The weekly pioneer and Democrat. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. Territory) 1855-1865, 1865-04-14

| the afternoon the cavalry pushed them hard,
and the strife went on uninterruptedly and
terrifcally. -.I
have no space in this hurried dispatch to
advert either to individual losses or to the many
thrilling episodes of the fight. It was fought
at 80 close quarters that our carbines were
| never out of range; for had this been other
given them every advantage. .t..
With their horses within call, the cavalry
men, In line of battle, stood together like
walls of stone, swelling onward like those
gradually elevating ridges of which Lyell
| speaks. Now and then detachment of rebels
would charge down upon us, swaying the
lines and threatening to annihilate us; for at
| no part of the action. till its crisis, did the
southern men exhibit their doubt or dismay,
but fought up to the standard of the most val
liant treason the world has ever had, and here
and there showing some of those wonderful
,sss sess Of Of iSa tms which are the mir
down upon Us in charge. The bayonets
were fixed the men came on with q yell !;
their gray uniforms seemed black amidst the
| smoke; their preserved colors, torn BY grape
and ball, waved yet defantly; twice they halt
| ed, and poured in volleys, but came on again
like the surge from the fog, depleted but de-
termined; yet in the hot faces of the carbi-
| neers, they read purpose as resolute, but
more calm, and while they pressed along,
| swept all the while by scathing volleys, q
group of ofhorsemen took them in flank. It was
an awful Instant the horses recoiled; the
| charging column trembled like single thing,
but at once the rebels, with rare organization,
| fell into hollow square. and with solid sheets
! of steel defed our centaurs. The horsemen
rrdo ArnOnd fhoO1 in vain. ohorOo COn16
break the shining squares, until our dismount-
ed carbineers poured in their volleys afresh,
making gaps in the spent ranks, and then in
their Wavering time the cavalry thundered
| down. The rebels could stand no more; they
reeled and swayed, and fell back broken and
beaten. And on the ground their Colonel lay,
sealing his devotion with his life.
Through wood and brake and swamp, across
field and trench, we pushed the fighting de-
tenders steadily. For part of the time Sher-
idan himself was there, short and broad, and
active, waving his hat, giving orders. seldom
out of fire, but never stationary, and close by
fell the long yellow locks of Custer, saber ex-
worn and haggard with much werk. At four
o'clock the rebels were behind their wooden
walls at Five Forks, and still the cavalry
pressed them hard, in feint rather than solemn
effort, while battalion dismounting, charged
squarely upon the breastworks which lay In
the main road on the north side of the White
Oak Road. Then while the cavalry worked
round toward the rear, the infantry of Warren,
though commanded by Sheridan, prepared to
take part in the battle.
By EcHELoN TO THE RIGHT.
The genius of Sheridan's movement lay in
his disposition of the infantry. The skill with
which he arranged 1t, and the difficult maneu-
vres he projected and so well executed, should
place him as high in infantry tactics as he has
shown himself superior In cavalry. The in
fantry which had marched at 2:36 P. NJ. from
the house of Boisseau on the Boydton Plank
Road was drawn up In four battle lines, q mile
or more in length, and in the beginning facing
the White Oak Road obliquely; the left or pivot
was the division of Gen. Ayres; Crawford had
the centre and Griffin the right. These ad-
vanced from the Boydten Plank Road at ten
away with the cavalry, mounted and dismount-
ed, and deluding the rebels with the idea that
he was the sole attacking party, they lay con-
cealed in the woods behind the Gravelly Run
Meeting house, but their left was not half
mile distant from the rebel works, though
the right reached 80 far off that q novice would
have criticised the position sharply. Little BY
little, Sheridan, extending his lines, drove the
whole rebel force into their breastworks; then
he dismounted the mass of his cavalry and
charged the works. straight in their front,
still laundering on their flank. At last every
rebel was safe behind his intrenchments. Then
the signal was given and the concealed infan-
try, many thousand strong, sprang up and
advanced by echelon to the right. Imagine
great barn door shutting to and you have the
movement, if you can also imagine the door
itself, hinge and all, moving forward also. This
was the door.
AYREs-CRAwFoRD-aR
Stick pin through Ayres and turn Griffin
and Crawford forward as you would spoke In
q Wheel but move your pin up also very lit
tie. In this way Ayres will advance, say, bali
q mile, and Griffin, to describe quarter revo'
luton, will move through radius OF four
miles. But to complicate this movement oy
echelou, we must imagine the right when halt
way advanced cutting across the center and
reforming, while Crawford became the right
and Griffin the middle Of the line OF battle.
Warren was with Crawford on this march.
Gregory commanded the skirmishers. Ayres
was so close to the rebel left that he might be
said to hinge upon it; and at 6 o'clock the
flank of the astonished rebels. Now came the
PITCH OF THE BATTLE.
We were already on the rebel right in force,
and thinly in their rear. Our carbineers were
making feint to charge In direct front, and our
Infantry, four deep, hemmed in their entire
left. All this they did not for an instant note,
lso thorough was their confusion but seeing
It directly, they, so far from giving up, concen-
trated all energy and fought like dends. They
had battery in position which belched inces.
sanity, and over the breastworks their musk
etry made one unbroken roll, while against
Sheridan's prowlers on their left, by skirmish
and sortic, they stuck to their sinking fortunes
so as to win unwilling applause from mouths
of wisest censure.
1t was just at the coming up of the infantry
that Sheridan's little band was pushed the hard
est At one time, indeed, they seemed about
to undergo determination, not that they wav-
cred but that they were so vastly overpowered.
1t will remain to the latest time q matter of
marvel that so paltry q cavalry force could
press back sixteen thousand Infantry. bnt
when the infantry blew like great barn door
the simile best applicable-upon the enemv's
left, the victory that was to come had passed
the region OF strategy, and resolved to an affair
OF personal courage. We had met the enemy.
were they to be ours? To expedite this con
summation every officer fought "a If he vere