500 Series I Volume XXX-II Serial 51 - Chickamauga Part II
Page 500 | KY.,SW.VA.,TENN.,MISS.,N.ALA., AND N.GA. Chapter XLII. |
fields beyond, making a distance altogether of about three-quarters of a mile. In the last advance Lieutenant-Colonel Hufstedler fell wounded with five balls. Here, though the enemy to whom we had been opposed in front were in flight, broken, and in confusion, having sustained a heavy loss in killed, the two regiments, finding their tired and weakened line exposed to a fatal flanking fire, especially on the left, unsupported on account of the rapidity of their advance, with the enemy's battery near on the left, and a strong enemy re-enforcement approaching, and our ammunition nearly exhausted, the impracticability of longer holding this advanced and exposed position was immediately manifest and the force was ordered back to the woods. Here they were reformed, and a fresh line having passed to relieve them, were marched back to nearly their original position to await ammunition, where they were joined by the rest of the brigade, which finally moved forward to the position in line, where it was encamped for the night between Johnson's brigade (on the right) and Hindman's division (on the left).
The First and Second Arkansas (dismounted) Rifles, Colonel Harper and Williamson, and the Fourth, Thirty-first, and Fourth Arkansas Battalion (consolidated), Major Ross, all under the immediate command of General McNair, were ordered forward soon after the advance of the Thirty-ninth North Carolina and Twenty-fifth Arkansas; charged to the right of the course taken by the latter regiments, and drove the enemy in successive charges to beyond the Chattanooga road. Here, on the withdrawal of the Thirty-ninth and Twenty-fifth, being exposed to a heavy flank fire on the left, besides that in front, and the ammunition beginning to fail, they rejoined the other two regiments.
The artillery, Captain Culpeper commanding, supported the advance of the brigade so long as it was safe to fire, and then, the undergrowth being too thick to advance, remained in their position the remainder of the day.
On the morning of the 20th, the brigade was placed in line between Stewart's division (on the right) and Hindman's (on the left), with a slight barricade of branches and small dead wood in front. Here, at about 9.30 a.m., the line repulsed an advance of the enemy. In a few minutes after, the brigade, advancing with the rest of the line, drove the enemy steadily and rapidly back, passing over two successive lines of temporary breastworks, a distance of about three-quarters of a mile, reaching the corner of the field, at the opposite end of which were two batteries of the enemy on a hill commanding the whole advance. General McNair and Colonel Harper, First Arkansas (dismounted) Riffles, having just been disabled by wounds (that of the latter mortal), the brigade, already in advance of the line, charged furiously upon the batteries diagonally on the right and captured them, taking ten pieces, eight of which were immediately sent with their remaining horses to our rear, and the remaining two, then in the woods, were carried to the rear afterward, the ground never having been reoccupied by the enemy.
The brigade was now considerably in advance of the line, though this was rapidly approaching. Our left was still more exposed by the break made by our diagonal charge. The enemy were firing from the woods in front, while within 200 yards farther in the woods a large body of the enemy was seen drawn up in good order. With our forces reduced by our rapid advance, and ammunition nearly exhausted, it was necessary at once to abandon our position. The
Page 500 | KY.,SW.VA.,TENN.,MISS.,N.ALA., AND N.GA. Chapter XLII. |