The Shipwreck of Their Hopes by Peter Cozzens

Author:Peter Cozzens
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: University of Illinois Press

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

WE ARE ALL OFFICERS TODAY

THOMAS'S probe of the Confederate rifle pits along the foot of Missionary Ridge had exacted a heavy toll on the Sixth Ohio Infantry. Hopping over their own entrenchments a few minutes after 10:00 A.M., the Ohioans had deployed as skirmishers and stepped off into a belt of leafless, open timber. They stumbled upon a few startled Rebel pickets, who fired a quick volley and ran. The Ohioans gave chase. Two hundred yards short of the Rebel rifle pits the Ohioans found themselves in a field chopped clear of trees. The Confederates opened fire, and the Ohioans dove for cover behind stumps and logs that lay scattered over the flat. For a while, they got on all right. Amidst the sharpshooting, the regimental postmaster sprinted from man to man, delivering letters received that morning from home. Finally, a few minutes before 2:00 P.M., the purpose of the reconnaissance having been achieved—that is to say, proof gained that the Rebels held the foot of Missionary Ridge in force—the Sixth was ordered to fall back. By then, Southern guns on the summit had ranged the regiment. As the men made for the timber, the guns boomed. A shell fragment split the skull of the major. Bursting shells cut down eighteen others.

While the Ohioans regrouped in the wood, orders came for them to return to their entrenchments. An audible sigh of relief rose from the ranks. “As we knew nothing of the intended attack, we congratulated ourselves upon our good fortune in being relieved so soon,” remembered the regimental historian. “But the moment we reached our fortifications on Orchard Knob we saw that something was up.”1

Something indeed. Troops by the thousands were rising to their feet. Anxious company officers shepherded them to their stacked arms. Color-bearers unfurled and shook out their flags. Field and staff officers took their places toward the front, and in the rear, surgeons mustered their stretcher-bearers. Regiment after regiment passed out of the fortifications and onto the flat. The troops of the Sixth Ohio promptly faced about and—instead of spending a restful afternoon in their fieldworks—found themselves in the front line of Hazen's brigade.

Just as they had two days earlier before sweeping Orchard Knob, the Federals marched with parade-ground precision toward the near edge of the cottonwood timber. When a regiment reached its designated line of departure, the men were ordered to lie down, leaving its general guides standing so that the next regiment coming up could align itself. All the while, the Rebel cannons on Missionary Ridge kept up a slow and steady rumble. Their range was poor and virtually no one in the gathering tide of blue was struck, but the possibility of a chance hit lent an urgency to the whole affair.2

As long as they were in the timber, the Federals knew they were fairly safe: the woods would provide at least a modicum of shelter for half the distance of their advance. Over the final three hundred to seven hundred yards

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