Читать книгу: «The Guns of Shiloh: A Story of the Great Western Campaign», страница 11

The situation was enough to cause the stoutest heart to weaken, but the unflinching Grant held on. The Confederate army within the works was sheltered at least in part, but his own, outside, and with the desolate forest rimming it around, lay exposed fully to the storm. Dick, at intervals, saw the short, thickset figure of the commander passing among the men, and giving them orders or encouragement. Once he saw his face clearly. The lips were pressed tightly together, and the whole countenance expressed the grimmest determination. Dick was confirmed anew in his belief that the chief would never turn back.

The spectacle, nevertheless, was appalling. The snow drove harder and harder. It was not merely a passing shower of flakes. It was a storm. The snow soon lay upon the ground an inch deep, then three inches, then four and still it gained. Through the darkness and the storm the Southern cannon crashed at intervals, sending shells at random into the Union camp or over it. There was full need then for the indomitable spirit of Grant and those around him to encourage anew the thousands of boys who had so lately left the farms or the lumber yards.

Dick and his comrades, careless of the risk, searched over the battlefield for the wounded who were yet there. They carried lanterns, but the darkness was so great and the snow drove so hard and lay so deep that they knew many would never be found.

Back beyond the range of the fort’s cannon men were building fires with what wood they could secure from the forest. All the tents they had were set up, and the men tried to cook food and make coffee, in order that some degree of warmth and cheer might be provided for the army beset so sorely.

The snow, after a while, slackening somewhat, was succeeded by cold much greater than ever. The shivering men bent over the fires and lamented anew the discarded blankets. Dick did not sleep an instant that terrible night. He could not. He, Pennington, and Warner, relieved from staff service, worked all through the cold and darkness, helping the wounded and seeking wood for the fires. And with them always was the wise Sergeant Whitley, to whom, although inferior in rank, they turned often and willingly for guidance and advice.

“It’s an awful situation,” said Pennington; “I knew that war would furnish horrors, but I didn’t expect anything like this.”

“But General Grant will never retreat,” said Dick. “I feel it in every bone of me. I’ve seen his face tonight.”

“No, he won’t,” said the experienced sergeant, “because he’s making every preparation to stay. An’ remember, Mr. Pennington, that while this is pretty bad, worse can happen. Remember, too, that while we can stand this, we can also stand whatever worse may come. It’s goin’ to be a fight to a finish.”

Far in the night the occasional guns from the Southern fortress ceased. The snow was falling no longer, but it lay very deep on the ground, and the cold was at its height. Along a line of miles the fires burned and the men crowded about them. But Dick, who had been working on the snowy plain that was the battlefield, and who had heard many moans there, now heard none. All who lay in that space were sleeping the common sleep of death, their bodies frozen stiff and hard under the snow.

Dick, sitting by one of the fires, saw the cold dawn come, and in those chill hours of nervous exhaustion he lost hope for a moment or two. How could anybody, no matter how resolute, maintain a siege without ammunition and without food. But he spoke cheerfully to Pennington and Warner, who had slept a little and who were just awakening.

The pale and wintry sun showed the defiant Stars and Bars floating over Donelson, and Dick from his hill could see men moving inside the earthworks. Certainly the Southern flags had a right to wave defiance at the besieging army, which was now slowly and painfully rising from the snow, and lighting the fires anew.

“Well, what’s the program today, Dick?” asked Pennington.

“I don’t know, but it’s quite certain that we won’t attempt another assault. It’s hopeless.”

“That’s true,” said Warner, who was standing by, “but we—hark, what was that?”

The boom of a cannon echoed over the fort and forest, and then another and another. To the northward they saw thin black spires of smoke under the horizon.

“It’s the fleet! It’s the fleet!” cried Warner joyously, “coming up the Cumberland to our help! Oh, you men of Donelson, we’re around you now, and you’ll never shake us off!”

Again came the crash of great guns from the fleet, and the crash of the Southern water batteries replying.

CHAPTER XI. THE SOUTHERN ATTACK

The excitement in the Union army was intense and joyous. The cheers rolled like volleys among these farmer lads of the West. Dick, Warner and Pennington stood up and shouted with the rest.

“I should judge that our chances of success have increased at least fifty, yes sixty, per cent,” said Warner. “As we have remarked before, this control of the water is a mighty thing. We fight the Johnnie Rebs for the land, but we have the water already. Look at those gunboats, will you? Aren’t they the sauciest little things you ever saw?”

Once more the navy was showing, as it has always shown throughout its career, its daring and brilliant qualities. Foote, the commodore, although he had had no time to repair his four small fighting boats after the encounter with Fort Henry, steamed straight up the river and engaged the concentric fire from the great guns of the Southern batteries, which opened upon him with a tremendous crash. The boys watched the duel with amazement. They did not believe that small vessels could live under such fire, but live they did. Great columns of smoke floated over them and hid them at times from the watchers, but when the smoke lifted a little or was split apart by the shattering fire of the guns the black hulls of the gunboats always reappeared, and now they were not more than three or four hundred yards from Donelson.

“I take it that this is a coverin’ fire,” said Sergeant Whitley, who stood by. “Four little vessels could not expect to reduce such a powerful fortress as Donelson. It’s not Fort Henry that they’re fightin’ now.”

“The chances are at least ninety-five per cent in favor of your supposition,” said Warner.

The sergeant’s theory, in fact, was absolutely correct. Further down the river the transports were unloading regiment after regiment of fresh troops, and vast supplies of ammunition and provisions. Soon five thousand men were formed in line and marched to Grant’s relief, while long lines of wagons brought up the stores so badly needed. Now the stern and silent general was able to make the investment complete, but the fiery little fleet did not cease to push the attack.

There was a time when it seemed that the gunboats would be able to pass the fortress and rake it from a point up the river. Many of the guns in the water batteries had been silenced, but the final achievement was too great for so small a force. The rudder of one of Foote’s gunboats was shot away, the wheel of another soon went the same way, and both drifted helplessly down the stream. The other two then retreated, and the fire of both fort and fleet ceased.

But there was joy in the Union camp. The soldiers had an abundance of food now, and soon the long ring of fires showed that they were preparing it. Their forces had been increased a third, and there was a fresh outburst of courage and vigor. But Grant ordered no more attacks at present. After the men had eaten and rested a little, picks and spades were swung along a line miles in length. He was fortifying his own position, and it was evident to his men that he meant to stay there until he won or was destroyed.

Dick was conscious once more of a sanguine thrill. Like the others, he felt the strong hand over him, and the certainty that they were led with judgment and decision made him believe that all things were possible. Yet the work of fortifying continued but a little while. The men were exhausted by cold and fatigue, and were compelled to lay down their tools. The fires were built anew, and they hovered about them for shelter and rest.

The wan twilight showed the close of the wintry day, and with the increasing chill a part of Dick’s sanguine feeling departed. The gallant little fleet, although it had brought fresh men and supplies and had protected their landing, had been driven back. The investment of the fort was complete only on one side of the river, and steamers coming up the Cumberland from Nashville might yet take off the garrison in safety. Then the work of the silent general, all their hardship and fighting would be at least in part a failure. The Vermont youth, who seemed to be always of the same temper, neither very high nor very low, noticed his change of expression.

“Don’t let your hopes decrease, Dick,” he said. “Remember that at least twenty per cent of the decline is due to the darkness and inaction. In the morning, when the light comes once more, and we’re up and doing again, you’ll get back all the twenty per cent you’re losing now.”

“It’s not to be all inaction with you boys tonight, even,” said Colonel Winchester, who overheard his closing words. “I want you three to go with me on a tour of inspection or rather scouting duty. It may please you to know that it is the special wish of General Grant. Aware that I had some knowledge of the country, he has detailed me for the duty, and I choose you as my assistants. I’m sure that the skill and danger such a task requires will make you all the more eager for it.”

The three youths responded quickly and with zeal, and Sergeant Whitley, when he was chosen, too, nodded in silent gratitude. The night was dark, overcast with clouds, and in an hour Colonel Winchester with his four departed upon his perilous mission. He was to secure information in regard to the Southern army, and to do that they were to go very near the Southern lines, if not actually inside them. Such an attempt would be hazardous in the extreme in the face of a vigilant watch; but on the other hand they would be aided by the fact that both North and South were of like blood and language. Even more, many of those in the opposing camps came from the same localities, and often were of kin.

Dick’s regiment had been stationed at the southern end of the line, near the little town of Dover, but they now advanced northward and westward, marching for a long time along their inner line. It was Colonel Winchester’s intention to reach Hickman Creek, which formed their northern barrier, creep in the fringe of bushes on its banks, and then approach the fort.

When they reached the desired point the night was well advanced, and yet dark with the somber clouds hanging over river and fort and field of battle. The wind blew out of the northwest, sharp and intensely cold. The snow crunched under their feet. But the four had wrapped themselves in heavy overcoats, and they were so engrossed in their mission that neither wind nor snow was anything to them.

They passed along the bank of the creek, keeping well within the shadow of the bushes, leaving behind them the last outpost of the Union army, and then slowly drew near to the fort. They saw before them many lights burning in the darkness, and at last they discerned dim figures walking back and forth. Dick knew that these were the Southern sentinels. The four went a little nearer, and then crouched down in the snow among some low bushes.

Now they saw the Southern sentinels more distinctly. Some, in fact, were silhouetted sharply as they passed before the Southern fires. Northern sharpshooters could have crept up and picked off many of them, as the Southern sharpshooters in turn might have served many of the Northern watchers, but in this mighty war there was little of such useless and merciless enterprise. The men soon ceased to have personal animosity, and, in the nights between the great battles, when the armies yet lay face to face, the hostile pickets would often exchange gossip and tobacco. Even in a conflict waged so long and with such desperation the essential kindliness of human nature would assert itself.

The four, as they skirted the Southern line, noticed no signs of further preparations by the Confederates. No men were throwing up earthworks or digging trenches. As well as they could surmise, the garrison, like the besieging army, was seeking shelter and rest, and from this fact the keen mind of Colonel Arthur Winchester divined that the defense was confused and headless.

Colonel Winchester knew most of the leaders within Donelson. He knew that Pillow was not of a strong and decided nature. Nor was Floyd, who would rank first, of great military capacity. Buckner had talent and he had served gallantly in the Mexican War, but he could not prevail over the others. The fame of Forrest, the Tennessee mountaineer, was already spreading, but a cavalryman could do little for the defense of a fort besieged by twenty thousand well equipped men, led by a general of unexcelled resolution.

All that Colonel Winchester surmised was true. Inside the fort confusion and doubt reigned. The fleeing garrison from Fort Henry had brought exaggerated reports of Grant’s army. Very few of the thousands of young troops had ever been in battle before. They, too, suffered though in a less degree from cold and fatigue, but many were wounded. Pillow and Floyd, who had just arrived with his troops, talked of one thing and then another. Floyd, who might have sent word to his valiant and able chief, Johnston, did not take the trouble or forgot to inform him of his position. Buckner wanted to attack Grant the next morning with the full Southern strength, and a comrade of his on old battlefields, Colonel George Kenton, seconded him ably. The black-bearded Forrest strode back and forth, striking the tops of his riding boots with a small riding whip, and saying ungrammatically, but tersely and emphatically:

“We mustn’t stay here like hogs in a pen. We must git at ‘em with all our men afore they can git at us.”

The illiterate mountaineer and stock driver had evolved exactly the same principle of war that Napoleon used.

But Colonel Winchester and his comrades could only guess at what was going on in Donelson, and a guess always remains to be proved. So they must continue their perilous quest. Once they were hailed by a Southern sentinel, but Colonel Winchester replied promptly that they belonged to Buckner’s Kentuckians and had been sent out to examine the Union camp. He passed it off with such boldness and decision that they were gone before the picket had time to express a doubt.

But as they came toward the center of the line, and drew nearer to the fort itself, they met another picket, who was either more watchful or more acute. He hailed them at a range of forty or fifty yards, and when Colonel Winchester made the same reply he ordered them to halt and give the countersign. When no answer came he fired instantly at the tall figure of Colonel Winchester and uttered a loud cry of, “Yankees!”

Luckily the dim light was tricky and his bullet merely clipped the colonel’s hair. But there was nothing for the four to do now save to run with all their undignified might for their own camp.

“Come on, lads!” shouted Colonel Winchester. “Our scouting is over for the time!”

The region behind them contained patches of scrub oaks and bushes, and with their aid and that of the darkness, it was not difficult to escape; but Dick, while running just behind the others, stepped in a hole and fell. The snow and the dead leaves hid the sound of his fall and the others did not notice it. As he looked up he saw their dim forms disappearing among the bushes. He rose to his own feet, but uttered a little cry as a ligament in his ankle sent a warning throb of pain through his body.

It was not a wrench, only a bruise, and as he stretched his ankle a few times the soreness went away. But the last sound made by the retreating footsteps of his comrades had died, and their place had been taken by those of his pursuers, who were now drawing very near.

Dick had no intention of being captured, and, turning off at a right angle, he dropped into a gully which he encountered among some bushes. The gully was about four feet deep and half full of snow. Dick threw himself full length on his side, and sank down in the snow until he was nearly covered. There he lay panting hard for a few moments, but quite sure that he was safe from discovery. Only a long and most minute search would be likely to reveal the dark line in the snow beneath the overhanging bushes.

Dick’s heart presently resumed its normal beat, and then he heard the sound of voices and footsteps. Some one said:

“They went this way, sir, but they were running pretty fast.”

“They’d good cause to run,” said a brusque voice. “You’d a done it, too, if you’d expected to have the bullets of a whole army barkin’ at your heels.”

The footsteps came nearer, crunching on the snow, which lay deep there among the bushes. They could not be more than a dozen feet away, but Dick quivered only a little. Buried as he was and with the hanging bushes over him he was still confident that no one could see him. He raised himself the least bit, and looking through the boughs, saw a tanned and dark face under the broad brim of a Confederate hat. Just then some one said:

“We might have trailed ‘em, general, but the snow an’ the earth have already been tramped all up by the army.”

“They’re not wuth huntin’ long anyway,” said the same brusque voice. “A few Yankees prowlin’ about in the night can’t do us much harm. It’s hard fightin’ that’ll settle our quarrel.”

General Forrest came a little closer and Dick, from his concealment in the snow, surmising his identity, saw him clearly, although himself unseen. He was fascinated by the stern, dark countenance. The face of the unlettered mountaineer was cut sharp and clear, and he had the look of one who knew and commanded. In war he was a natural leader of men, and he had already assumed the position.

“Don’t you agree with me, colonel?” he said over his shoulder to some one.

“I think you’re right as usual, General Forrest,” replied a voice with a cultivated intonation, and Dick started violently in his bed of snow, because he instantly recognized the voice as that of his uncle, Colonel George Kenton, Harry’s father. A moment later Colonel Kenton himself stood where the moonlight fell upon his face. Dick saw that he was worn and thin, but his face had the strong and resolute look characteristic of those descended from Henry Ware, the great borderer.

“You know, general, that I endorse all your views,” continued Colonel Kenton. “We are unfortunate here in having a division of counsels, while the Yankees have a single and strong head. We have underrated this man Grant. Look how he surprised us and took Henry! Look how he hangs on here! We’ve beaten him on land and we’ve driven back his fleet, but he hangs on. To my mind he has no notion of retreating. He’ll keep on pounding us as long as we are here.”

“That’s his way, an’ it ought to be the way of every general,” growled Forrest. “You cut down a tree by keepin’ on cuttin’ out chips with an axe, an’ you smash up an army by hittin’ an’ hittin’ an’ keepin’ on hittin’. We ought to charge right out of our works an’ jump on the Yankees with all our stren’th.”

The two walked on, followed by the soldiers who had come with them, and Dick heard no more. But he was too cautious to stir for a long while. He lay there until the cold began to make its way through his boots and heavy overcoat. Then he rose carefully, brushed off the snow, and began his retreat toward the Union lines. Four or five hundred yards further on and he met Colonel Winchester and his own comrades come back to search for him. They welcomed him joyfully.

“We did not miss you until we were nearly to our own pickets,” said the colonel. “Then we concluded that you had fallen and had been taken by the enemy, but we intended to see if we could find you. We’ve been hovering about here for some time.”

Dick told what he had seen and heard, and the colonel considered it of much importance.

“I judge from what you heard that they will attack us,” he said. “Buckner and Forrest will be strongly for it, and they’re likely to have their way. We must report at once to General Grant.”

The Southern attack had been planned for the next morning, but it did not come then. Pillow, for reasons unknown, decided to delay another day, and his fiery subordinates could do nothing but chafe and wait. Dick spent most of the day carrying orders for his chief, and the continuous action steadied his nerves.

As he passed from point to point he saw that the Union army itself was far from ready. It was a difficult task to get twenty thousand raw farmer youths in proper position. They moved about often without cohesion and sometimes without understanding their orders. Great gaps remained in the line, and a daring and skilful foe might cut the besieging force asunder.

But Grant had put his heavy guns in place, and throughout the day he maintained a slow but steady fire upon the fort. Great shells and solid shot curved and fell upon Donelson. Grant did not know what damage they were doing, but he shrewdly calculated that they would unsteady the nerves of the raw troops within. These farmer boys, as they heard the unceasing menace of the big guns, would double the numbers of their foe, and attribute to him an unrelaxing energy.

Thus another gray day of winter wore away, and the two forces drew a little nearer to each other. Far away the rival Presidents at Washington and Richmond were wondering what was happening to their armies in the dark wilderness of Western Tennessee.

The night was more quiet than the one that had just gone before. The booming of the cannon as regular as the tolling of funeral bells had ceased with the darkness, but in its place the fierce winter wind had begun to blow again. Dick, relaxed and weary after his day’s work, hovered over one of the fires and was grateful for the warmth. He had trodden miles through slush and snow and frozen earth, and he was plastered to the waist with frozen mud, which now began to soften and fall off before the coals.

Warner, who had been on active duty, too, also sank to rest with a sigh of relief.

“It’s battle tomorrow, Dick,” he said, “and I don’t care. As it didn’t come off today the chances are at least eighty per cent that it will happen the next day. You say that when you were lying in the snow last night, Dick, you saw your uncle and that he’s a colonel in the rebel army. It’s queer.”

“You’re wrong, George, it isn’t queer. We’re on opposite sides, serving at the same place, and it’s natural that we should meet some time or other. Oh, I tell you, you fellows from the New England and the other Northern States don’t appreciate the sacrifices that we of the border states make for the Union. Up there you are safe from invasion. Your houses are not on the battlefields. You are all on one side. You don’t have to fight against your own kind, the people you hold most dear. And when the war is over, whether we win or lose, you’ll go back to unravaged regions.”

“You wrong me there, Dick. I have thought of it. It’s the people of the border, whether North or South, who pay the biggest price. We risk our lives, but you risk your lives also, and everything else, too.”

Dick wrapped himself in a heavy blanket, pillowed his head on a log before one of the fires and dozed a while. His nerves had been tried too hard to permit of easy sleep. He awoke now and then and over a wide area saw the sinking fires and the moving forms of men. He felt that a sense of uneasiness pervaded the officers. He knew that many of them considered their forces inadequate for the siege of a fortress defended by a large army, but he felt with the sincerity of conviction also, that Grant would never withdraw.

He heard from Colonel Winchester about midnight in one of his wakeful intervals that General Grant was going down the river to see Commodore Foote. The brave leader of the fleet had been wounded severely in the last fight with the fort, and the general wished to confer with him about the plan of operations. But Dick heard only vaguely. The statement made no impression upon him at that time. Yet he was conscious that the feeling of uneasiness still pervaded the officers. He noticed it in Colonel Winchester’s tone, and he noticed it, too, in the voices of Colonel Newcomb and Major Hertford, who came presently to confer with Winchester.

But the boy fell into his doze again, while they were talking. Warner and Pennington, who had done less arduous duties, were sound asleep near him, the low flames now and then throwing a red light on their tanned faces. It seemed to him that it was about half way between midnight and morning, and the hum and murmur had sunk to a mere minor note. But his sleepy eyes still saw the dim forms of men passing about, and then he fell into his uneasy doze again.

When he awoke once more it was misty and dark, but he felt that the dawn was near. In the east a faint tint of silver showed through the clouds and vapors. Heavy banks of fog were rising from the Cumberland and the flooded marshes. The earth began to soften as if unlocking from the hard frost of the night.

Colonel Winchester stood near him and his position showed that he was intensely awake. He was bent slightly forward, and every nerve and muscle was strained as if he were eager to see and hear something which he knew was there, but which he could not yet either see or hear.

Dick threw off his blanket and sprang to his feet. At the same moment Colonel Winchester motioned him to awaken Warner and Pennington, which he did at once in speed and silence. That tint of silver, the lining of the fogs and vapors, shone more clearly through, and spread across the East. Dick knew now that the dawn was at hand.

The loud but mellow notes of a trumpet came from a distant point toward Donelson, and then others to right and left joined and sang the same mellow song. But it lasted only for a minute. Then it was lost in the rapid crackle of rifles, which spread like a running fire along a front of miles. The sun in the east swung clear of the earth, its beams shooting a way through fogs and vapors. The dawn had come and the attack had come with it.

The Southerners, ready at last, were rushing from their fort and works, and, with all the valor and fire that distinguished them upon countless occasions, they were hurling themselves upon their enemy. The fortress poured out regiment after regiment. Chafing so long upon the defense Southern youth was now at its best. Attacking, not attacked, the farmer lads felt the spirit of battle blaze high in their breasts. The long, terrible rebel yell, destined to be heard upon so many a desperate field, fierce upon its lower note, fierce upon its higher note, as fierce as ever upon its dying note, and coming back in echoes still as fierce, swelled over forest and fort, marsh and river.

The crackling fire of the pickets ceased. They had been driven back in a few moments upon the army, but the whole regiment of Colonel Winchester was now up, rifle in hand, and on either side of it, other regiments steadied themselves also to receive the living torrent.

The little band of Pennsylvanians were on the left of the Kentuckians and were practically a part of them. Colonel Newcomb and Major Hertford stood amid their men, encouraging them to receive the shock. But Dick had time for only a glance at these old comrades of his. The Southern wave, crested with fire and steel, was rolling swiftly upon them, and as the Southern troops rushed on they began to fire as fast as they could pull the trigger, fire and pull again.

Bullets in sheets struck in the Union ranks. Hundreds of men went down. Dick heard the thud of lead and steel on flesh, and the sudden cries of those who were struck. It needs no small courage to hold fast against more than ten thousand men rushing forward at full speed and bent upon victory or death.

Dick felt all the pulses in his temples beating hard, and he had a horrible impulse to break and run, but pride kept him firm. As an officer, he had a small sword, and snatching it out he waved it, while at the same time he shouted to the men to meet the charge.

The Union troops returned the fire. Thousands of bullets were sent against the ranks of the rushing enemy. The gunners sprang to their guns and the deep roar of the cannon rose above the crash of the small arms. But the Southern troops, the rebel yell still rolling through the woods, came on at full speed and struck the Union front.

It seemed to Dick that he was conscious of an actual physical shock. Tanned faces and gleaming eyes were almost against his own. He looked into the muzzles of rifles, and he saw the morning sun flashing along the edges of bayonets. But the regiment, although torn by bullets, did not give ground. The charge shivered against them, and the Southern troops fell back. Yet it was only for a moment. They came again to be driven back as before, and then once more they charged, while their resolute foe swung forward to meet them rank to rank.

Dick was not conscious of much except that he shouted continuously to the men to stand firm, and wondered now and then why he had not been hit. The Union men and their enemy were reeling back and forth, neither winning, neither losing, while the thunder of battle along a long and curving front beat heavily on the drums of every ear. The smoke, low down, was scattered by the cannon and rifles, but above it gathered in a great cloud that seemed to be shot with fire.

The two colonels, Winchester and Newcomb, were able and valiant men. Despite their swelling losses they always filled up the ranks and held fast to the ground upon which they had stood when they were attacked. But for the present they had no knowledge how the battle was going elsewhere. The enemy just before them allowed no idle moments.