Edgefield advertiser. [volume] (Edgefield, S.C.) 1836-current, 1919-06-04
Longssreet at chicamauga.

lLCSSIISlO f1ONS1GlSC1.
1t is my purpose 20 write several
articles in the defense of Gen. James
Longstreet, and am anxious that
they be published.
All the blood shed by Longstreet's
corps was not poured out on the Po-
tomac, Sharpsburg and Gettysburg.
On September, 80, 1868, two mighty
armies met in fercest conflict on
stream near the Georgia and Tennes-
see line under the brow of Lookout
Mountain called Chicamauga, name
antedating history, called by the red
man, "streafn of DEATH" 1t may be
that prophetic Ken revealed to the
! red man, as he drank of its cooling
waters or rested in its grateful shade,
that the white men who were to drive
him from his home and possess his
land, would on its banks and amid it's
waters meet in deadly conflict and
stain it's currents with the flow of
blood.
Gen. Lee ordered Gen. Longstreet
of the army of northern Virginia,
then camped on the banks of the Rap
pahannock, to take the first (his)
army corps and move by rail, with
all possible haste to Chicamauga to
reinforce Gen. Bragg, who was being
hard pressed there.
It was about the middle of Sep
! tembcr we left the beautiful Kappa
hammock. Hoods division and three
other brigades landed in time to be
in the battle of the 10th, McLaw's
division, South Carolina, Humphreys,
Mississippi, came on the 18th about
sundown and marched to the Chica-
mauga creek and bivouaced for the
night on it's bloody banks. The curtain
of night slowly descended, the powder
blackened bayonets and flags over the
hostile lines were but dimly seen.
"The night after the battle" No one
but soldier can realize the import
ance Of these few words.
Shortly after dark the remorseless
war-god relaxed his hold on the two
armies, whose blood has been flowing
since early morning, growing faint,
bleeding and painting heavily, and 81
lence reigned again in the shell-shiv-
cred forest. But the gray and blue
forms in the bushes didn't move.
Sunday morning at 8 o'clock as
the church bells of Chattanooga sum-
moned its children to Sunday school,
the signal guns sounded through the
forest at Chicamauga calling the
bleeding armies again to battle. Here
Gen. Longstreet's corps broke the
Federal line at the beginning. Later
in the day, Longstreet drove his col
umn like wedge into the Union CEN
ter, ripping asunder the steady line
of the Federal division. / am freeto
say and justice requires it to be stat
ed here, that no officer or body of
men of the same number could have
contributed more to the triumph of
the Confederates than did Gen. Long
street and the brave men from Vlr-
ginia. The praises of Longs1reet ana
his men were freely proclaimed oy
the army of Tennessee.
In writing these letters it is rot M
intention to give the details of the
battle, but simply in defense of
Gen. Longstreet, and to let people
know that he was always in the thick
of the fight and always held his
ground. With him it was war to the
knife. Gen. Lee called him his war
horse. He stood in rank next to Lee.
He commanded the 1st army corps,
Jackson the End.
At the end of the two days battle,
which has scarcely parallel, as the
two wings of the Confederate army
met on the field their battle flags
waved triumphantly above every
CORY acre of it and their ringing
shouts rolled through the forest and
rose to heaven, a mighty anthem of
praise and gratitude to God for the
victory. Thus c::6ed one of the blood
lest and ::,@;os; stubbornly contested
battles cf ...e war. And without hes
itation, l declare that Gen. Long
street never did disobey one single
order of his chief when duty called,
no matter how deadly the conflict.
Gen. John B. Gordon waited until
Gen. Lee died before he published to