Western Reserve chronicle. [volume] (Warren, Ohio) 1855-1921, 1869-04-21

"Well," said the stranger, as lie
loosened his belt and stretched him.
self in an easy, recumbent position,
ait is not more than fair that / should
| throw something into the stock Of
common entertainment; but the story
am TO tell you is a sad one, and fear
will not add to the pleasure of the eve
ming. As you desire il, however, and
IL comes within the line Of the request
that l would narTate some personal
episode of the war, ] will tell it, and
trust the impression will not be alto
gether unpleasant.
..It was at the battle of Malvern
Hill-a battle where the carnage was
more frightful. as il seems to me, than
in any this side of the Alleghanies
during the whole war-that my story
must begin. / was then serving as
Major in the -th Massachusetts Reg
iment-the old -th as we used TO call
it-and bloody time the boys had of
it, too. About , p. nj. we had been
sent out to skirmish along the edge of
the wood in which, as our Generals
suspected, the Rebs lay massing for a
charge across the slope, upon the crest
of which our army was posted. We
had barely entered the underbrush
when we met the heavy formations of
Magruder in the very act of charging.
Of course our thin line of skirmishers
was no impediment to those onrush-
ing masses. They were on us and
over Us before we could get out of the
way. do not think that half of those
running, screaming masses of men
ever knew that they had passed over
the remnants of as plucky regiment
as ever came out of the old Bay State.
But many of the boys had good reason
TO remember that afternoon at the
base of Malvern Hill, and among the
number; for when the last line of rebs
had passed over me, / was left amid
the bushes with the breath nearly
trampled out of me, and an ugly bay
onet-gash through my thigh; and
mighty little consolation was it for
me at that moment to see the fellow
who run me through lying stark dead
at my side, with bullet-hOle in his
head, his shock of coarse, black hair
matted with blood, and his stony eyes
looking into mine. Well, bandaged
up my limb the best might, and star
ted to crawl away, for our batteries
had opened, and the grape and canis-
ter that came hurling down the slope
passed but few feet over my head
1t was slow and painful work, as You
can imagine, but at last, by dint of
perseverance, l had dragged myself
away TO the left of the direct range of
the batteries, and creeping to the
verge of the wood, looked Off over the
green slope. / understood by the
crash and roar of the guns, the yells
and cheers of the men, and that
hOarse murmur which those who have
been in battle know, but which l can
not describe in words, that there was
hot work going on out there; but new
er had / seen, no, not in that three
DAYS desperate melee at the Wilder
ness, nor at that terrific repulse we
had at Cold Harbor, such absolute
slaughter as / saw that afternoon on
the green slope of Malvern Hill. The
guns of the entire army were massed
on the crest, and thirty thousand of
our infantry lay, musket in hand, in
front. For eight hundred yards the
hill sank in easy deelension to the
wood, and across this smooth expanse
the rebs must charge to reach our line.
Ii was nothing short of downright in
sanity to order men to charge that
hill; and so his Generals told Lee, but
he would not listen TO reason that day,
and so he sent regiment after regi-
ment, and brigade after brigade, and
division after division, to certain
death. Talk about Grants disregard
of human life, his effort at Cold Har-
bOr-and j ought TO know, for got
mimic in my shoulder that day-was
hopeful and easy work TO what Lee
laid on Hills and Magruder's divis-
ions at Malvern. 1t was at the close
of the second charge, when the yelling
mass reeled. back from before the
blaze Of these sixty guns and thirty
thousand rifles, even as they began to
break and fly backward toward the
woods, that 1 saw from the spot where
/ lay a riderless horse break out of the
confused and flying mass, and, with
name and tail erect and spreading
nostril, come dashing obliquely down
the slope. Over fallen steeds and
heaps of the dead she leaped with
motion as airy as that of the flying fox
when, fresh and unjaded, he leads
away from the hounds, whose sudden
cry has broken him off from hunting
mice amid the bogs Of the meadow
So this riderless horse came vaulting
along. Now from my earliest boy
hood i have had what hOrsemen call
a weakness for horses. Only give me
a colt of wild, irregular temper and
fierce blood to tame, and l am perfect
ly happy. Never did lash of mine,
singing with cruel sound through.the
air, fall on such a colts soft hide.
Never did yell or kick send his hot
blood from heart to head deluging his
-onnitir-n hrain Nth Anrr nr,rrsrnt..