Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1905-12-06

strength. cartridges, hope all spent
and gone, they drop their useless rifle
butts to earth and lean exhausted on
the hot, black muzzles. At least they
hold the ground.
So, too, does that stern, silent, iron
com mand across those so yards of
smoking void, with obstinate deter
mination," writes Old Jack, in rueful
admission of the stubborn valor of his
foe. And after all what has he ac-
complished? What has he not done this
night but blunder? Ali he had to do
was to remain there in concealment
beyond that unfinished railway grade,
resting in the shady woods, and, all
unconscious of his presence, the union
brigades would have passed him by,
leaving Ricketts, far in the rear to be
cut off, crushed or captured. But the
sight Of 5000 Yankees marching along
almost parallel to his front, all unsup-
ported, was too much for even such
piety as Jackson's. Ordinarily he had
done wonders with dozen regiments
nearly as small as these. Tonight he
sends in twice that number to assail
smaller force, and is fought to a
stand within an hour. He has gained
nothing. He has lost one-third of his
best and bravest-his Virginians. He
has betrayed his position to the enc
my, for Sigel, away to the southeast,
has heard the sound of battle, and Nc
Lean, brave leader of one of his few
American brigades, watches the des-
perate struggle from Ladue's old look
out at the Henry house, and Pope,
skillfully directing his diverging col
umn to trap Jackson at Centreville,
hears over the left shoulder, far over
league behind him, the storm of a
battle that only dies out at nine, but
that tells him the tale of one more
trick of Jackson's-the time-honored
tale of the Irishman's flea
But it opens Pope's otherwise blinded
eyes, changes in toto his plans for the
morrow, and bids him turn his col
umns on Groveton. Jackson's blunder
has taken much from his own fame,
| added much to those of another, and
given the Badgers and Hoosiers the
title they rejoice in ever thereafter
| the name of the Iron Brigade.
Sore times are these, this black,
| mOonless night, as, within hailing dis
lance of each other, officers and men
Of the opposing forces go cropping about
with glimmering lights, looking for
friends among the slain. Sad hearts
are these beating in the bosoms of the
group of union generals in the fence
| corner back Of the moaning wood. for
it is full of wounded. The regimental
commanders are slowly withdrawing
their wearied men to the line of the
pike, leaving strong pickets to protect
the surgeons and their stretcher-bear-
ers at the front 1t is dramatic scene
when that dark-eyed soldier, COM
mander of the Seventh, rides in to re-
port to his brigade chief concerning
the regiment that caustic regular"
has sometimes misjudged. What do
you think of the Seventh now" is the
irrepressible question just before the
colonel slips. fainting. from his saddle,
and then and not until then permits
| it to be known that all the time as he
held his men to their desperate work,
he sat his horse, pierced through both
thighs by Enfield bullet, his boots run
| ming over with blood Old Graybeard
| of the Sixth, too, is shot through the
leg, and Gibbon has. borrowed his
| right-hand man, the tall, brainy adj
| jutant, and the Sixth feels bereft,
| though it, too. falls into soldier hands.
But the Black Hats and the Hoosiers
| have lost more than ALL
ITO Be Continued