The Sun.
London, England, 1862-10-04 00:00:00

211 E BAT? LE OF SHA.RPSBURG.

The following account of the above battle is given
by the correspondent of the .New York Tribune :
Battle-field of Sharpsbnrg, Wednesday
Evening, Sept. 17, 1862.
Fierce and desperate battle between 200,000 men
has raged since daylight, yet night closes on an un-
certain field. It is the greatest fight since Waterloo

over the field contested with a obstinacy equal
even to Waterloo. If not wholly a victory to-night,
I believe it is the prelude to a victory to-morrow.
But what can be foretold of the future of a fight in
which from five in the morning till seven at night
the best troops of the continent have fought with-
out decisive result ?

I have no time for speculation—no time even to
gather details of the battle; only time to state its
broadest features—then mount and spar for New
York.

After the brilliant victory near Middletown
General M'Clellan pushed forward his army rapidly
and reached Keedysville with three corps on
Monday night. That march has already been
described. On the day following the two armies
faced each other idly, until night. Artillery was
busy at intervals; once in the morning, opening
with spirit, and continuing for half an hour with
vigour, till the rebel battery, as usual, was silenced.
M'Clellan was on the hill where Benjamin's bat-
tery was stationed, and found himself suddenly un-
der a rather heavy fire. It was still uncertain
whether the rebels were retreating or reinforcing—
their batteries would remain in position in either
case, and as they had withdrawn nearly all their
troops from view, there was only the doubtful indi-
cation of columns of dust to the rear.
_ _

On the evening of Tuesday Hooker was ordered
to cross the Antietum Creek with his corps, and,
feeling the left of the enemy, be ready to attack
next morning. During the day of apparent activity
M'Clellan hud been maturing his plan of battle, of
which Hooker's movement was one development.
The position on either side was peculiar. When
Richardson advanced on Monday he found the ene-
my deployed and displayed in force on a crescent-
shaped ridge, the outline of which followed more or
less exactly the course of Antietum Creek. Their
lines were then forming, and the revelation of force
in front of the ground which they really intended
to hold was probably meant to delay our attack
until their arrangements to receive it were complete.
During the day they kept their troops exposed,
and did not move them, even to avoid the artillery
fire, which must have been occasionally annoying.
Next morning the lines and columns which had
darkened cornfields and hill crests, had been with-
drawn. Broken and wooded ground behind the
sheltering hills concealed the rebel masses> What
from our front looked like only a narrow summit
fringed with woods was a broad table-land of forest
and ravine—cover for troops everywhere, nowhere
easy access for an enemy. The smoothly-sloping
surface in front and the sweeping crescent of slowly-
mingling lines was all a delusion. It was a rebel
stronghold beyond.

Under the base of these hills pans the deep
stream called Antietum Creek, fordable only at dis-
tant points. Three bridges cross it, one on the
Hagerstown road, one on the Sharpsburg pike, one
to the left in a deep recess of sleepy falling hills.
Hooker passed the first to reach the ford by which
he crossed, and it was held by Pleasanton with a
reserve of cavalry during the battle. The second
was close under the rebel centre, and no way im-
portant to yesterday's fight. At the third Burn-
side attacked and finally crossed. Between the first
and third lay most of the battle lines. They
stretched four miles from right to left.
Unaided attack in front was impossible. M'Clel-

lan's forces lay behind low, disconnected ridges, in
front of the rebel summits, all, or nearly all, un-
wooded. They gave some cover for artillery, and
guns were therefore massed on the centre. The
enemy had the Shepherdstown road and the
Hagerstown and Williamsport road both open to
him in rear for retreat. Along one or the other, if
beaten, he must fly. This, among other reasons,
determined perhaps the plan of battle which Ai' Clel-
lan finally resolved on.
The plan was generally as follows:Hooker was

to cross on the right, establish himself ox the ene-
my's left, if possible, flanking his position, and to
open the fight. Sumner, Franklin, and Mansfield
were to send their forces also to the right, co-ope-
rating with and sustaining Hooker's attack, while
advancing also nearer the centre, The heavy work
in the centre was left mostly to the batteries. Por-
ter massing his infantry supported in the hollows.
On the left Burnside was to carry the bridge
already referred to, advancing then by a road which
enters the pike at Sharpsburg, turning at once the
rebel flank and destroying his line of retreat.
Porter and Sykes were held in reserve. It is
obvious that the complete success of a plan
contemplating widely divergent movements of
separate corps must largely depend on accurate
timing, that the attack should be simultaneous and
not successive.

Hooker moved on Tuesday afternoon at four
o'clock, crossing the creek at a ford above the
bridge and well to the right, without opposition.
Fronting south-west his line advanced not quite on
the rebel flank, but overlapping it and threatening
it. Turning off from the road after passing the
stream he sent forth cavalry skirmishers straight
into the woods and over the fields beyond, Rebel
pickets withdrew slowly before them, firing scat-
tering and harmless shots. Turning again to the
left the cavalry went down on the rebel flank,
Coming suddenly close to a battery which met them
with unexpected grape and canister. It being the
motive of cavalry to retire before batteries, this com-
pany loyally followed the law of its being, and came
swiftly back without pursuit,
Artillery was sent to the front, infantry was
rapidly deployed, and skirmishers went out in front
on either flank. The corps moved forward com-
pactly, Hooker, as usual reconnoitring in person.
They came et last to an open grass-sown field, en-
closed on two sides with woods, protected on the
right by a mill, and entered through a corn-field in
the rear. Skirmishers entering these woods were
instantly met by rebel shots, but held their ground,
and as soon as supported, advanced, and cleared the
timber. Beyond, on the left and in front, volleys
of musketry opened heavily, and a battle seemed to
have begun a little sooner than it was expected.
Gen. Hooker formed his lines with precision and
without hesitation. Ricketts' division went into thc
woods on the left in force. Meade, with the Penn-
sylvania reserves, formed in the centre. Double-
day was sent out on the right, planting his batteries
on the hill, and opening at once on a rebel battery
that began to enfilade the central line. It was
already dark, and the rebel position could only be
discovered by the flashes of their guns. They pushed
forward boldly on the right, after losing ground
Oil the other flank, but made no attempt to re-
gain their hold on the woods. The light flashed,
and glimmered, and faded, and finally went out in
the dark.

Hooker had foound out what he wanted to know.
When the firing ceased the hostile lines lay close to
each other,
their
pickets so near that six rebels
were captured
during the night. It was inevitable
that the fight
should recommence at daylight.
Neither side had sufrd
considerable loss ; it was
a skirmish, not a battle. "We are through for to-
night," remarked the general, "but to-morrow we
fight the battle that will decide the fate of the
Republic."
Not long after the firing ceased
it sprang up
again on the left. General Hookehad taken
up his head-quarters in a barn, which cli
had
been
nearly the focus of the rebel artillery,
one, First came rapid and unusuallyafarequent
out at
picket shots, then several heavy volleys. The
ral listened a moment and smiled • I y, ~ gene-
grina, We
have no troops there. The troops are shooting
each
other. It is Fair Oaks over again." So everybody
lay down again ; but all the night through there
were frequent alarms.
M'Clellan had been informed of the night's work
and of the certainties awaiting the dawn. Sumner
was ordered to move his corps at once, and was ex-
pected to be on the ground at daylight. From the
extent of the rebel lines developed in the evening it
was plain that they had gathered their whole army
behind the heights, and were waiting for the shock.
',hr battle Won with the clai:rxt, gOraing

found both armies just as they had slept—almost
close enough to look into each other's eyes.. The
left of Meade's reserves and the right of Ricketts'
line became engaged at nearly the same E r oment—
one with artillery, and the other with infantry. A
battery was almost immediately push< d forwards
beyond the central woods, over a ploughed field,

near the top of the slope where the corn-field begun,
On the open field, in the corn beyond, and in the
woods which stepped forward into the broad fields
like a promontory into the ocean, was the hardest
and deadliest struggle of the day.
For half an hour after the battle had grown to
its full strength the line of fire swayed neither way.
Hooker's men were fully up to their work. They
saw their general everywhere in front, never away
from the fire, and all the troops believed in their
commander, and fought with a will. Two-thirds
of them were the same men who, under M'Dowell,
had broken at Manassas. _ _ _

the rebels began to give
The half-hour passed,
way a little, only a little, but at the first indication
of a receding fire, " Forward" was the word, and
on went the line with a cheer and a rush. Back
across the corn-field, leaving dead and wounded
behind them, over the fence, and across the road,
and then back again into the dark woods which
closed around them, went the retreating rebels.
Meade and his Pennsylvanians followed hard and
fast—followed till they came within easy range of
the woods, among which they saw their beaten
enemy disappearing—followed still, with another
cheer, and flung themselves against the cover.
But out of those gloomy woods came, suddenly
and heavily, terrible volleys—volleys which smote
and bent, and broke, in a moment-, that eager front,
and hurled them swiftly back for half the dis-
tance they had went ; not swiftly, nor in
panic, any further. Closing up their shattered
lines, they came slowly away—a regiment where
a brigade had been, hardly a brigade where a whole
division had been victorious. They had met from
the woods the first volleys of musketry from fresh
troops—had met them and returned them till their
line had yielded and gone down before the weight
of fire, and till the ammunition was exhausted.

" In ten minutes the fortunes of the day seemed
to have changed. It was the rebels now who were
advancing, pouring out of the woods in endless
lines, sweeping through the corn-field from which
their comrades had just fled. Hooker sent in his
nearest brigade to meet them, but it could not do
the work. He called for another. There was
nothing close enough, unless he took it from his
right. His right might be in danger if it was
weakened, but his centre was already threatened
with annihilation. Not hesitating one moment, he
sent to Doubleday : " Give me your best brigade
instantly."
The best brigade came down the hill to the right
on the run, went through the timber in front
through a storm of shot and bursting shell and
crashing limbs, over the open field beyond, and
straight into the corn-field, passing as they went
three brigades shattered by the rebel fire, and stream-
ing to the rear. They passed by Hooker, whose
eyes lighted as he saw these veteran troops led by
a soldier whom he knew he could trust. " I think
they will hold it," he said.

" General Hartsuff took his troops very stea-
dily, but, now that they were under fire, not
hurriedly, up to the hill from which the corn-field
begins to descend, and formed them on the crest.
Not a man who was not in full view—not one who
bent before the storm. Firing at first in volleys,
they fired them at will with wonderful rapidity
and effect. The whole line crowned the hill and
stood out darkly against the sky, but lighted and
shrouded over in flame and smoke. These were the
12th and 13th Massachusetts, old troops all of
them.

There for half an hour they held the ridge, un-
yielding in purpose, exhaustless in courage. There
were gaps in the line, but it nowhere dwelt. Their
general was wounded badly early in the fight, but
they fought on. Their supports did not come—
they determined to fight without them. They be-
gan to go down the hill and into the corn. They did
not stop to think that their ammunition was nearly
gone ; they were there to win that field, and they
won it. The rebel line for the second time fled
through the corn and into the woods. I cannot tell
how few of Hartsuff's brigade were left when the
work was done. There was no more gallant, deter-
mined, heroic fighting in ail this desperate day.
General Hartsuff is very severely wounded, but I
do not believe he counts his success too dearly pur-
chased.

The crisis of the fight at this point had arrived ;
Ricketts' division, vainly endeavouring to advance,
and, exhausted by the effort, had fallen back. Part
of Mansfield's corps was ordered in to their relief,
but Mansfield's troops came back again, and
their General was mortally wounded. The left,

nevertheless, was too extended to be turned, and
too strong to be broken. Ricketts sent
word he could not advance, but could hold his
ground. Doubleday had kept his guns at work on
the right, and had finally silenced a rebel battery
that for half an hour had poured in a galling en-
filading fire along Hooker's central line.
" There were woods in front of Doubleday's hill
which the rebels held, but so long as those guns
pointed that way they did not care to attack. With
his left then able to take care of itself, with his
right impregnable with two brigades of Mansfield
still fresh and coming rapidly up, and with his centre
a second time victorious, General Hooker determined
to advance. Orders were sent to Crawford and
Gordon—the two Mansfield brigades—to move
directly forward at once, the batteries in the centre
were ordered on, the whole line was called on, and
the general himself went forward.
To the right of the corn field and beyond it, was
a point of woods. Once carried and firmly held it
was the key of the position. Hooker determined to
take it, He rode out in front of hid furthest troops
on a hill to examine the ground for a batters. At
the top he dismounted and went forward on foot,
completed his reconnaissance, returned, and re-
mounted. The musket'y fire from the point of wood
was all the while extremely hot. As he put his foot
in the stirrup a fresh volley of rifle bullets came
whizzing by. The tall, soldierly figure of the ge-
neral, the white horse which he rode, the elevated
place
where he was—all made him a most danger-
ously conspicuous mark. So he had been all day,
riding without a staff officer or an orderly near
him—all often
lsnent off on urgent duty—visible every-
where on
the field. The rebel bullets had followed
him all
day, y
but
they had not hit him, and he would
e r
not
riddenregard five them.
Remounting on this hill, he had
not steps when he was struck in the

foot by a ball.
Three men
were shot down at the same mo-
ment by his side. The air was alive with bullets.
He kept on his horse for a few moments, though
the wound was severe and excessively painful,
and would not dismount till he had given
his last order to advance. He was himself
in the very front. Swaying unsteadily on his horse,
he turned in his seat to look about him. There is
a regiment to the right. Order it forward. Craw-
ford and Gordon are coming up. Tell them to carry
these works, and hold them—and it is our fight."
It was found that the bullet had
passed com-
pletely through his foot. The surgeon who exa-
mined it on the spot could give no opinion whether
bones were broken, but it was afterwards ascer-
tained that, though grazed, they were not frac-
tured. Of course, the severity of the wound made
it impossible for him to keep the field which he be-
lieved already won, so far as it belonged to him to
win it. It was 9 o'clock. The fight had been
furious since 5 o'clock. A large part of his command
was broken ; but with his right still untouched, and
with Crawford's and Gordon's brigades just up—
above all, with the advance of the whole central
line, which the men had heard ordered with cheers
he —'with a regiment already on the edge of the woods—'with'anted, he might well leave the field, thinking
the battle
'was won—that his battle was won, for I
am writing,
of
course, only about the attack on the
rebelleft.
I see no reason why I
ration of Gen, " should disguise my admi-
ration
bravery and soldierly abi-
lity. Remaining
right, I could not hel; alls the morning on the
promptness of his movem:eneting the sagacity and
troops were kept io hand, 8, how completely his
Ixow devotedly they

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