Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 33.djvu/101

 One of the Gamest of Modern Fights. 97

From the Times- Dispatch, December zoth, 1905.

ONE OF THE GAMEST OF MODERN FIGHTS.

No Equal Area of the American Continent so Drenched

in Blood.

SHARPSBURQ OR ANTIETAM.

Fifteenth Virginia, of Semmes' Brigade, McLaws' Division, at the

Crisis.

In many a nook and cranny of Virginia, "far from the madding crowd ', is some old soldier, scarred with wounds, who without pay and without title, did deeds for his State and the Southern cause which, had he served a victorious people, would have crowned his name with honors, perpetuated his fame, and brought to him the emoluments with which fortune endows her favorites. Though such things came not to him, it has never soured his temper nor disturbed the serenity of his spirit.

If the old cry "vae victis" fulfilled itself to him in many ways, so also did the fortitude of his manliness put under him his protect- ing arms.

In many a nook and cranny in Virginia, too, is a valiant leader of his neighbors, who commanded and guided them in the battle shock, and stepped behind the scenes to the work of restoration when war's dread thunders stormed no more.

One of these is Colonel E. M. Morrison, of the I5th Virginia Infantry, who now resides at Smithfield, in the Isle of Wight county, and who is yet busy with his tasks.

The 1 5th Virginia lost at Sharpsburg 58 per cent, of its men, which is 23 per cent, more than the Light Cavalry Brigade of the English army, lost in the world-heralded "Battle of Balaklava." Our folks write poems in honor of the Light Brigade and our schoolboys declaim Tennyson's verses; but what do we know of our own boys who stood proof on this red day at Sharpsburg?

Fourteen officers and one hundred and fourteen men of the Fifteenth Virginia were in that fight, of whom one officer was killed (Captain A. V. England) and six were wounded, including