Karl Bacon (5 page)

“John, they got Sarge,” I shouted.

John pointed to the empty place beside him. “Come on back, Michael.”

“But Sarge is dead! What should we do?”

“I’m just going to do what Sarge told me to do. You should do the same.”

John went about loading his rifle again while I remained next to Sarge. Should I find someone and tell them? Should I return to the fight? Should I head for the rear? Many others already had, especially on the right end of the regiment.

“What’s your name, Private?” a voice yelled above the roar of battle.

I looked up and came face-to-face with Captain Carpenter, crouched low, his pistol leveled at my forehead.

“Sir, Palmer, sir.”

“You’re not thinking about quitting on us, are you, Palmer?”

“Sir?”

“Well, Palmer, if I have to inform your family of your death, would you like them to know that you died facing the enemy or running away from them? Look at the Sharps boys! Look at the rest of Company C.” I looked right and left. “Company C is still holding. So are the Sharps boys and the Pennsylvania boys.”

“Sir, Sergeant Needham is—he’s dead, sir.”

“I know that, Private. It’s a great shame. Now get back to it, Palmer.”

I did as I was ordered and returned to my place beside John. I reloaded and fired again and again, sighting through tear-filled
eyes, oblivious to all else save the desire to see one of my bullets strike home to avenge Sarge. But before any such satisfaction could be had, General Kimball’s brigade came up to relieve us and our fight was done.

The Rebels had treated us severely and I had behaved badly. The regiment had done some good work, and it did seem that the firing from that section of the road had slackened some. The men of the Fourteenth fell back up the slope, being careful to provide assistance for all their wounded brothers, so that all of the still living would make it off that field. Over the low fence and back through the trampled corn we went, moving swiftly toward the safety that lay over the brow of the hill.

The L
ORD
killeth, and maketh alive:
he bringeth down to the grave, and bringeth up.
1 SAMUEL 2:6

T
HE FARMSTEAD IN THE SHALLOW GLEN HAD ALREADY BEEN
converted into a field hospital. Hundreds of Federal wounded lay about the grounds. Warm water from my canteen refreshed my parched throat but did nothing to improve my spirits. The carnage of war was inescapable. My ears ached with the cries of the afflicted, and my eyes burned at the appalling scene as my senses once again assaulted me with the ghastly human toll being exacted this day.

We spent only a few minutes at the farm before being ordered forward to prevent the enemy from advancing down the lane that led from the sunken road to this sheltered farm. We ran a few hundred yards up the lane and sat behind a rock wall, thankful to be shielded from most of the danger, and even more thankful to move even a short distance away from that dreadful hospital. The respite allowed us a brief rest, a more few swallows of water, and an opportunity to regain a measure of the composure and morale we needed to function as a disciplined unit once again.

Captain Carpenter chose this opportunity to address the
men of Company C. “I am proud of the way you handled yourselves this morning. You have been tested and bloodied, but now you know the business of battle.” He pointed at the cornfield atop the rise behind him. “You all know that Sergeant Needham was killed up on that hill. He was a great soldier, and he will be missed. I am promoting Sergeant Holt to the rank of first sergeant. Obey his orders as you did Sergeant Needham’s, and you will do well. That is all.”

“Sir, yes, sir!” we all answered.

A great cheer went up from the men in the road. “The Irish! The Irish!” A long straight line of blue-clad troops marched in step through a freshly plowed field, toward the brow of the hill to the east of the lane. “It’s the Irish! They’ll whip them Rebs!”

Indeed, their brilliant green banner waved lazily in the gentle breeze. Their general rode proudly at the front, leading them into the fight, facing the flying perils of lead and iron along with his men. The brigade crested the hill and marched with both bayonets and faces fixed toward the sunken road. For well over half an hour the sounds of fighting waxed and waned as the Irish made repeated attempts to take the Rebel position. They stood their ground in the open field and poured as much lead as they were able into the Rebels, but to no avail.

The brave Irish finally gave way to fresh troops coming up behind them. These men had an easier go of it, mostly because the Irish, even as they were being cut down, had done their duty and killed many of the enemy. Finally the Rebels started to abandon the sunken road, first by ones or twos and then by dozens, to head toward the rear. A short time later the Stars and Stripes was lifted above the sunken road and a mighty hurrah arose from the entire Federal line.

“Form by companies!” Colonel Perkins ordered the regiment out from behind the wall and into the lane. “Forward at the double-quick!”

A shell screamed down the lane. Those toward the front of the column dove for the ground, but those farther down the line were not as fortunate. The shell exploded amid the boys of Company D, and when the smoke cleared, three more of our friends lay dead, one with his head blown entirely off. Several men retched by the side of the road. My own stomach turned heavily at the sudden and sickening manner in which death had visited us.

Once order was restored, we marched through the large field of soft earth to the east of the lane, once again toward the sunken road. When we crested the hill, we chose our steps with care so as not to tread on any of the hundreds of Union dead. Most of them had
SNY
belt buckles and regimental numbers on their caps—
69
or
63
or
88
—remnants of the Irish Brigade. Ambulance attendants moved here and there among the hundreds of wounded, ministering what aid and comfort they could. Other men were engaged in private struggles for survival, hobbling or crawling toward the rear, one agonizing yard at a time.

The Fourteenth was assigned to support Colonel Brooke’s brigade of General Richardson’s division. While they pursued the Rebels into a large cornfield south of the sunken lane, we were to guard a battery of artillery being maneuvered into position along the north side of the sunken lane.

The carnage in the lane was dreadful. Confederate dead lay in twisted heaps, covering the lane from side to side for hundreds of yards, sometimes two or three deep. Here and there, the dark blue of a Union corpse lay in stark contrast to the drab grays and tans of the dead Rebels. Already, Federal burial details were at work clearing paths across the lane. They recovered the dead in blue for burial and made gruesome piles of the rest.

We deployed around Battery K, First U.S. Artillery, to protect it from Rebel counterattack. We lay down and hugged the earth just behind the guns as they began to throw shells into the
cornfield beyond the sunken road. The guns bucked and nearly leaped off the ground each time they were fired. I covered my ears with my hands to dampen the noise and tried to glue my body to the earth, which tried its best to shake me loose with every blast.

A general galloped frantically up the hill behind us, waving his hat furiously and screaming incomprehensibly. He rode straight through our line, causing several men to dive to one side or the other to keep from getting trampled. The general pulled his steed up next to the officer in charge of the guns.

“Captain Graham,” the general yelled, “those scoundrels are trying to move by our right flank. See? Over there.” The general waved his hat at some shadowy figures moving through a stand of trees. “They’re trying to get into that swale behind us. Move your guns over there immediately and drive them off.”

“Yes, sir, General Richardson.” The captain saluted and immediately issued the necessary orders. Since the guns needed to be moved only a short distance to the right, it was much quicker to use men to move the guns rather than the usual teams of horses, and as it was the duty of our regiment to support and protect the battery, it fell to us to help the gun crews manhandle the big guns over to their new positions under the watchful eye of General Richardson.

“That’s fine, Captain,” he said when he was satisfied. “Now give them canister until they leave.” At that moment a shell exploded over the battery. The general clutched his left shoulder, swayed slowly in the saddle, and fell heavily to the ground between two of the guns. Several of the gunners clustered around him, but the general waved them back to their guns. “Make it hot for them, Captain Graham,” the general ordered. Then he lay back on the earth.

The battery gunners produced a stretcher. Four men were chosen from the ranks, and the general was borne off toward the
hospital at the farmstead down in the glen. Several weeks later we learned that General Richardson died of his wound. No one was safe, not even a major general.

“The regiment is now attached to the first division,” Captain Carpenter told us, “and the division is now under the command of General Hancock. We have been placed in line between his first and second brigades. The brigade just to our left, the one we’re supporting, is Meagher’s Irish Brigade. We are ordered to hold here against any attack until relieved. Now, stay down and try not to draw fire.”

We remained where we were, prone in the dirt of that plowed field, not moving a muscle for fear of drawing fire. Afternoon gave way to a beautiful evening with the last rays of a dying blood-red sun beaming through a layer of clouds off to the west. The shelling continued until darkness finally ended that long, hot day of bloodletting. When it was fully dark, an eerie hush fell over the field, broken only by occasional shots traded by the pickets and the cries of the wounded lying stranded between the lines. Believing it was safe to move, I took a long drink from my canteen and ate a couple of crackers and a few bites of salt pork. Then I lay back in the place I had spent the last several hours and soon fell into exhausted sleep.

About midnight, I awakened to the touch of raindrops upon my face. The cries of the wounded continued, but they were fewer in number. Some were haunting howls of pain and desperation that could be heard over some distance. Others were low, deep groans of resigned agony, which I knew were much nearer at hand. As the intensity of the rain increased, the sound of its falling muted all but the most piercing wails. I turned my face heavenward and opened my eyes, allowing the heaven-sent droplets to cleanse my sight and wash the filth of the day of battle from my face.

Then I prayed. I realized to my shame that it was the first
time since Fort Ethan Allen, so long ago, that I had really prayed. I lifted my spirit to God and prayed for my family, thanking God for my deliverance that day. I prayed for Sergeant Needham’s family, that God would comfort them in their sorrow and meet their every need in abundance. And I prayed that God would calm and soothe my already war-weary soul.

Then I began to weep over all that I had seen and heard and known that day—the dread, the horror, the gore, the fear. I wept for Sarge and for the young men from Company D I had seen killed in the lane, and for the thousands of others now dead, so many lost in a single long day. Sarge’s family would grieve his loss, and I knew it could have as easily been Jessie Anne and Sarah and Edward grieving for me. I opened my eyes wide and stared heavenward as raindrops fell heavily from the blackness above. The rain merged with my tears and spilled off my face into the same red earth that had so freely drunk of the blood of so many good men that day.

How long, O God, how long?

He will swallow up death in victory;
and the Lord G
OD
will wipe away tears from off all faces.
ISAIAH 25:8

T
HE ARTILLERY OPENED UP AT BREAK OF DAWN.
I
T SEEMED AT
first as if the fighting would resume in earnest, but the cannonading lacked both intensity and longevity. The energies of both armies had been spent in the rampant slaughter of the preceding day. Now and again, fighting flared up at one point or other along the line, but it subsided quickly. Sometime after noon, the shelling and musketry ceased altogether. A short time later a rider came up from the rear bearing the news that a twelve-hour cease-fire had been agreed upon to tend to the wounded and bury the dead.

In the field where the boys from Connecticut lay, the nighttime rain had turned the furrows of freshly turned earth to little muddy sloughs. As the clouds disappeared and the sun began to dry us, our new uniforms looked new no longer. In fact, the caked mud made us look more Confederate butternut than Union blue.

Sergeant Holt approached. “Palmer.”

“Yes, Sergeant?”

“You said Sarge was killed near you?”

My head drooped low between my shoulders. “Yes, Sergeant.”

“Think you can find him?”

“Yes, Sergeant Holt. I believe I know exactly where he is.”

Sergeant Holt chose John and four other men from the company. Our small squad set off in silence across the battlefield.

The powerful stench of rotting flesh assaulted my nostrils as carrion birds feasted upon untold hundreds of dead soldiers. I closed my mouth and held a kerchief to my nose, thus reducing the stench to a tolerable level, but nothing could shield me from it entirely. Here, a corporal had died where he fell facedown, the fingers of his right hand frozen about his rifle, the fingers of his left hand clutching the earth, as if trying to hold on. There, a captain was sitting against a fencepost, appearing to be asleep, until one approached and saw the dried, bloody hole in the middle of his chest. Had the captain managed to sit down there before he expired or had some caring companion placed him there? And this boyish private here, with his leg blown off at mid-thigh, the blackened stain around him showed how he had bled to death. His contorted features evidenced the agony of his passing; his mouth gaped wide at me in a grotesque, silent scream. Some of the bodies could not even be recognized as human remains; they were just blackened heaps on the ground adorned with a soldier’s accoutrements. In addition to the human carnage, there were mutilated horses, blasted caissons, cratered earth, and splintered trees—corruption of man, beast, and nature itself. I recalled the haunting words of the preacher just two days before,
Hell will be infinitely worse.

Sarge was already swollen almost beyond recognition by the hot sun, but I knew him immediately by his bushy sand-colored hair and moustache. Still, we checked for the
14
on his cap just to make sure. John fell to his knees beside Sarge. With deliberate
care John unfastened the top four buttons of Sarge’s jacket, slipped a hand inside and retrieved Sarge’s pocket letter.

“I’ll take that,” said Sergeant Holt. His gruff manner disturbed the solemnity of the occasion. “Captain Carpenter will see to it.”

We lifted Sarge onto a blanket and carried him to the rear. Orderlies directed us to an area being used as a burial ground. We laid Sarge gently in the wide, shallow trench and watched as the burial detail spaded dark red earth over him. A small wooden cross was stabbed into the ground at the head of his grave. I took the knife my father had given me and carved “1
^st
Sgt. John Needham, 14
^th
Conn. Vol.” on it. The men removed their caps and John offered a short prayer.

And when he had finished, he quoted, “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”

Sunday, September 21, 1862
Camp of the 14
^th
Conn. Rgt. Vol. Inf.
Near Sharpsburg, Maryland

My Dearest Jessie Anne,

By now you surely have read newspaper accounts of the great battle fought near this place. I assure you that while the 14
^th
was heavily engaged, the Lord preserved me without so much as a scratch. John was also preserved unharmed and proved he is the finer soldier. A hearty dinner was prepared for us on Friday and another today, so I have had plenty to eat for now.

The enemy was drawn up behind their barriers, with their backs to the Potomac. We advanced generally against their front, and after much severe fighting, the enemy was thrown back and have retreated south of the Potomac. Regrettably, 21 men of the regiment were killed and 88 wounded. 1
^st
Sgt. Needham
was among those killed. Sarge was a good man. He commanded respect for his knowledge and leadership. If I am a soldier now, it is because he made me a soldier. Sarge was a sincere Christian, I believe, and I cannot fathom a divine purpose in taking this saint from us. His friendly manner and skillful teaching will be missed by all. Pray the Almighty for this man’s grieving family.

This morning a memorial service was conducted under a stand of trees by Chaplain Stevens. It was a somber occasion. The band played a prelude of several hymns; never have they played better or more fervently. Chaplain Stevens gave a prayer of invocation and read several Scripture passages. Then he preached on the first eight verses of Isaiah 40. The chaplain spoke of the suddenly empty places where friends had been a few short days ago, like grass that is here today and is tomorrow cut down. How sharp these words now sound in my ears, “All flesh is grass.”

After the sermon, Colonel Perkins read the names of our twenty-one dead in a high-pitched, strident voice, as a gentle breeze stirred the leaves of the trees over our heads. The service ended with the singing of the hymn “Abide with Me.” The band played in perfect harmony, and the chorus of several hundred soldier voices rose high into the arching trees and was carried heavenward. I sang from memory, as you and I have many times before. The words came to my lips without thinking, but the words of the fourth verse stuck in my throat. How could I sing “I fear no foe” when indeed fear had held me in its grasp all during the fight? I have shed bitter tears; I have felt death’s sting.

Yesterday, General McClellan and General French inspected the brigade. They pranced back and forth atop their steeds and made flowery speeches. They proclaimed the fight a great victory – then they rode away. The mood of the men does not speak of victory, and many wonder if, in the not too distant future, we will have to do the thing all over again, since the enemy has escaped and we are pursuing them. In spite of all I have known from
childhood, I fear the only victor in the recent battle was the grave. Pray the Almighty for the promised triumph, that this war may swiftly and victoriously end, and that I may return to you and the children.

Lest you think me entirely without hope, John’s unfailing friendship strengthens me each day. He is as ever a sturdy oak. He never wavered when we were under fire and even now, after a few short weeks, he shows a leadership uncommon among others in the company or even the regiment. Has it truly been little more than a month since we left home? Pray the Almighty for John and that beloved family.

On Monday, we will march away from here. Our destination will probably be near Harper’s Ferry. I will write again once we have encamped. Words fail, but tears do not, when I think of you and the children. How I miss you all and long for you. Kiss Sarah and little Edward for me and assure them of their father’s (and their Father’s) love. Please pray the Almighty that He will continue to guard me and that I might know more of His tender mercies.

With much love and deepest affection,
I am your loving husband,