Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 4.djvu/120

102 gade and Law’s brigade of North Carolinians, Alabamians and Mississippians. The Southerners had made a toilsome journey to help their comrades, and Longstreet says they welcomed the opportunity. &quot;Each,&quot; reports Hood, the senior commander, &quot;seemed to vie with the other in efforts to plunge the deeper into the ranks of the enemy.&quot; Longstreet comments: &quot;A fierce struggle of thirty minutes gave them advantage, which they followed through the dark to the base of the high ground held by bayonets and batteries innumerable, as compared with their limited ranks. Their task accomplished, they were halted to wait the morrow.

Law’s men drove off three guns and captured one. Law states in his report that this gun was fought until its discharges blackened the faces of his advancing men. &quot;What higher praise,&quot; exclaims Ropes, &quot;could be given, either to the gunners or their antagonists?&quot; That night, General Lee, knowing that the forces would again join battle in the morning, readjusted his entire line. All of Jackson s men were moved into their original and strong position along the unfinished railroad, and Longstreet’s corps was aligned on Jackson’s right. Pope mistook these movements fora retreat, and telegraphed, "The enemy is retiring toward the mountains. Little did he then anticipate how he was to be swept across Bull Run by that &quot;retreating army&quot; next day.

On the morning of the 3oth, General Pope, seemingly yet unaware that Longstreet was in position to strike his left, massed the commands of Porter, King, Hooker, Kearny, Ricketts, and Reynolds in a final effort to crush Jackson. Not all the men ordered against Jackson joined in the heavy assaults on his weakened lines. Still, that afternoon enough pressed the attack home to make it doubtful whether his three divisions could stand the —