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A creek ran right
down the middle of the battlefield. It couldn't have been more then thirty
or forty feet wide. It wasn't much more than two or three feet deep at the
ford and it was lined on both banks by brush and hardwood trees and a
plush green carpet of pea vines. truth be told, it would have made a great
swimmin' hole except for the snipers.
The yanks held the west pasture and we held the east. The
creek divided us a good as any Mason-Dixon line might've. Our fire line
was set up sixty yards out into the pasture, their line about the same
distance and up a slight rise. For some strange reason that nobdy ever got
around to explainin', each side had a well built stone wall to shoot from
behind.
Every morning, for a week or so, just a little after sunup,
we formed up ranks, marched down to the ford, crossed over to their side
of the creek and moved quietly to the edge of the trees. We could see the
smoke from their campfires hanging low in the morning air in wisps and
layers. For just a moment or two we would drink in the beauty of the
place, breathing the misty, hickory tinged dawn, tasting the smell of
coffee as it wafted toward us.
Our attacks came as no surprise to them. The silence of the
moment suddenly shattered with the crack of a single rifle. One of their
snipers held a position off to the side of their line that offered a good
view of the tree line. Always, it seemed, he had us in his sights. For a
week he'd been pecking at us. His one shot alerted the others that we were
coming. Never once did he ever actually hit anyone.
Then came Sunday. Fighting on the Sabbath just seemed like a
bad idea to me. We'd done it before, but none of us liked it much.
Corporal Turnbull told us once, when we griped out loud to him, just to
shut up and fall in. He said that dying on one day was no different than
any other and did we want to live forever? Or more importantly, did we
want to let them yanks live forever?
The answer was hell no on both accounts, which was how we
happened to be on the west side of the creek on that particular Sunday,
getting shot at by a couldn't hit the broad side of a barn yank sniper.
We formed up along the tree line, most of two hundred of us,
bayonets fixed, loaded and ready for the charge. We'd take them today, we
told ourselves. We'd been saying that for a week now and had lost seventy
of our own charging up that hill toward that wall.
The bugler sounded the charge. We all let out a cry to the
heavens that would have curdled a cannibal's blood and started up the
rise.
The wall before us came alive with rifles, all trained on us.
Still we
charged. They let go a volley that exploded against us in a fury of agony
and death. Still we charged. We had our orders, take that hill.
Two more volleys from them thinned us even more. Then their
bugle sounded and they poured over the top of that wall and out onto the
meadow, touching ground at a dead run, a wave of blue and bayonets.
We fought bravely. A lot of them died, but a lot more of us
died as well. We fought until the pasture ran red with the blood of
soldiers. Our bugler sounded recall at almost the same moment as theirs.
We regrouped at the tree line, crossed the creek with the
wounded and dead, then prepared for one more charge. This time we'd get
them for sure. But a curious thing happened before we able bodied could
form up our line. A Yank horseman, carrying a white flag rode slowly out
onto the field and waved it three times for a parlay.
Our Captain hitched a handkerchief onto his sword, waved it
back, then rode out to meet his opposite. To us, it meant fifteen minutes
or so of extra rest before going up that hill again. When he came back,
tears were streaming down his face. Captain was a hard man and it shook me
up to see him crying.
"Men." He addressed us loud enough for everybody to
hear. "The war is over. General Lee surrendered at Appomattox
Courthouse in Virginia fifteen days ago. They just got the word."
Corporal Turnbull spit a wad of tobacco out onto the ground
and said, "It's a damn Yankee trick, Cap'n."
"I think we can't take their word for it." The
Captain said to us. "We
haven't been relieved. We need to take that hill. Right or wrong, we need
to follow our orders until someone says different."
We rallied behind our Captain that Sunday and charged the
hill three more times. We were reforming for the fourth charge when a
rider in gray splashed across the ford looking for our officer.
Instead of charging, we marched back to our side of the creek
and set up pickets along our own wall.
We didn't know what would happen next, but the gray rider
confirmed what the yanks had said. The war was over.
(c) 2001 by Bob Liddil.
All Rights Reserved
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