hurt too.” Nelson Majors watched the continuous stream of injured being carried past. Sometimes soldiers would cross their muskets, place their wounded companions across them, and carry them. A wounded soldier walked past with his arm around another soldier’s neck, the two of them making their way slowly to the rear.

“This is hard going, Mapes,” Lieutenant Majors said. “We’re going to have to do better than this if we’re going to whip those Yankees.”

“I guess you’re right, sir look, the General’s motioning for you.”

Nelson Majors saw Jackson signaling him to come forward. He moved his horse up beside the General’s, and Jackson said, “Lieutenant, I want you to ride from battery to battery and see that the guns are properly aimed and the fuses are the right length.”

“Yes, sir.” He immediately galloped away to do as the General had ordered.

“We ain’t got much ammunition left,” one artillery officer told him. “Tell the general if we’re going to do anything, we had better do it quick.”

Nelson Majors made his way back to General Jackson and gave his report, adding, “The guns are running low on ammunition, General.”

Jackson’s eyes fairly blazed. He had a way, the lieutenant had noticed, of throwing up his left hand with the open palm toward the person he was addressing. He threw it up now and said, “All right, Lieutenant, we’ll—”

Then he jerked his hand down, and the lieutenant saw blood streaming from it.

“General, you’re wounded!”

Jackson drew a handkerchief from his breast pocket and began to bind up his hand. “Only a scratch a mere scratch,” he said and galloped away.

The battle raged for another hour, and then General Jackson returned, his staff officers behind him. “We’ll be leading a charge, Lieutenant Majors. I want Company A in the front. Are your men ready?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Then have your drummer boy signal the charge.”

Nelson Majors whirled away and found his top sergeant. “We’re going to charge, Mapes.” He looked about and saw Jeff. “Jeff, sound the charge.”

Jeff’s face was pale, but he at once began beating the long drum roll that announced the charge.

At once the men looked up, though weary already with fighting.

Lieutenant Majors drew his saber. “Follow me, men! We’ve got them this time!”

The entire company moved forward. To their right and to their left, other companies began to form.

Jeff marched along, but the lines became so uneven that it seemed there was little order. He saw his father getting far ahead and wanted to call out to him to slow down.

Curly Henson stayed beside him. “That pa of yours he don’t know what fear is, does he?”

“I wish he did, Curly,” Jeff muttered. “He’s getting too far ahead.”

Even as he spoke, he heard the thunder of Federal artillery. Shells began to drop all around them. One came so close that it almost deafened him, and when the dirt had stopped falling he saw that several men were down.

Then, lifting his eyes, Jeff saw a group of Federal soldiers emerge from a stand of trees. He yelled, “Look out, Pa!”

But he was too late. One of the blue-clad men leveled his musket. A puff of smoke came from the end of it. At almost the same time, Jeff saw his father throw up his hands and go to the ground.

“Pa!” He stripped off his drum and leaped ahead, but Curly Henson threw his arms around him. “It’s too late, Jeff,” he said. “See the Yankees have cut us off.”

Jeff saw that what the curly-haired man said was true. The Federals who had come out of the trees were joined by others, so that now they formed a solid line. But Jeff still struggled to free himself. “I’ve got to get to him.”

But now the sergeant was yelling, “Retreat! Retreat!”

“Come on, Jeff, your pa will be all right; probably just wounded. He’ll be a prisoner, but he’ll be OK.”

* * *

General Beauregard’s face ordinarily was an olive color, but now his officers saw that he had grown pale. When one said, “I don’t see how we can go on, sir,” the general did not answer.

Suddenly he raised his arm. In the distance a column of men was approaching. “Whose flag is that?” Beauregard demanded.

“I don’t know,” a major answered. “I can’t tell at this distance whether it’s Federal or Confederate.”

General Beauregard stared at the flag. He well knew that, despite all their efforts, if the men under that flag were Union troops the battle was lost. He took his glass to examine the flag and the approaching banner, but he still could not identify it.

Finally, Colonel Evans said, “I fear that may be Patterson’s division from the Valley. If so, it’s all up with us, I’m afraid, General Beauregard.”

Just then a gust of wind shook out the folds of the flag, and the general shouted, “It’s the stars and bars!”

Cheer after cheer was raised along the Confederate lines as the men came on. These were Kirby Smith’s troops from the Shenandoah Valley. Their train had broken down, but they had arrived on the field at the supreme moment.

The reinforcements had an extraordinary effect on the battle. They threw themselves into the woods and laid down a withering fire on the Union troops. The Federal soldiers soon disintegrated into disorder. Their officers made every attempt to rally them but in vain, and soon the slopes were swarming with retreating and disorganized forces. Riderless horses and artillery teams ran furiously through the fleeing men.

All further Union efforts were futile. Something had happened to the Army of the Potomac. All sense of manhood seemed forgotten. Even the sentiment of shame had gone. Everything was thrown aside that would hinder flight. Rifles, bayonets, pistols, haversacks, cartridges, canteens, blankets, belts, and overcoats lined the road as they fled.

Daniel Carter and Leah sensed that the battle had turned.

“I think we’re losing,” he said. As if to confirm his words, a crowd of Union soldiers suddenly appeared over the hillcrest. They carried no guns, and they ran frantically like men in a wild race.

As they passed by, Leah saw that their eyes were blank with fear. No one could have stopped them.

“We’d better get out of here, I guess, Leah,” her father said. “If the troops are running, the Confederates will be here soon.” He turned the
wagon around and followed the Warren Turnpike, which soon became the main line of retreat for soldiers, sutlers, and spectators.

When they reached a bridge, Leah saw that gunfire had taken down a team of horses ahead of them. The wagon had overturned directly in the center of the bridge, and their passage was completely obstructed. Shot and shell from Rebel fire continued to fall, and the infantry were furiously pelted with a shower of grape and other shot. The dead lay all about.

Seeing the bridge blocked, drivers began turning off, and their wagons bumped over the rough stones as they forded the small creek. Army wagons, sutlers’ teams, and private carriages choked the passage, tumbling against each other amid clouds of dust. The congressmen whipped their horses furiously. Horses, many of them wounded, galloped at random. Men who could catch them rode them bareback, as much to save themselves from being run over as to make quicker time.