Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 16.djvu/232

 226 Southern Historical Society Papers.

We were not long left quiet. General Fitz. Lee encountered the enemy on our right, and being overwhelmed by numbers it became necessary for us to attack them at our front, to divert their attention from his brigade. General Hampton proposed to lead our regiment. We started out in fine style, and one continued shout arose from the charg- ing column. The enemy now appeared in a black compact line, and at a casual view appeared rather a continuation of the forest. The intervening ground over which we were passing was so crossed and seamed with fences and ditches as to greatly impede our progress, and the sharpshooters, concealed wherever concealment was possible, found in the moving mass of beings an excellent mark for their rifles. It was, no doubt, by one of these chance balls that I was wounded. We had not advanced beyond two hundred yards from the cluster of trees where we had taken shelter, when I was struck, the ball entering my right side, penetrating into the abdominal cavity and lodging against or in the region of the kidneys. Believing it to be no more than the fragment of a shell, which had struck without breaking the surface an impression strengthened by the fact that these missiles were bursting all around I kept on with the regiment. We were soon at the sabre-point and fighting desperately. The color-guard, from some mysterious circumstance, became precipitated from its posture to the head of the column and met the enemy at a small opening in a fence, which soon became so blockaded by the regiment as to prevent those in the rear coming to the assistance of the few who had first entered the enclosure, or any of us who might be wounded to secure our escape to the hospital. General Hampton, I was informed, here engaged a number of the enemy, and cut his way through them with Achilleian valor, bearing upon his noble form the marks of cruel wounds.

At this critical juncture my right side and arm became paralyzed, the sabre fell from my hand, and large cold drops of sweat collected upon my face. Surgeon Joseph Yates, seeing my unfortunate condi- tion, rode up and assisted me over the fence. Having my blankets rolled up and fastened to the front of my saddle, I fell upon them, being no longer able to sit erect; while my horse, infuriated by the crash of cannon, the explosion of shells, and sight of blood, rushed desperately to the rear. Before I reached the temporary hospital established on the field, I overtook Private W. D. Shirer, of Com- pany E, whose right arm had been broken. He was in the very acme of pain. This unfortunate young man died from the effects of the wound, about three weeks afterwards, at Gettysburg. I have no