Saturday, May 7th.
I woke this morning just at daylight, probably aroused by the whizzing of a stray bullet now and then, and taking an observation from the stump behind which I lay, and which stood about fifty feet in rear of the breastworks, I discovered that .the pine trees in our front and just beyond the “slashing” were full of rebel sharpshooters. This discovery very much surprised me, and disabused my mind of the impression given me the night before that there were two lines of battle in our front, and as quietly as possible I got such of my men as were not already there, into the little trench close to the breastworks, and in the limited space allowed us we began to boil our coffee. This was rather a ticklish business, for the rebels “had us down,” as the situation is described in the army, that is, had the advantage of seeing, and the opportunity of shooting at, any head which might be raised above the top log of the breastworks, a condition of things which seriously embarrassed us in gathering fuel for our little fires. As illustrative of the advantage which accrues to the side which has the other side “down,” I may mention the following incident. One of my men named Michael Ryan, with more curiosity than discretion, looked over the top of the breastworks, thinking to locate a sharpshooter who was in a tree quite near us and was persistent in his attentions to any of us who was careless in exposing himself. Hardly had Ryan’s head reached the level of the log when the sharpshooter furrowed his cheek with a minie ball, and conferred upon him the distinction of being the second man in the company to be wounded. However, the shot had located the tree in which the rifle-man was perched, and borrowing a Springfield musket from one of my men, I crawled along the breastworks a little way, and taking off my hat poked the gun over the ten-inch pine log which topped the earthwork at that point, and gradually bringing the muzzle down in line with the tree, started to squint along the barrel for the chap in the butternut suit. Of course he saw the movement, and at once prepared for the head which he knew would appear at the breach of the gun, and before I could aim anywhere in his neighborhood, he sent a bullet into the log not three inches below my nose, and filled my eyes so full of pulverized pine bark that it took at least fifteen minutes to clear them out, and a much longer time than that to allay the smarting. It was a beautiful line shot, only a trifle low, and raised the man considerably in my estimation. When at length I had recovered my eyesight, I went a little further up the line where there was a green oak stake driven into the ground to support the logs which formed the inner wall of the breastworks. This stake projected a little above the upper log but was not fastened to it, and being some nine inches thick at the top and six inches thick at the bottom, I thought I could with reasonable safety rest my gun on the log alongside of the stake, and, shielding my head behind its wide upper end, get a fair chance for a shot. Hardly had I commenced to put my scheme in execution, when a minie ball struck that stake just opposite my left cheek bone with such precision and force that the blow it communicated sent me sprawling to the ground, where, upon reflection, I concluded that I did not want to kill such an excellent marksman and so returned the Springfield to its owner.
Soon after daylight the enemy, who seemed to suspect that there were some batteries of artillery somewhere on that line, though why they did not know it for a fact I cannot imagine, as their sharpshooters must have seen them, began shelling the line to draw their fire and so unmask their exact location, and as the six-pound rifle shells came in a straight line towards us, we could see them in the air after we knew at just what elevation to expect them, and they looked very much like pigeons coming at us. Some struck outside the breastworks and some passed over our heads, but no damage was done except the killing of one artillery horse and the wounding of some men in other regiments in our rear, and as our artillerists withheld their fire the cannonade did not enlighten the rebels. Shortly after the firing ceased, with the well-known “rebel yell,” the enemy came charging on us through the woods in a disordered mass, the trees having broken up anything like regular charging lines, and just as they were emerging from the timber and had nearly reached the “slashing” in front of the breastworks, not more than forty yards from our lines, our batteries, composed of eighteen guns, I think, opened with grape and canister, and in less time than it takes to tell it, what there was left uninjured of that force disappeared in the dense woods and over the hill in the rear, while the wounded were hiding behind trees as best they could and the dead were scattered about in full view.
About ten o’clock the 12th U. S. Infantry, starting from a point some distance to the left of my company, made a charge through the woods, but with what result I do not know. It was not, however, according to the notions of a volunteer, a very creditable affair so far as military formation and steadiness were concerned, for though all the men were going in the same general direction, they were scattered like a mob and were apparently firing from their hips into the tops of the trees.
Later in the day the 93rd Pennsylvania and the 2nd Michigan formed a line in a ravine in our rear preparatory to charging from our part of the works. This intended movement necessitated my drawing my company out of the ditch behind the breastworks, so that the charging line might pass through and jump the breastworks. As my men were moving out from under cover to the rear, and I was backing away as they approached me, my accomplished acquaintance of the early morning, who had stuck to his tree until this time, apparently drew another bead on me, for a shot came from his direction and passed through the top of the cap of one of my men named Barber, who was directly in front of and very close to me. His cap flew off and he dropped on one knee and raised his hand rather hesitatingly to the top of his head but, finding no blood nor any unusual depression there, he smiled rather a sickly smile, and rising to his feet stood up until all were ordered to lie down. Evidently my friend the enemy in the tree, did not at once grasp the significance of the movement on our side of the breastworks, for, as the picket line which preceded the changing line of the Pennsylvanians jumped the pine logs, he committed the indiscretion of shooting at one of them, thus attracting attention to his aerie, and almost instantly he came tumbling out of that tree as full of holes as a skimmer. After a time the charging troops returned, reporting that they had cleared out a very weakly-defended rifle-pit the holding of which would have been of no advantage to us.
At night we were relieved and ordered back to the wagon train, and moving out under fire we marched about six miles and overtook some of the artillery near Chancellorsville at about two o’clock in the morning. It was pitch dark, and we halted in line along the side of a plank road and laid down and went to sleep. A brigade of infantry was lying fast asleep on the plank road, and sometime before daylight there was a great commotion in that line, caused by a series of most unearthly yells not unlike the “rebel yell” greatly intensified, and by many of the men suddenly awakening and jumping over a fence into a woods filled with underbrush and thus carrying consternation to those farther down the line. When the road was pretty well cleared of everything but guns and old shelter tents, the cause of the stampede in the shape of an enormous mule, came trotting along, braying with all its might, thus illustrating for a second time the power and efficiency of the “jawbone of an ass.”
Saw classmate Capt. Van Marter with his cavalry drawn up beside a road on which we were marching.
