Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 7.djvu/595

112 deserves success and seldom fails in achieving it. As often as their ranks were shattered and broken by grape and canister did they rally, re-form and renew the attack under the leadership of their gallant officers. They were ordered to take the batteries at all hazards, and they obeyed the order, not, however, without heavy loss of officers and men.

"Not far from where the batteries were playing, and while cheering and encouraging his men forward, Lieut.-Col. James L. Autry, commanding the Twenty-seventh Mississippi, fell pierced through the head by a minie ball. The death of this gallant officer at a critical period caused some confusion in the regiment until they were rallied and re-formed by Capt. E. R. Neilson, the senior officer present, who subsequently was seriously wounded on another part of the field.

"About the same time that Lieutenant Autry fell, Colonel Brantly, of the Twenty-ninth Mississippi, and his adjutant, First Lieut. John W. Campbell, were knocked down by concussion produced by the explosion of a shell very near them; but the regiment was soon after carried forward by Lieut.-Col. J. B. Morgan in gallant style, capturing the battery in their front and driving the enemy in great confusion into and through the dense cedar brake immediately beyond. On the left of this last regiment was the Thirtieth Mississippi, commanded by Lieutenant-Colonel Scales. Most gallantly did they perform their part. In moving across the open field in short range of grape, canister and shrapnel, 62 officers and men were killed and 139 wounded, of this regiment alone, all within a very short space of time, and upon an area not greater than an acre of ground. The Twenty-fourth Mississippi, Lieutenant-Colonel McKelvaine commanding, and the Forty-fifth Alabama, on the left of the Thirtieth, also encountered a battery in their front, strongly supported by infantry on advantageous ground.

"For a moment these regiments appeared to reel and