They Met at Shiloh (38 page)

“Yes, sir. Are we really going all the way back?”

“ ‘Fraid so. It’s back to our starting point for us.”

“Yes, sir.”

The command structure was built to make every man replaceable. But only the functions were duplicated. There could be no other Albert S. Johnston in command of the army, and P.G.T. Beauregard proved unable to do anything but occupy his place of command. Wilson was a good soldier and sergeant, but he was no Charles Mahoney. Almost fifteen years Michael’s senior, Mahoney had been more than a friend. He had been a comrade and mentor. Michael would work closely with Wilson as he had with Mahoney, but would it be as before? No, it didn’t seem likely.

The burial had been quick and brief behind the barricades of fallen timbers. Three other officers perished in that bounding shot that had found the officers’ mess. Michael remembered standing by the grave site and doing something unexpected. He had crossed himself.

Now, amid the voiceless clamor of men on a dreary march, Michael wondered what caused the involuntary movement. Mother’s catechism and the days spent avoiding the parish priest as a lad in Natchez, Mississippi, were so far removed from the present that Michael was forced to reconcile the incongruence. Something of those times, when he was brought into the presence of the crucifix behind the pulpit, must have stuck.

Michael smiled to himself as he thought about Mahoney’s possible reaction to his Catholic gesture over the grave of a Protestant. Yet it was never that simple. Did not charity say that the lost were the ones to be found? But for some reason, Mahoney was equally concerned for Michael’s spiritual state. His father’s descriptions of the sectarian strife in the old country were foreign to him, with Protestants and Catholics fighting one another. Perhaps it was a strictly Irish affair. Perhaps he didn’t think enough about what the differences were to even care that Mahoney was of a different faith than he. His father would have cared. Indeed, until Michael entered into life as a man, he’d never had a close friend of the Protestant faith. It just never happened in the circles his family kept. The Catholics in Texas were different from those in Mississippi and Arkansas. The faith of the Mexicans and natives he played and worshipped with had a mystical quality. They took their religion much more seriously than even his Irish Catholic father. Mahoney had been a different animal. His faith was neither mystical nor serious.

“What’s so wrong with the faith of St. Peter and the true church of their Catholic fathers?” Michael had asked one evening after a long day of drill, although it stretched his own shallow understanding of the origins of the Protestant movement and Catholicism.

“Oh, something about St. Peter’s Basilica needing a renovation, and the dispensing of indulgences to keep out of Hell for a price would about do it,” Mahoney replied with a chuckle.

“But then why aren’t you a Lutheran instead of a Methodist? Why was Wesley better than Luther?” Michael asked.

“Honestly? Because my mother was a Methodist,” Mahoney admitted. “That and it just happened to be the faith passed down to me.”

“But is there any real difference? Why the separation? Why not be some other Protestant sect?” Michael said.

Mahoney shrugged. “Just not the way it is. Would you say that some of those Catholics fighting for the Federals are wrong or just of a different mind than those fighting for us?”

“Don’t really know. It ain’t a question of faith, just of politics and loyalty, I suppose.”

“So, if they sin no more than you sin just by wearing a different uniform, then might the same be said of anyone of a different faith? We have different ways of expressing faith, despite the designations, but serve the same God. No matter what faith you grew up in, there is a need for Christ to cover all.”

Those words still rattled around in Michael’s mind as the road wound past Michie’s and down the long way to Corinth. The Eucharist was something Mahoney did not partake of, one of the things that separated a Catholic from anyone else. Same wine, same bread, same prayers said in all reverence, but yet not the same. In the priest’s hands, the bread and wine became something else in accordance with Christ’s words to eat of His flesh and drink His blood or be found to have no part in Him. Not a big difference, perhaps. They still prayed to the same God the Father. Not like the savages roaming the Texas western plains who worshiped trees and birds and the elements. There was a difference there: many gods versus one God. Those were differences he could understand.

But now Mahoney had gone to whatever reward he most believed in. Heaven or Hell was waiting for his soul, and everyone’s soul, once the last breath was breathed. There was another difference between the two men. Mahoney said he knew for sure where he was going, not just wishful thinking or vain hoping but knowing. Not even the parish priest would make such a declaration of himself. Was not there a balance to life with the good and the bad, sin and righteousness being held in account?

Michael puzzled over this whenever he felt the most vulnerable or tired. His friend and the man whom he would gladly have called a brother was gone. He said he was clean as if the sacrament held by the priest in the chalice had done something permanent for him though he had never partaken of it. There was a difference that was hard to place with the man. Perhaps his own faith was the difference. Not the upbringing, but the faith. If faith was it, then was there more that he didn’t understand about what makes a man accept death without feeling remorse for what lay ahead? Michael lowered his head and allowed the movements of his horse to lull him into a fitful nap.

24th Ohio

Field Hospital April 7th, 1862

P
hilip stood vigil over Harper’s corpse until he couldn’t feel his feet. The passing had not been quiet or peaceful, but wracked with violent spasms of breath tingled with blood. Mule, trying to make Harper comfortable, had joined Philip in his ministrations. But there was nothing to be done to relieve the man of his torment. His last moments were filled with invective and cries for absolution from his sins. In the end, Harper pleaded with Philip to prevent his soul from experiencing the torments of Beelzebub. Philip replied that he needed not to seek it from him but from the Christ. Only Jesus could do such a thing, he said. Philip prayed aloud, stumbling over his words in frustration and exhaustion. The man was silent now, but Harper’s passing was as trying to Philip’s soul as the man’s life had been.

“I don’t want to go to Hell. Don’t leave my father with more grief. See to it,” Harper whispered.

“I cannot do anything for your soul.”

“See to it!” Harper wheezed and weakly grabbed Philip’s arm.

“Do you renounce the ways of this world?” Philip asked.

Harper mumbled something, closing his eyes tightly.

“Do you receive the Son as the only answer for your sin?”

Harper shuddered again and took in a deep, labored breath.

“Pray this to God and by faith accept the forgiveness and the spirit of life.”

Harper did nothing, nor did he seem even to have heard Philip. A weakened hand gripped Philip’s arm.

Philip, confused, tried to jerk it free.

“Say . . . say it,” Harper struggled.

It was Philip’s turn to squirm. Whether Harper was going to burn in Hell or live in Heaven was forgotten as the memory of the serious breach of his trust confronted him again. Harper was using his last breaths to drag out of him something that could easily be given but not easily felt. He had done his duty and even pressed it to Harper in as plain a language as he could. Harper’s soul waited in limbo, and the only thing Harper could do in return was extract a last moment of retribution.

“I’m sorry,” Philip said weakly. “I’m sorry I did not comfort you and your family in your loss at the funeral. Will you forgive me?” Philip cringed inwardly as he waited for what must be the last words to be spoken between them. So many in the intervening years had been wasted in hateful speech.

Harper forced a wry smile, or something akin to a smile. He blinked several times and looked at Philip, and his mouth moved in silent words.

Philip gripped Harper’s shoulders. “What?”

“Momma for . . . forgave y . . . you. I d . . . do not.” Harper drew in a shallow breath, threw his head back, exhaled slowly, and finally fell still.

Philip and Mule sat looking at the still form without a word. It was over for Philip. After so many arguments, so many harsh words, he didn’t know what to do. His nemesis was removed, and his greatest, most secret, prayer answered. The torment of those memories might finally be put to rest now that the reminder of that day so long ago no longer needed to be suffered.

“You think he did it?” Mule broke the silence.

“Did what?”

“Gave it to God.”

“Only God can know. I hope he did, or he wasted his last moments for an apology.”

“And what about you?” Mule said.

“What? What about me?”

“It’s something you should have done long ago.”

“Apologized?” Philip stared at Mule, and then looked down at Harper’s corpse. “Yes, I should have.”

“He gone?” Sammy asked as he knelt down beside Philip.

“A time ago,” Mule replied.

Sammy just nodded and said, “We’ve done all we can fer our wounded. We ought to head back to the regiment.”

A lesson in humility from a crass and unrighteous man, from a crass and unrighteous family, was not something Philip could easily swallow. But how could he not? Forgiveness should have been sought from the parents years ago, the day after, even. But he was too proud. Who were they to question his pronouncement of truth? Pride for pride, was it not? That was the day his ministry died, as did his desire for it. But for a simple phrase, a simple question, he might have avoided years of strife.

“Harper didn’t die in his sins,” Mule whispered to Sammy.

“We don’t know that,” Philip shot back. “But he did accept my apology.”

“You apologized?” Sammy asked, surprised.

Mule shrugged, looking at Philip. “I think he did.”

“He stayed alive long enough to hear me say it,” Philip said with bitterness. “I needed to say it and knew I needed to when I found him. He was dying, and instead of spending that time in confession to God, he wanted to see me squirm.”

“I think he did you a favor,” Sammy said.

Philip swallowed hard and was loathe to admit it. He already felt better and free.

“Let’s go collect Johnny and make our way back,” Sammy said and stood with a grunt.

Philip raised his hand, “I can’t feel my feet at the moment.” Raised upright and unsteady, Philip brushed his Kerseys off and straightened his empty canteen on his shoulder. He breathed an easier breath and stepped a lighter step, free from an unseen burden. Taking one last look back at the body as they walked away, Philip grudgingly thanked Harper for forcing him to make his own confession of sin.

*****

25th Missouri

Original camp, April 9th 1862

Normality, if it could be called that upon the battle-scarred landscape, returned to Grant’s army, but the cleaning up after the battle took weeks. The stench of rotting horse flesh hung heavily in the air as the thousands of carcasses festered where the beasts fell. The carnage was worse near artillery positions, marked by disabled gun carriages and caissons and horses felled in their traces. The carcasses were burned where they fell in great bonfires that burned the day and night. The dead humanity that littered the open fields and recesses of the forests were also collected or buried where they fell, Confederates in trenches and Union men wherever space allowed. Burial parties worked in shifts, and no one was exempt from the disagreeable work.

Reunited with many more of their comrades, the 25th Missouri regained their command structure and were again falling into the routine of drill, though much time was spent cleaning up their former parade ground. Robert and Huebner sat idly by their company cook fire with the remains of their company. There was no revelry such as they enjoyed before the battle. It was a forlorn affair spent mostly in the remembrance of fallen pards. It was April 11th, and both men were tired, as was everyone who took a place about the fire.

“I hear Halleck replaced Grant in command,” a sergeant said absently.

“Some say he was drunk during the battle.”

“Some say we killed twenty thousand of them Rebels.”

“We must’ve lost many more.”

“Newspapers sayin’ we lose eight thousand killed and wounded.”

“We lose too many Kameraden.” That was from Huebner.

“Ja, Hube,” Robert replied.

“Adjutant tol’ me our returns was fifteen killed, three hundred wounded and missing,” the sergeant added.

Robert picked absently at a blister on his palm from hours digging burial trenches. In the heat the bodies were an awful sight and grotesquely warped. They could do nothing more than dig and toss the bodies in like cordwood. It became an act of rote movement after a day. No longer did the humanity register upon his mind. Their tents had been used to house the wounded, making a hospital compound immediately after the firing ceased. New stores were soon appropriated, as were replacement equipment. The men of the company crowded into new Sibley tents.

New uniforms and tents did not replace the missing men. Standing above the parade ground as the sun was setting earlier in the evening, Robert had looked out upon the wrecked tree line below the encampment and the hill the Rebel host had charged. Now, everything was quiet. No longer did he need to fear the whip of minié balls past his ears or the barking of cannon. The fading sunlight cast shadows that hung long upon the matted grass. Spare and cast-off equipment still littered the gentle slope leading down to the uneven parade ground. No shot was fired in anger, but his nerves were tense. A finality escaped him.

Looking out to where it all began, Robert heaved a sigh and exhaled it slowly. Faces he would no longer see flashed through memory in sad procession. Gustavson growling at Huebner, Hildebrande chiding Gustavson about his age and experience, Piper worrying about making corporal, and he, Robert, fussing over Huebner like a mother hen. Huebner was alive and well but no longer the Jonah of old. He still looked to Robert with boyish affection, but he had also grown. He made it to formations on time, and though he still loved his Kaffe, Robert’s own coffee was now safe.