St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1880-08-27

slackens his pace, not canOneer looses
his seat. Six guns, six caisons, 60
horses, go men race for the brow of the
bill as if he who reached it first would
be knighted.
A moment ago the battery was
confused mob. We look again, and
the guns are in position, the detached
horses hurrying away, the ammunition
chests open, and along our line runs
the command, sGive them one more
volley and fall back to support the
guns" We have scarcely obeyed when
boom boom boom !! opens the battery,
and jets of fire jump down and search
the green fields under which we fought
and despaired.
The shattered old brigade has a
chance to breathe for the first time in
three hours as we form line of battle
behind the guns and lie down. What
grim, cool fellows these canoneers are
Every man is a perfect machine. Bull
let's plash the dust into their faces, but
they do not vince. Bullets sing over
and around them, but they do not
dodge. There goes one to the earth,
shot through the head as he sponged
his gun. The machinery looses Just
one beat-misses just one cog in the
wheel-and then works away again as
before.
Every gun is using shot fuse shell.
The ground shakes and trembles-the
roar shut out all sounds from a battle
line three miles long, and the shells go
shrieking into the swamp to cut trees
short oH-tO NOW great gaps in the
bushes-tO hunt out and shatter and
mangle men until their corpses cannot
be recognized as human. You would
think a tornado was bowling through
the forest, followed by pillows of fire,
and yet men live through it-aye,
press forward to capture the battery
We can hear their shouts as they form
for a rush.
Now the shells are changed for grape
and canister, and the guns are served
so fast that all reports blend into one
mighty roar. The shrek of shell is
the wickedest sound in war, but moth
ing makes the flesh crawl like the de-
moniac singing, purring, whistleing
grapeshot, and the serpent-like hiss of
canister. Mems legs and arms are not
shot through, but torn off. Heads are
torn from bodies, and bodies cut in
two. A round shot or shell takes two
men out of the ranks as it crashes
through. Grape and canister NOW a
swarth and pile the dead on top of each
other.
Through the smoke we see a swarm
of men. 1t is not a battle line, but a
mob of men desperate enough to bathe
their bayonets in the flame of guns.
The guns leap from the ground almost
as they are depressed on the foe, and
shrieks and screams and shouts blend
into one awful steady cry. Twenty
men on the battery are down, and the
firing is interrupted.
The foe accepts it as a sign of waver-
ing, and come rushing on. They are
not ten feet away when the guns give
them last shot. That discharge picks
living men off their feet and throws
them into a swamp, blackened, bloody
mass.
Up now, as the enemy are among
the guns! There is a silence of ten
seconds, and then the flash and roar of
more than 5000 muskets and rush for
ward with bayOnets. For whatP Nei-
ther on the right nor the left nor in
front of us is living foe There are
corpses around us which have been
struck by three, four and even six
bullets, and now here on this acre of
ground is wounded mani The
wheels of the guns cannot move until
the blockade of dead is removed. Men
cannot pass from caissOn to gun with
out climbing over windrows of dead.
Every gun and wheel is smeared with
blood-every foot of grass has its hor-
rible stain.
Historians write of the glory of war.
Burial parties saw murder where histO-
rians saw glory.