LITMIR.BIZ

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driven out, however, with the loss of several in killed, wounded and prisoners.

      The whole command had now taken the alarm, and assembled behind their artillery, which was posted on a hill that commanded the town and its approaches. Dashing through the streets, we were soon in the open country, when the companies commanded by Captains Nicholas, Herbert and Goldsborough were deployed as skirmishers, with Wheat on the left, the whole being under the command of Lieutenant Colonel E. R. Dorsey (who had reached that rank by reason of seniority upon the promotion of Elzey and Steuart), whilst Colonel Johnson commanded the reserves.

      The enemy now opened his artillery with great precision, and his shell began to tell in our ranks. Nothing daunted, however, the gallant fellows moved steadily forward, and reached the very foot of the hill upon which he was posted. From there the fight was stubbornly waged for at least two hours, with no apparent advantage on either side. In the meantime the troops of Jackson were moving to the right and left to envelop the enemy and cut off his retreat. Kenly saw the movement, and determined to withdraw his forces and cross the river (immediately in his rear) if possible. On his right was the turnpike bridge, and on his left, in our front, was the long and high trestle-work of the Manassas Gap Railroad. Dorsey divined his purpose, and, as the enemy commenced to fall back, immediately ordered a charge along the whole line. With a yell the men responded to the command, and the long line of skirmishers pressed forward in pursuit. The fight would have terminated then and there had not the Louisiana battalion stumbled upon the enemy’s camp, and bent on plunder, the threats and entreaties of their officers were for some time in vain, and when they were at length prevailed upon to move forward, it was found the enemy in their front, with artillery and cavalry, had escaped over the bridge. Not so in front of the Maryland command. The enemy were closely pressed to the river’s bank, where, finding it impossible to escape across the trestle-work, they threw down their arms in a body. By this time a heavy force of cavalry had forded the river some distance below, and charging the remainder of Kenly’s command, which was rapidly retreating up the turnpike, captured it almost to a man, not, however, without meeting with a desperate resistance, in which many were killed and wounded on both sides.

      Thus ended the battle of Front Royal, if it can be so termed, and in which Marylander met Marylander for the first time in the war. It has been said Kenly’s command had fought a vastly superior force of the Confederates, whereas it was a much inferior one, which, however did not compel him to withdraw from the position he had taken in front of the town, but the flank movement by heavy bodies of our troops did, and it was then we pressed our advantage. The actual number of assailants prior to his recrossing the river with what remained of his command, did not exceed four hundred men. And it has been more than once asserted, also, that Colonel Kenly did not offer the spirited resistance to the Confederate advance expected of him, and that there was no reason why he should have lost his command. This is doing him injustice. He fought his troops like the brave man that he is, and Commissary Banks can thank him for being instrumental in saving the little he did from the wreck of his army at Strasburg and Winchester. He committed one great, inexcusable error, however, in not having his cavalry scouts and pickets out, but it is said they reached him but an hour or two before our attack, although he had called for them several days before. If this be true, he deserves no blame or censure for his misfortune at Front Royal.

      The morning after the fight, when the prisoners were drawn up in line, it was truly amusing to see the men of the two Maryland regiments greet each other. “Why, if there ain’t my brother Bill;” “And there’s my cousin Jim,” could be heard, whilst nearly all recognized old friends and acquaintances, whom they greeted cordially, and divided with them the rations which had just changed hands.

      The kindest attention was shown the wounded officers and men, the former being paroled, and allowed to accept the invitation of the citizens to accompany them to their homes, where they were provided with all they required. And whilst we were thus treating our enemies in the field, the cowardly ruffians in Baltimore, who had remained at home, were brutally assaulting every citizen there suspected of sympathizing with the people of the South in their struggle for independence, because some poltroon, who had deserted his companions at the first fire, reported they had been murdered in cold blood to a man after having surrendered themselves.

      The officers of the First Maryland Confederate called upon those of the First Maryland Federal, and offered them any assistance in their power, and in some instances it was thankfully accepted. Colonel Kenly was quite badly wounded, by either a pistol ball or a sabre cut, in the head, and at the time that I saw him appeared to be suffering much mental depression, caused by his misfortune. His wound he seemed to care but little for; but, as he paced the floor, would, from time to time, bend over his adjutant, Tarr, who was desperately wounded, and gaze anxiously in his face.

CHAPTER VII.

       Table of Contents

      On the morning of the 24th Ewell took up the line of march for Winchester, Jackson having moved on Strasburg the evening before. That night we encamped on the banks of the Opequon, six miles from our destination. Here we were ordered to cook some rations, and be ready to move at midnight upon Banks, whom we intended to attack at daylight.

      Long before the sun had risen on the morning of the 25th, the commands of Jackson and Ewell were in line of battle about two miles from the town, the former to the left of the Valley turnpike, the latter joining him on the right. Skirmishers were thrown out, and cautiously, at early dawn, through the dense fog that prevailed, the Confederate line advanced.

      In front of a portion of Ewell’s line the First Maryland was deployed, which, after proceeding a short distance, encountered the enemy’s skirmishers, who fell back at our approach. About the same time was heard the spattering of musketry in the direction of Jackson, which told us he, too, had them in his front.

      The fog had now become so dense as to make it impossible to see twenty steps in any direction; and Colonel Johnson therefore thought it advisable to assemble his skirmish line, as we had entirely lost sight of our line of battle, and did not know but we might be enveloped by the enemy. Quietly the men were drawn in, and the regiment lay down in an orchard and concealed itself behind a board fence, to await the lifting of the fog.

      For an hour everything was still as death, when, the fog rising somewhat, a column of the enemy was revealed lying behind a stone wall about three hundred yards in our front, with his right flank resting toward us, and totally unconscious of our close proximity. They were apparently intent on watching something before them; and presently, to our horror, there emerged from the fog the Twenty-First North Carolina regiment, marching directly upon the stone wall, and altogether ignorant of the ambuscade there awaiting. Scarcely two hundred yards separated them, and in a minute the poor fellows would be in the fatal trap. Like ourselves, they had become separated from the main body and lost their way; but, unlike ourselves, had failed to exercise the precaution to ascertain where they were before advancing.

      There was nothing on earth we could do to warn them of their danger. Oh! it was a sad, sickening sight, to see them thus unconsciously marching straight into the jaws of death. On, on they go, and nearer and nearer they approach the treacherous fence, behind which they expect to shelter themselves. They are but forty yards from it.

      “Can nothing be done for them?” I heard from more than one around me.

      No; too late; too late; and the next instant the long line of blue rise from their cover; there is an instant’s pause, and then comes a deafening volley of musketry, and the deadly minnie by hundreds are sent tearing and crashing through the Confederate columns. The slaughter was appalling, and the survivors fled to the rear in the utmost confusion.

      But they were avenged; for just then the gallant Griffin, of the Baltimore Light Artillery, espied them, and training the guns of his splendid battery upon the fence, he raked it from one end to the other, sending the enemy flying to a safer position nearer the town.

      On the left Jackson was now hotly engaged, whilst, with the exception of his artillery, Ewell is unaccountably idle. Why could he not swing the right of his division around

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