Page:The Reminiscences of Carl Schurz (Volume Three).djvu/117

 obstacle to his progress. In the course of the morning I received orders to join General Sherman, the second division of our Corps having preceded me. About 2 p.m. I took position on Sherman's left. I then met the General personally for the first time. I found him sitting on a stone fence overlooking the great ravine separating him from the enemy's fortifications on Tunnel Hill, which bristled with cannon and bayonets.

General Sherman was anxiously watching the progress of Ewing's division of the Fifteenth Corps, reinforced by two or three regiments of Buschbeck's brigade of the Eleventh, as it struggled up the slope toward the rebel entrenchments above, under very heavy fire of the enemy. They were evidently laboring hard. General Sherman received me very cordially and asked me to sit by him. At once we were engaged in lively conversation as if we had been old acquaintances. The General was in an unhappy frame of mind, his hope of promptly overwhelming the enemy's right flank and thus striking the decisive blow of the battle having been dashed by the discovery of the big ravine in his way. It was a stinging disappointment. He gave vent to his feelings in language of astonishing vivacity,—at least, it astonished me, as I had never seen or heard him before. I expected every moment that he would order me to “go in” with my whole division in support of Ewing's charge. But he preferred that my command should remain in reserve on his left to provide for the emergency of a rebel attack from that quarter. The result as to my command was that it stood there inactive, only now and then attracting a shell from the rebel position across the ravine, as my troops showed themselves. So the afternoon wore on. After a short stay on the stone fence Sherman restlessly walked away, and I did not see him again that day. Ewing's attack advanced more and more slowly, but came near reaching