Tensas gazette. [volume] (St. Joseph, La.) 1886-current, 1911-12-01

most desperate enterprises Of the entire war
There are today surviving members of the
Forty-ffth Illinois in whose veins the words Fort
Hill Nine" will make the blood tingle. II was
only week before the Fourth which Pember-
ton surrendered the Confederate city In Logan's
front lay Fort Hill It was decided at a council
of the generals that its sapping and mining and
the subsequent seizing and holding of the en-
brasure made by the explosion would be of ire
mendous moral and strategcal value to the Union
cause. The place was commanded by Confeder-
ate artillery and by sharpshooters in hundred
rife pits. II was known that II the explosion Of
Fort Hill was a success that few OF the men who
rushed into the creyasses could hope to come out
alive. II would be what the Saxons called deed
of derrtng-do Owing to the limited space to be
occupied only single regiment was to be named
20 jump into the great yawning hole after the ex
posion and to hold IT against the hell fire OF the
enemy until adequate protective works could be
thrown up
There as many volunteers for the enter
prise there were colonies Of regiments In
Grants army. The choice fell on Jasper A Malt
by and his following Of Illinois boys
The time came for the explosion The Forty
fifth lay grimly awaiting the charge into deaths
pit The signal was given; there came heavy
roar and a mighty upheaval Silence had barely
fallen before there rose one great reverberating
yell and the Lead Mine Regiment. led by its col
onel. Jasper A. Maltby. with his lieutenant col
onel. Malancthon Smith. at his elbow hurled
itself into the smoking crater The lieutenant col
one was shot through the head and MORALLY
wounded before his feet had fairly touched the
pits bottom The colonel was shot twice. but
paid little heed to his wounds battery Of
Confederate artillery belched shrapnel into the
ranks and sharpshooters seemed fairly to be firing
by volleys. The question became of getting
some sort of protection thrown up before the en-
tire regiment should be annihlated Certain men
in the pit were tolled on to answer the sharp
shooters fire and to make II hot for the cannon
aders In the Confederate battery They did what
they could but II svailed little to their COM
rades, who were toiling to throw up the redoubt
Men fell on every side
Beams were passed into the pit and these we're
put into position as protection by the surviving
soldiers The joists we're placed lengtnwise and
dirt was quickly piled about them Colonel Malt
by helped the men to lodge the beams He went
to one side Of the crater where there was no ele-
walton. There he stood fully exposed. shining
mark He put his shoulder under great piece
of timber, and. weak with wounds though he was
he pushed 1t up and forward into place The bull
lets Clipped the woodwork and spat In the sand
all about him One Confederate gunner Of artil
lery trained his great piece directly at the devoted
leader solid shot struck the beam. from which
Colonel Maltby had Just removed his shoulder
and split It into kindling Great sharp pieces Of
the wood were driven into the colonePs side. and
he was hurled to the bottom OF the black pit
The action was over shortly. for the gallant
Fortyffth succeeded in making that deaths hole
tenable. Then they picked up their colonel HI
was still alive though the surgeon shortly after
ward said that 1t would be hard work to coun
his wounds They took him to the field hospital
and before he had been there an hour there wal
clicking over the wires to Washington a message
carrying the recommendation that Colonel Jaspe
A. Maltby of the Lead Mine Regiment be made
brigadier general Of volunteers for conspcuou
personal gallantry in the face Of the enemy
A week later Grants victorious forces marche,
into vicksburg
Colonel Jasper A. Maltby OF General Jasper
Maltby as 1t soon became lived until the end o
the war. but system could long withstand tn
shock and pain Of those gaping wounds. He die
in the very city which he had helped to conoueI
Afterward flag and a precious memory wer
rarely absent from the life which finally dickere
out when the vhite-haired little widow died a
St Luke's hospital. Chicago