Chapter 61

CHAPTER LXI

On came the rider, up came the rifle of the picket, and then above the clatter of the horse’s hoofs was heard the voice of the rider, who thus ad­dressed the sentinel:

“For Heaven’s sake don’t halt me I have important dispatches for General Hooker, I must reach him, or we are lost!”  He had not halted and by the time that he had finished he had passed the sentinel and was riding through the camp, as he approached the other end of the camp he was again halted, when he made a similar answer and passed out of camp as he had entered and we could hear the clattering of the horses hoofs far down the road as he bore his rider safely onward.  Who he was, and what his mission was, will ever remain a mystery to us.

The night passed wearily enough for those on duty, whilst those who were more fortunate and had passed the night in sleep were awakened at day light, thinking that they had passed an unusual short night.  Orders were issue to be ready to move in an hour.  The command consisted of the 28^th, 147^th Regiments and a section of Knap’s Battery, all under the command of Colonel Pardee.

At the expiration of the hour the command was on the move, with orders to press forward as rapidly as possible.  After marching several miles we were met by one of General Geary’s orderlies, who gave us the results of the battle of the previous night, and from him we first learned of the death of Lieut. Geary of Knap’s Battery, a son of our Division commander, as well as of the fearful slaughter of the brave men of our 2^nd and 3^rd Brigades.  As we neared the battle-field we were drawn up in a line of battle, and ordered to “load at will.”  We were then advanced cautiously, having deployed skirmishers, to prevent a surprise, as there was no telling where the enemy might be found.  We advanced until we came out into the valley, here a beautiful sight burst upon our gaze, to our right and front, Lookout Mountain reared its cloud capped summit, and like a giant sentinel, obstructing our onward progress in that direction, whilst on its top a signal corps was plainly seen signaling our arrival, to our front was a beautiful valley, on our left a range of the Raccoon Mountains, in the distance was Chattanooga and before us almost equally distant was the winding Tennessee river, all of which would have proven a worthy theme for the pencil of an artist, but the circumstan­ces by which we were surrounded somewhat knocked the romance out of us, and we were more alive to the dangers by which we were surrounded.  An animated discussion arose between our boys as to whether the mountain was held by our men or the rebels, and as usual upon such occasions the dispute became very warm, but it was de­cided in a very conclusive manner.  Isaac Reed of our company, who bad never been under tire, remarked that “wun ase rebels sin don wunch ich das sie do river scheesa datah.”  No sooner ­had young Reed given expression to his wish, than a small rift of white smoke was observed by us to rise with a sudden puff, and soon the whurr-whurr-wuzz” announced the approach of a shell, and with a crash it cut the limb of a tree off, almost above our heads, and then exploded with a ringing sound, scattering the deadly fragments about us in profusion fortunately however no one was injured.  No sooner could Reed obtain control of his tongue than he said:

“Now will ich kennah may by’m dunner hareh.”

Notwithstanding the scare we had received, Reed’s words and his scared appearance caused the boys to break forth in a shout.

This was the only shell the rebels threw at us while moving into the valley.  We were received with cheers of welcome by the remainder of our Division, as we came to a halt on part of the battle-field of the previous night.  The sight which met our eyes, was sickening in the extreme, fully 20 dead horses, together with a large number  of dead rebels were scattered about whilst forty or fifty newly made graves told the sad tale of the price we had paid for the victory.

We were halted and ordered to stack arms, and at once commenced to prepare our dinner, for which our tramp of eight or ten miles had sharpened our appetites.  After dinner we found that the men had taken about 200 prisoners, and when we found that they had belonged to Longstreet’s com­mand and that they too were from the Army of Northern Virginia, we felt as though they were friends, and we were soon on friendly terms with them.  At about 2 o’clock, p. m., we were ordered to fall in at once.