The Douglas independent. [volume] (Roseburg, Or.) 187?-1885, 1883-11-17
Bull Run Battle Field.

| Gn0 DaGUi6 ueiu Ol Dull hLn, 1Ollf miles
distance, over the same road that Beau
regard travelled to meet Mcdowell, July
| 81, 1861.
The trouble now is not what to say
but what not to say in a single letter
Briefly, then, the south was massing for
battle at this point. You can to this day
4 see miles of earthwcrks. Fort Beaure-
gard is still an imposing piece o. fortifi-
cation, earthwork with beech trees, pear
trees, willows, and in fact, all kinds of
wild as we'll as tame woods climbing
over. 1t is too heavy to level down and
restore again to the dominion of the
| pillow. But neariys he other lines and
earth forts have quietly surrendered to
the husbandman, and mounting there
| to. day, the tall corn stands in regiments
flashing its green, bent sabres in the
| sun.
The first battle of Bull Run stands
first in the alphabet of great American
battles. Greater battles have been
fought hereabouts; a greater battle,
indeed, on this same ground But the
first has fastened itself on us. There is
a savage fascination about which we who
lived on that day cannot escape. And yet
it was not yesterday. [ saw lounging
against lamp-post here at Manassas not
an hour ago. handsome young south
erner pulling at his mustache. I
approached and asked him OF the bat
| tie. He had been born since it
I was fought! So you see it was not fought
yesterday, this battle of Bull Run, when
the cannon shook the earth even to the
shores of Oregon. And do you know the
north played the air of Dixie in this
first battle? It is so. The south had not
yet learned it, but played ''The Girl I
Left Behind Me-" Let us look in upon
this battle field as we look upon the face
of one whom we knew nearly quarter
of a century ago. By a wide, well-kept
country road, through corn fields and
clumps of oak, chestnut, walnut, hick-
ory aud half dozen other kinds of scrub
trees, some of them badly shot to pieces,
we were driven toward the muddy, slug
gish, crooked and ugly little stream Gf
Bull Run. In this drive of four miles
we met one man on horseback; we passed
one man on horse and barefoot negro
boy on foot, driving little flock of
sheep. Overhead / saw single raven !;
not bird, not squirrel, on either
hand; but the crickets and grasshcppers
in the corn fields and clumps of wood on
either side Of us chirped and san g inces-
sanity.
At the end of four miles we turned
through gate to the right into a field /;
COWS were scattered here and there around
the crescent of the hill; On the crest of
the hill stood long frame farm house;
back of this house little brown
stone monument to the dead soldiers
soldiers; in front of it, in the door yard
graveyard. The house which formerly
stood here had been torn to splinters
during the battle. The lady
buried in the grave in the door yard was
killed here. She was the mother of the
kind old gentleman who now inherits
this place. This battlefield was his
mothers farm. It is now his, and he
shows you over it. He was teaching
school down at Alexandria at the time
his mother was killed here; school
teacher for forty years. He and his sis
ter live in this old gray house together;
no one but these two old deaf people for
many mile about. The peach trees are
breaking down under loads of fruit in
the heart of the le-field; little way
down the slope of the hill below the
grave in the door-yard. Long strings OF
fat turkeys tread on tangled grass through
the orchard, chasing the grasshoppers,
Below this orchard, half mile away and
curved around in muddy crescent, but
hidden by young growth of trees
creeps Bull Run. On the morning Of
the battle in the broad cornfields, an6
away out yonder, miles away over tht
foothills, the federal bayonets cleaned
by tens of thousands. They were march
, ing for Beauregard's rear, or rather fo
| ha II vuI, No bn1
, up.from the south. He had come ou
from Manassas. four miles away, to sto]
this movement, as all the world knows
The north was not to be stopped. Henc
,, the battle. But this is trenching on his
tory, and we must draw the line. Yo,
can see where the south retreated t.
where stood Jackson, like stone wall.
; Back of this house, where the ol,
; schoolmaster lives with his oldest sister
about hundred yards, and almost at tn
top of the gently sloping hill, on th
outer edge of the tall. rank corn, an
:, against young growth of pines, is th
place where jackson got down to pray
And here it was he sat on his horse
wounded, and held his men in stubbor
line that day, while the storm of battl
r beat against them, and so won his singr
d lar name. On the front of this slopin
hill the dead lay thickest when the figt
s was done. The corn is rank and tai
II But do not see as some pretend t
IS when looking over the field of Waterloo
II that the blood of brave men has put an
y particular mark of vitality upon it. Th
q truth is, if some one did not point out
IS you all this, you would know nothin
l. whatever of the battle of Bull Rul
II Nature covers up all such scars; tim
II heals the wounds on the breast of OF
common mother, as well as on our owl
,r Wander about here for week, as T hay
: done, and, save for the one little brow
,e stone monument here, the old eartl
: works at Manassas and son Scared oil
g. trees, you would not know there ha
j. er been any battle here. have picke
is up one bullet and one button from
lie soldiers coat; that is all. But on Il
a. earthworks near Manassas, under peae
le tree, while picking up peaches, four
" an Indian arrow head Think of it, al
i follow these two facts What other bs
O. ties, what other races had fought for Il
o. fields of Virginia ages and ages before
in Not many people came to visit th
b. battlefield. have seen a thousand
In Waterloo for a single visitor here.
~ The great trencL where the dead we
b buried on this sloping hill immediate
a under where Stonewall Jackson sat
b his horse during the battle, is still
ia trench This is sore that refuses
ii. heal. It has become little drain
In rivulet. The bones of the dead we
te mostly taken away at the close of t
all war. and this opened the trench ane