The Democratic press. [volume] (Ravenna, O. [Ohio]) 1868-1901, 1889-01-03
A BATTERY IN HOT ACTION.
Description of Battlefield seene.-Not as
Historians Tell of It, but a. Fight
ing Men Known 1t to Be.

One who has fought on many a bat
tle-field writes the following thrilling
description of the work of battery Of
six guns:
Did you ever see battery take po-
siti0n?
1t hasn't the thrill of q cavalry
charge, nor the -grimness of a line Of
bayOnets moving slowly and determin-
edly on, but there is peculiar excite
ment about it that makes old veterans
rise in their saddles and cheer.
We have been fighting at the edge
of the woods. Every cartrldge-box
has been emptied once or more, and
one-fourth of the brigade has melted
away in dead and wounded and miss
ing. Not cheer is heard in the
whole brigade. We know that we are
being driven foot by foot, and that
when we break once more the line viii
go to pieces and the enemy will pour
through the gap.
Here comes help!
Down the crowded highway gallops
battery, Withdrawn from some other
position to save ours The field
fence is scattered while you could
count thirty. and the guns rushed for
the hills behind Us. Six horses to .
piece-three riders TO each gun. Over
dry bitches where farmer would, not
drive a wagon. through clumps Of
bushes, over logs a foot thick. every
horse on the gallop. every rider LASH
ing his team and yelling-the sight be-
hind us making us forget the Zoe in
front. The guns jump two feet high
rs the heavy wheels strike rock or
log but not horse slackens his pace,
not cannOneer loses his seat. Six
guns, six caissons. sixty horses, eighty
men, race for the brOwsOf the hill as II
he who should reach it first would be
knighted.
A moment ago the battery was .
confused mob. We look again aud
the six guns are in position, the de-
tached horses hurrying away, the am-
munitiou chests open, and along our
line runs the command:
"Give them one more volley and fall
back TO support the guns" We have
scarcely obeyed when boom! boom!
opens the battery, and jets of ire jump
down and scorcii the green trees under
which we fought and despaired.
The shattered old brigade has O
chance to breathe for the first time in
three hours as we form n line and lie
down. What grim. cool fellows those
cannoneers are. Every man is per-
feet machine. Bullets splash dust in
their faces. but they do not Vince.
Bullets sing over and around; they do
not dodge. There goes one to the
earth, shot through the head IS he
sponged his gun. That machinery
loses Just one beat, misses Just one cog
in the wheels and then works away
again as before.
Every gun is using short fuse shell.
The ground shakes and trembles, the
roar shuts out all sounds from a line
three miles long, and the shells go
shrieking into the swamp to cut trees
short of, to NOW great gaps in the
bushes, hunt out and shatter and man-
gle men until their corpses cannot be
recognized as human. You would
think tornado was bowling through
the forest, followed by pillows Of fire,
and yet men live through it-ayei
press forward to capture the battery.
We can hear their shouts as they form
the rush.
Now the shells are changed for grape
and canister, and guns are fired so fast
that all reports blend into one mighty
roar. The shrek of a shell is the
wickedest sound in the war, but moth
ing makes flesh crawl like the demo-
niacal singing, purring. whistling
grape shot, and the serpent-like hiss OF
canister.
Mems legs and heads are torn from
bodies and bodies cut in two. A round
shot or shell takes two men out Of the
rank as it crashes through. Grape and
40 nj fnas m a
dead on top of each other.
Through the smoke we see q swarm
of men. 1t is not battle line, but
mob of men desperate enough to bathe
their bayonets in the flame of the guns.
The guns leap from the ground, al
most, as they are depressed on the foe,
and shrieks and screams and shouts.
blend into one awful and steady cry.
Twenty men out of the battery are
down, aud the firing is interrupted.
The foe accept 1t as q sign Of waver-
ing and come rushing on. They are
not ten feet away when the guns give
them the last shot. That discharge
picks living men off their feet and
throws them into the swamp, q black
ened. 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
forward with bayonets. For WHAT
Neither on the right nor left nor in
front of us is living fOei There are
corpses around us which have been
struck by three, four. and even six
bullets, and nowhere on this acre OF
ground is q wounded man. The wheels
of the guns cannot move until the
blockade of dead is removed. Men
cannot pass from caissiOn 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.