BURNSIDE’S BRIDGE—II.
BURNSIDE’S BRIDGE AT ANTIETAM—I.
only a few reached the bridge and sought shelter behind the stone wall above. Subsequently, the bridge was carried by the 51st Pennsylvania, Colonel Robert B. Potter, and the 51st New York, Colonel John F. Hartrauft, charging from the pines on the hill-side.
ber presence. Here, too, on all the distant portions of the line, motion was imperceptible, but could be inferred from the casual glint of sunlight on a musket-barrel miles away. It was 3 o’clock when we resumed our march, turning our backs upon the beautiful, impressive picture — each column a monstrous, crawling, blue-black snake, miles long, quilled with the silver slant of muskets at a “ shoulder,” its sluggish tail writhing slowly up over the distant eastern ridge, its bruised head weltering in the roar and smoke upon the crest above, where was being fought the battle of South Mountain.
We were now getting nearer to the danger line, the rattle of musketry going on incessantly in the edges of the woods, and behind the low stone fences that seamed the mountain-side. Then we came upon the fringes of the contest — slightly wounded men scattered along the winding road on their way to the hospital, and now and then a squad of prisoners, woundedandunwounded together, going under guard to the rear.
The brigade was ordered to the left of the road to support a regular battery posted at the top of a steep slope, with a corn-field on the left, and twenty-yards or so in front, a thin wood. We formed behind the battery and a little down the slope — the 89th on the left, the 9th next, then the 103d. We had been in position but a few minutes when a stir in front advised us of something unusual
This picture, after a photograph taken in 1885, is a view of tile Union position from the hill where Confederate artillery was planted to enfilade the bridge. From a point below, the 2d Maryland and the 6th New Hampshire charged up the road, but they were swept by such a murderous fire that
site slope of the valley almost at point-blank. An hour before, from the same spot, it had been merely a scene of quiet pastoral beauty. All at once, along its eastern edge the heads of the columns began to appear, and grew and grew, pouring over the ridge and descending by every road, filling them completely and scarring the surface of the gentle landscape with the angry welts of war. By the farthest northern road — the farthest we could see — moved the baggage wagons, the line stretching from the bottom of the valley back to the top of the ridge, and beyond, only the canvas covers of the wagons revealingtheir character. We knew that each dot was a heavily loaded army wagon, drawn by six mules and occupying forty feet of road at least. Now they looked like white beads on a string. So far away were they that no motion was perceptible. The constant swelling of the end of the line down in the valley, where the teams turned into the fields to park, gave evidence that in this way it was being slowly reeled along the way. The troops were marching by two roads farther south. The Confederates fighting on the western summit must have seen them plainly. Half a mile beyond us the column broke abruptly, filing off into line of battle, right and left, across the fields. From that point backward and downward, across the valley and up the farther slope, it stretched with scarcely a gap, every curve and zigzag of the way defined more sharply by its som-
Confederate battery on the left enfiladed the crossing. Union sharp-shooters took advantage of the stone ־wall on the right of the approach to the bridge. The continuation of the road to Sliarpsburg is seen on the right across the bridge. [See notes under cuts on page 151, and map and note on page 149.]
We marched at last, and on the 12th of September entered Frederick, wondering all the way what the enemy meant. We of the ranks little suspected what sheaves he was gathering in at Harper’s Ferry, behind the curtain of his main body. We guessed, however, as usual, and toward evening began to get our answer. He was right ahead, his rear-guard skirmishing with our advance. We came up at the close of the fight at Frederick, and, forming line of battle, went at double-quick through corn-fields, potato patches, gardens, and backyards •—■ the German washerwomen of the 103d New York regiment going in with us on the run. It was only a measure of precaution, however, the cavalry having done what little there was to do in the way of driving out of the city a Confederate rear-guard not much inclined to stay. . . .
The 14th of September we crossed the Catoctin range of mountains, reaching the summit about noon, and descended its western slope into the beautiful valley of Middletown. Half-way up the valley’s western side we halted for a rest, and turned to look back on the moving host. It was a scene to linger in the memory. The valley in which Middletown lies is four or five miles wide, as I remember it, and runs almost due north and south between the parallel ranges of Catoctin and South Mountains. From where we stood the landscape lay below us, the eye commanding the oppo-
150
This picture, after a photograph taken in 1885, is a view of the Confederate position from the slope of the hill occupied by the Union batteries before a crossing was effected. At the time of the battle the buildings had not been erected, and the Confederate hill-side was covered with trees. A
THE UNION SIDE.
IN THE RANKS ־WITH HAWKINS’S ZOUAVES AT SOUTH MOUNTAIN AND ANTIETAM.
BY DAVID L. THOMPSON, CO. G, 9TH NEW YORK VOLUNTEERS.
ON the 5th of September, 1862, Hawkins’s Zouaves, as a part of Burnside’s corps from Fredericksburg, landed at Washington to assist in the defense of the capital, then threatened by Lee’s first invasion of Maryland, and, as events proved, to join in the pursuit of the invaders. Here, in pursuance of a measure for shortening the baggage-train which had lately been decided oh, we were deprived of our Sibley tents — those cumbersome, conical caravansaries, in which eighteen men lie upon the ground with their feet toward the center. . . .
UNIFORM OF HAWKINS’S ZOUAVES.