The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1894-09-17
It Was "Grandma's'' Grave Also.

AT 10 o'clock we of Company A were
pushed to the front as pickets, says a
writer in the Pittsburg Post We scat
tered along the edge of a cornfeld and
crouched down. On the other side of the
field and hardly pistolshot away, were
the pickets of the enemy. We had come
up as a reinforcement just at dark, and
had not looked over the ground and did
not know of the farmhouse a few rods
distant. At II o'clock, when the men on
the battle lines were asleep and mutter-
Ing as they dreamed | heard footsteps in
the darkness. Some one was coming
along down the edge of the cornield.
challenged, and the footstep ceased.
challenged again, and the voice of a
woman called TO me through the dark
ness:
please let me come. want to speak
to you"
She came forward and stood close be-
side me in the gloom. | saw that she was
old, and gray and bent, and that she
leaned heavily on a stick. The farm
house was almost the center of the battle.
rom noon to shutdown il had been eX-
posed to every missile of war, and that it
had not been burned as well as rent and
shattered was a wonder. No one lived
there except an old man and his equally
them for hight. For hours their lives
had been spared, while hundreds of others
had been taken, but as the sun hung low
the poor old man received mortal ound
and died in her arms. She had hobbled
down to me, past the dead and wounded,
to ask help 10 bury him. She would 20
away If We would assist her, but he must
be buried first
| passed the word back, and corporal
and two men were sent forward. They
had been aroused from Sleep and feared
they would speak grufly to the poor old
wife and widow, but they did not. They
called her grandma and gave her
words of sympathy, and the corporal
gave her his arm to lean upon as they
made their way TO the house. There lay
the old man, dead, and while she
kneeled to weep and pray beside the
corpse the men dug grave in the garden
behind the house. 1t was grave among
the dead. In that quaint old garden
where the pinks and hollyhocks and IL
laos shared the ground with the lettuce
and onions and cucumbers. were q score
of men whose eyes would never open
again.
Now, grandma, come on, and please
don't cry" said the corporal as he helped
! her TO her feet. Men, get sheets from
! the bed. We will give him better than a
] SOlulGI DuTldl
With the strange murmur rising from
| the wounded, with the face of the dead
| looking up into the black night, with 200.
600 living men asleep to renew their
| strength for the morrow's battle. thew
| made ready to lower the gray-haired dead
! to his resting place. Hank Away down
| on the left there is the echo of a single
musket fired by accident, perhaps. There
Is another and another, and the reports
| come rapidly nearer, 1t was always so.
! The discharge of one musket meant the
discharge OF perhaps 800. The pickets
! SIMPLY fired into the darkness in
! front. 1t was a signal that they
were alert. The reports come ripping
| along the line. | fired with the
rest OF them, and the pop. pop, pop runs
/ to the right. One single bullet, fired from
! across the field, reached a human life. II
| cut through the branches of the cherry
| tree, whizzed over the tall stalked holly.
! hooks and struck the poor old woman in
| the side, as she sobbed and grieved, and
! laid her dead, with the tears vet yelling
! from her eyes She sank down and died
/ without cry-with only sob in her
! throat. The firing died away a minute
| later as the men bent over her to see if
/ she were dead. One dead in his winding
! sheet-the other dead and waiting.
The corporal motioned with his hand
/ and the men began TO widen the grave
| He entered the house and brought out
other sh cts, and when the grave was
ready two bodies were lowered into it, side
by side. So were they covered in and left
to their eternal sleep At midnight a
group of men looking for missing officer
entered the garden and stumbled over the
new made grave.
"Who is buried here2" they asked OF
one another in surprise, knowing that the
living do not bury the dead until after
| the battle is over
There was no one to tell them. Cavalry
| galloped over the grave next day; thu
| wheels of cannon cut the earth; men fell
and died there. 1t was stamped into the
earth. as it were. Son or daughter might
have searched for lifetime and searched
| in vain.