Greene County herald. (Leakesville, Miss.) 1898-current, 1911-12-08

most desperate enterprises of the entire wan,
There are today surviving members of the
Forty-fifth Illinois in whose veins the words Fort
Hill Mine" will make the blood tingle. It was
only week before the Fourth on which Pember-
ton surrendered the Confederate city In Logans
front lay Fort Hill. 1t decided at a council
OF the generals that its sapping and mining and
the subsequent selling and holding of the en-
brasure made by the explosion would be of ire
mendous moral and strategical value to the Union
cause The place was commanded by Confeder-
ate artillery and by sharpshooters in a hundred
rifle pits 1t was known that If the explosion of
Fort Hill was success that few of the who
rushed into the crevasses could hope to come out
alive 1t would be what the Saxons called deed
of derring-do. Owing to the limited space to be
occupied only single regiment was to be named
to jump into the great yawnng hole after the eX-
plosion and to hold it against the hell fire of the
enemy until adequate protective works could be
thrown up.
There was many volunteers for the enter
prise as there were colonies of regiments in
Grants army. The choice fell on Jasper A. Malt
by and his following of Illinois boys.
The time for the explosion The Forty
fifth lay grmly awaiting the charge into deaths
pit. The signal was given; there came heavy
roar and 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. Matby, with his lieutenant col
one Maancthon Smith, at his elbow hurled
itself into the smoking crater The lieutenant col
onel 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. A battery of
Confederate artillery beched shrapnel into the
ranks and sharpshooters seemed fairly to be firing
by volleys. The question became one of getting
some sort of protection thrown up before the en-
tire regiment should be annihilated Certain men
in the pit were tolled off to answer the sharp
shooters fire and to make it hot for the cannon
aders in the Confederate battery. They did what
they could, but it availed little to save their COM
rades. who were toiling to throw up the redoubt.
Men fell on every side.
Beams were passed into the pit and these were
put into position protection by the surviving
soldiers. The joists placed lengthwse 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-
Vation There he stood fully exposed, a 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
let's 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 A solid shot struck the beam from which
Colonel Maltby had just removed his shoulder,
and split 1t into kindling. Great sharp pieces of
the wood were driven into the colones side, and
he was hurled to the bottom Of the black pit
The action was over shortly, for the gallant
Forty-hfth succeeded in making that deaths hole
tenable. Then they picked up their colonel He
was sui alive, though the surgeon shortly after
ward said that it would be hard work to count
his wounds They took him to the field hospital.
and before he had been there hour there was
clicking over the wires to Washington message
carrying the recommendation that Colonel Jasper
A Maltby of the Lead Mine Regiment be made
brigaGier general of volunteers for conspicuous
personal gallantry in the face of the enemy.
week later Grants victorious forces marched
into Vicksburg.
Colonel Jasper A Maltby or General Jasper A.
Maltby as 1t became, lived until the end of
the war, but no system could long withstand the
shock and pain of those gaping wounds. He died
in the very city which he had helped to conquer.
Afterward flag and precious memory were
rarely absent from the life which finally flckered
out when the white-hared little widow died at
St LulIes hospital Chicago.