Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-10-05
From an engraving in Harper's Weekly,

THERE was no lack OF bravery on the part
of the Unoin troops. Indeed, they were all
Americans in this great war. fighting against
one another, and one SIDE was just as brave
the other, and the repeated assaults the
attacking army made had little effect on the
army securely intrenched Repeated charges
availed nothing but to be hurled back, leaving
each time additional manged troops as the
price for bad generalship. Indeed, the Lon
don Times correspondent, who watched the
battle from the heights, speaking of their des-
perate valor says:
"Never at Fontenoy, Albuera nor at Waterloo
was more undoubted courage displayed by
the sons of Erin than during those six frantic
daSheS which they directed against the al
most mpregnabie position of their foe. That
any mortll man could have carried the po-
sition, defended as it was it seems idle for
moment to believe. But the bodies which
lie in dense masses within AZ yards of the
muzzles of Col Walton's guns are the best
evidence what manner of men they were who
pressed on to death with the dauntlessnesS Of
a race which has gained glory a thousand
'battlefields, and never more richly deserved
1t than at the foot of Maryes Heights on the
18th day of December, 1862"
Gen. Burnside in his report of casualties
gives the Union loss 124 officers killed. 1,16O
enlisted men killed 654 officers wounded S946
enlisted men wounded, 20 officers missing or
captured and 1,749 enlisted men captured or
missing the grand total being given as 1858.
The report of Medical Director Lafayette Guild
c. S. A. dated January TO- 1868, gives as the
Confederate killed In the Battle of Fredericks-
burg 458 and the wounded 3,743 The missing
and captured are not included in this report
though they are said to have amounted to
1,176 or total loss OF 5,377.
Looking at this peaceful city today and COM
ing in contact with its hcspitable inhabitants
one can hardly realize the important part it
played during the Civil War, nor the great
slaughter that took place there, not only on
the nearby Maryes Heights (row the National
Cemetery, where sleep $1,000 Union dead) but
in the streets of Fredericksburg itself A few
days after the battle of December Is a New
York correspondent wrote the following account
OF the hopeless charge of Humphreys Divi-
sion, which gives good idea of the desperate
fighting which took place on the heights Of
this fair city He writes
The officers were ordered to the 'front.' then
the brigade, led in person by Gen. Tyler and
Gen. Humphreys, moved forward with glorious
cheer. They reached the little rise in the
ground, within 80 yards of the stone wall
where line after line of our men lay fiat upon
the ground. They began to move over the
living mass, when suddenly the PROSTATE men
cried out: Don't go there, tits certain deathp
and rising, began to impede the progress of
the column, and by protesting of every nature
implored the men not to go forward. Then
the crisis came. The division was fighting
its maiden battle; older troops than they
quailed before the murderous volleys now max
ing great gaps through their ranks; the head
of the charging column enveloped in a
sheet of living flame; the hideous shells were
bursting all around and in their midst. Was
it any wonder that they faltered? The men
began to load and fire; the momentum of the
charge was gone; the column began to re-
tire slowly, falling back to its place of for
nation. oh, men!' said Humphreys if you
had only gone forward well as you came
back! And then, again dismounted, his sec
ond horse having been killed, he reported the
result to Gen. Butterfeld, who ordered him
to withdraw his troops to pont of shelter.
And this was the forlorn hope of the day,
and this is what it did: It demonstrated the
mpregnabiltty of the enemys positions-dem-
onstrated that the bravest troops in the world
could not stem the torrent of fire which poured
and plunged and converged into that fatal
space-and it developed quiet, courteous and
accomplished man of science with whom books
and charts and surveys have been his stldieE
P1Ts