An Eye for Glory The Civil War Chronicles of a Citizen Soldier by Karl Bacon

Author:Karl Bacon
Language: eng
Format: mobi
ISBN: 9780310412625
Publisher: Zondervan
Published: 2011-02-22T06:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 20

A Knock on the Head

And thou shalt grope at noonday,

as the blind gropeth in darkness,

and thou shalt not prosper in thy ways:

and thou shalt be only oppressed and spoiled evermore,

and no man shall save thee.

DEUTERONOMY 28:29

IT CAME UP THE LINE FROM THE SOUTH, A CHORUS OF HUSHED whispers sweeping toward us like a swarm of angry bees. “Hooker’s dead! Killed by a Rebel shell.” Each man turned and passed this dreadful news on to the next.

The roar of the cannonading had been constant, and every veteran infantryman could tell that the Federal artillery was not getting the best of it. The firing to the south of our line had gradually shifted eastward, toward the rear of our position, closer and closer to the Chancellorsville crossroad, as our guns withdrew under a heavy Confederate onslaught.

“General Couch must be in command of the whole army now,” Teddy Mills said. “I think he’s the senior corps commander.”

“He is,” I said. “Who’s got the corps, then? Hancock?”

“Probably—hope it’s not French.”

“Do you think Couch is the man for the job?” I asked. “Do you think he can command the whole army?”

“Probably not, but who else is there?”

“That’s the question. And Lincoln had better find an answer for it if we’re ever to win this war. Who is that general of generals who can beat Bobby Lee at his own game?”

A rider galloped up, dismounted, and spoke briefly and excitedly to Colonel Carroll for a few moments, then galloped back the way he had come.

“Men,” the colonel called out, “I’ve just been informed that we’re being withdrawn from this advanced position. The army will form a new line back near the Bullock farm where we will prepare to meet the enemy again. These orders have come from General Hooker himself. He has not been killed, only slightly injured, just a knock on the head. He remains in command of this army. Prepare to move out.”

“I helped build these works and I fought to take them back from the Rebs,” I said to Mills. “We won this ground—and now we’re just supposed to walk away and give it all up?”

Yet that is what we did. We simply walked away and left those fine breastworks and that blood-bought ground to the Confederates, not understanding why we were yielding without a fight, but the army never issued explanations along with its orders.

Carroll’s brigade withdrew to the northeast, and soon we emerged from the woods into the fields around the Bullock farm. Six corps of Federal infantry, about 70,000 troops in all, were assembling in the vicinity, and pandemonium ruled as units of every type tried to organize and maneuver to their newly assigned positions, all the while dodging the incessant rain of shot and shell from Rebel guns.

Captain Davis of Company I, the ranking officer of the Fourteenth on that part of the field, gathered the forty-odd men of the regiment together. We bade our comrades in Carroll’s command a fond farewell and set off to find the rest of the regiment.

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