The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1886-05-20
THE FIGHT WITH STONES.
A Federal Soldiers Story of the Second
Battle of Manassas.

heads from the Union guns ceased, and
we we're ordered to move on at double
quick. Bounding over the fence into the
clear ground we were halted again for
the line to get straightened, and for the
first time 1 discovered the object of our
attack, and laughed outright at what
seemed comical sight. At a distance
of thirty or forty rods from me was .
railroad grade, perhaps dozen feet high
on our side, at the highest point, and at
the top of that grade was an incessant
Kaleidoscope popping up of slouch hats
and muskets, the latter of which we're all
successively withdrawn as fast as dis
charged.
1t did not seem possible that any of US
could be hit by such firing as that, and
altogether looked ridiculous. My first
perception of its being otherwise was in
looking along the line aud seeing a blue
blouse fall forward or backward to
the ground, or reel and stagger from the
rank. By that time we we're once more
in motion, and I experienced what is
probably the purely animal sensation of
bloodthirstiness. Loading and firing as
we ran toward the embankment, sue
cessively shouted, screamed, laughed,
swore, stamped and whooped, although
commonly one of the most quiet and
undemonstrative of youths. To see one
of my comrades fall made me rs angry at
him as at the enemy, for he seemed to be
deserting us at the very point where his
assistance was needed. Before We
reached the railroad grade, we had to
face grape and canister as we'll as mus
kerry; but three of us arrived there to-
gether. Farther back the field was
strewn with wounded men and corpses,
and along the RAILROAD cut" at our left,
the men of Porter's corps were contend
ing desperately with their almost inyisi-
BILE, though deadly, foe.
THE INTERNAL REGIONS BROKEN LOOSE.
My backward glance which revealed
these things was taken in the hope of
discovering the approach of our follow.
ing lines, but they were still in the woods
behind. The sight of the demolished
regiments in their front caused the
second line to hesitate, and in the mean
time the few of us who had reached the
grade crawled 10 near the top of it and
loaded as we lay close to its side, lifting
our pieces above our heads and firing
over the embankment as we'll as we could
without special aim. Then came the
charge of our second line toward us, and
it seemed as though the internal regions
had broken loose The noise was so
tremendous that we could not hear our
own voices. Of course our troops were
repulsed to the woods again, where they
stopped and commenced firing at the
enemy, who were only separated from
ourselves by a few feet of broken rock
and earth. Still, my companions and
myself stayed on the embankment,
partly because it was most dangerous to
recross the field, and partly in the hope
that another line would soon get up to
us. Our ammunition failed, and we lay
with our backs against the embankment,
as near the top as we dared venture,
throwing large stones over our heads
backward as forcibly as we could among
the enemy.
l can not now tell which side began
this method of fighting, but I remember
distinctly that we very soon got the
worst of it. The big jagged pieces of
blasted rock kept falling about US, and
some of them took effect, to our sorrow.
I was myself hit three times, as I find
by letter written to my parents few
days afterword. But our side of the fight
there was conducted under most terrible
disadvantages. Bullets from our own
troops in the woods were striking around
US, and both my immediate companions
we're soon fatally wounded from that di-
rection. My own haversack and canteen
were destroyed by fragment of she'll
and a bullet respectively, and looking
along the side OF the embankment, in
both directions, I could see no active
participant in the fight. The men of the
First Louisiana we're invisible to US, aud
they had no means of knowing that the
force opposed to them consisted of one
man not seriously wounded, with perhaps
dozen others so sorely struck that none
of them could have aimed a musket or
thrown a missile to accomplish any
object
PERSONAL INTERVIEW WITH THE FOE.
The groans and complaints of my
wounded friends at the fall of stones
upon them finally decided my action, and
1 concluded to stop that danger and an-
noyance to them by personal interview
with the gentlemen on the other side of
the work. My appearance at the time
could not have been prepossessing.
Grimed with dirt and powder, and wear
ing neither hat nor shirt had given
the latter garment to wounded comrade
from whom I had cut his own in order to
examine his hurt-my blouse was INSULT.
cient to hide the deshablle entirely. By
way of introduction, however, l lifted
the butt of my musket into the air,
pitched it forward on to the top of the
grade, and presently, drawing an anx,
iously long breath, followed my piece.
I looked down from the top upon the
bayouets and into the muzzles of the
muskets of Company E, Montgomery
guards, of the First Louisiana. The
noise of the battle was still so great that
they could not hear my request to be
allowed to jump down among them, but