January Dawn

by Cody Lennon

  The sharp talons of death never ceased their blind groping of the ranks of the men, both Yankee and Confederate. The physical and mental mutilation wrought upon the men was what troubled me the most. It was senseless and a gross waste of life. I wanted it all to stop. I didn’t know how much longer I could take it.

  Every day was the same. At dawn, we’d watch as the morning birds darted away when the Yankees began shelling us with artillery and airstrikes. We’d cower as low as we could get as the earth around us was torn and disfigured in mountainous splashes of explosive pressure. Dirt, wood, metal and human flesh rained down upon us. We could only wait helplessly for the shelling to stop. When it finally did, we immediately rose up and prepared to fight off the waves of infantry and armored vehicles that would follow.

  It went on like this all day. We’d counterattack, but it hardly made a difference, they’d push us back even further after we expended ourselves.

  On some days, the frontlines would fluctuate so fast and so far that we were running nonstop just to keep from being surrounded.

  Nighttime was the only reprieve we had. After a long day of fighting, we’d dig in, take stock of our supplies and count off for roll call to see who was missing or dead. Every time the Lieutenant called out a name and nobody answered was like a dagger stabbing each one of us in the heart. It meant another brother in arms lost to the list of dead or dying.

  Our desire to throw the enemy back into the sea quickly dissipated after a few hard fought weeks on the line. The enemy was strong and lacked nothing. They had supplies, ammunition, armored vehicles, air superiority, and an iron will, but most importantly they had a cemented beachhead, which they fought doggedly for.

  However worse our situation seemed, word on the line spread that the defensive operation against the southern invasion fared even worse. An entire Confederate infantry division had been decimated in vicious suburban fighting and the enemy was already on the southern outskirts of Savannah. This news didn’t go over well with the men. A lot of them had families in the city. None of us wanted to believe it.

  Echo Company was entrenched alongside the rest of the Ninth at the junction of I95 and Highway 17, south of Hardeeville, a few miles north of the Georgia border. We were paired up with a battalion of tanks from the Sixteenth Armored Division. The same bastards that were supposed to show up on day one when we first made contact with the enemy but never did.

  As long as we held the junction the enemy would have no viable roads to effectively maneuver their armor and vehicles south. We were the only ones in their way. Once they could throw us aside, the complete encirclement of Savannah would commence. We couldn’t let that happen.

  In some of the worst fighting we saw to date, we held our ground for nearly a week in this position when, bizarrely, Command ordered a tactical retreat. Half the division stayed to hold the junction and stage a delaying action against the enemy, while the other half, including us, moved southbound on I95 to clear the way toward our next objective.

  We walked in two lines in the right two lanes of the highway, grumbling all the way. A seemingly endless array of vehicles and military machinery wheeled past us in the left lane, choking us with exhaust fumes.

  The enemy controlled the skies during the day. The Yankees had a tendency to swoop down on us unexpectedly and blow our vehicles to smithereens. So, they made the infantry walk. As if we weren’t already tired.

  “I don’t understand why we had to retreat. We had a legitimate defensive position. It doesn’t seem smart to me,” Beauregard said.

  “The Army doesn’t want you to understand. You’re a pawn, Walter,” Hayes said.

  “What did you call me?”

  “He’s right,” Junior said. “Command’s back in Savannah, sitting comfortable in their warm beds, smoking cigars with pretty little red heads under their arms. And every so often they have to get up, put their fluffy slippers on and issue some bullshit order for us to follow out here in the sticks. Half the time they don’t even look at a map. They just say move here and move there.”

  Junior proved to be a useful addition to Second Squad. Nobody trusted him at first, but after he saved me from certain obliteration from that artillery barrage, we decided that maybe we’d give him a second chance. I, for one, was glad he was with us.

  “You’re father’s one of them,” said Shannon.

  “And I know he likes red heads,” Junior said to an applause of chuckles.

  “I like the General. He’s a great leader. He wouldn’t pull us off the line for nothing.”

  When Shannon recorded his first kill, something inside of him changed. He seemed to mature into a man overnight. He was no longer the sixteen-year-old naïve teenager from Basic. The guys still ribbed on him because of his youth, but it was in good nature.

  “If he’s such a great leader, why doesn’t he come out here with a rifle and join us?” Junior asked.

  “He’d probably bag more bad guys than Colton,” Beauregard said.

  “Anyone could bag more kills than Colton,” said Sergeant Redman, walking at the front of the squad, “Just put’em on the line for an hour.”

  Alex got promoted to Squad Leader a few days back after a piece of shrapnel severed Sergeant Garcia’s arm. I was the first one on the scene when it happened. I tried to wrap the stump and stop the bleeding, but Garcia was writhing too much for me to bandage him. Junior came when I yelled for help. While waiting for the medic, he held him down and I held pressure on the wound.

  “Yeah, what happened to you Colton? Are you having performance issues? You were the crack shot of the company in Basic, what’s up with you?” Hayes asked.

  I smiled and shook my head, because I knew they were right. My marksmanship had disappeared. I couldn’t hit anything I was aiming at. Even after recalibrating my rifle my woes continued. I had lost my touch.

  Hayes put his arm around my shoulders and smiled his goofy smile at me. “Come on, you can talk to your good buddy Hayes. Do you have anxiety? No? Are you having trouble getting your rifle up? Or are you having difficulty with the discharge?”

  I gave him a good shove as everyone laughed on.

  “Colton couldn’t hit water even if he fell out of a boat,” Alex said.

  “A Yankee could run straight at you and bop you on the nose before you even come close to hitting him,” said Hayes.

  “Would you like to test that theory?” I asked, cocking my rifle.

  “Yet still, somehow he’s never been wounded,” Shannon said.

  That was true also. Alex and I both miraculously evaded serious injury. The others weren’t as lucky.

  Carrigan got hit in the shoulder with a piece of shrapnel. She spent a day at the aid station and came right back.

  Beauregard got nicked in the neck. It was nothing too serious, but it did require a few butterfly stitches. Shannon suffered a concussion when an artillery burst sent him headfirst into a tree.

  Hayes and Junior both got pinned with splinters from an artillery barrage. I picked one splinter out of Junior’s back that was the size of a kitchen knife. As for me, besides scratches and bruises, I avoided injury.

  “You are one lucky duck, Colton,” Hayes said.

  The tiresome line of ragged infantry marched solemnly on as we brooded over this most recent retreat. For the first time in a long while, we held an advantage over the enemy. And just like that it was taken away. How much farther can we go on like this?

  Somewhere up the line, a few soldiers broke out in song, singing “Bonnie Blue Flag.” The few among us who could hold a tune joined in singing the opening verse.

  We are a band of brothers

  And native to the soil,

  Fighting for the property

  We gained by honest toil;

  And when our rights were threatened,

  The cry rose near and far—

  Hurrah for the Bonnie Blue Flag that bears a single star!

  On cue, every soldier busted out with the chorus.

>   Hurrah! Hurrah!

  For Southern rights hurrah!

  Hurrah for the Bonnie Blue Flag that bears a single star.

  The melody spread down the ranks like a wave for as far as I could hear. The combined harmony of several thousand men singing the beloved lyrics to this age old army favorite gave proof that our will was not broken despite our recent adversities.

  Still, there was an element of sadness among the men. Some sang with tears in their eyes. Others mumbled their words, incapable of such emotion anymore. Every last one of us sang none the less. The deep chorus of tired voices sang together as one.

  Then here’s to our Confederacy,

  Strong are we and brave;

  Like patriots of old we’ll fight

  Our heritage to save.

  And rather than submit to shame,

  To die we would prefer;

  So cheer for the Bonnie Blue Flag

  That bears a single star.

  Yes, we were still in this fight.

  Moments after the song faded and the ranks fell silent once more, someone up the road spotted two black dots in the sky heading in our direction. Our Air Force didn’t fly during the day. It had to be Yankee. News of the impending attackers spread to all the officers and NCOs. They scrambled to get their units into cover.

  “Enemy helos, cover! Go, go, go!”

  We all sprinted into the tree line and dived for cover behind anything we could find. Moments later, two enemy attack helicopters flew over us in formation heading back the way we came. They held their fire. The loud thumping of their propellers vibrated my entire body and rekindled the flame of hatred I had for those things.

  We hated those Yankee pilots more than anything. They were a special breed of ruthless murderers. We’d seen those bastards rocket an entire supply convoy en route to deliver us ammunition and water. When the truck drivers ditched the vehicles to run for cover, the Yankee pilots gunned them down with their machine guns.

  During the second week of battle, we watched from our foxholes as a dogfight erupted overhead. A squadron of Confederate Apache helicopters engaged the Yankees in an all-out aerial brawl in broad daylight.

  Our Air Force quickly got the upper-hand, knocking several enemy birds out of the sky, but soon lost it, when the U.S. sent in fighter jets. Like birds of prey, they swooped in for the kill. Our Apaches didn’t stand a chance. They were all shot from the sky in a matter of minutes.

  Except for one very lucky--or very skilled--pilot, who evaded everything they shot at him.

  I remember that day clearly, because everyone on the ground was up out of their holes cheering for him. Finally, a Yankee helo took him down with a well-placed rocket, but not before our pilot let loose a volley from his own arsenal. We stood up in our foxholes and shook our fists at the air as we watched our bird disappear over the tops of the trees in a fiery summersault. A plume of black smoke signaled his fate.

  The Yankee helo, missing its rear rotor and belching black smoke, sunk into a tailspin and crash landed among our lines. Men rushed from their foxholes, foaming at the mouth and cursing up a storm. When I got there, someone had pulled the lone surviving pilot from the wreckage and was delivering him a beating with his own flight helmet. The young pilot looked scared to death.

  A crowd gathered, and like an angry mob, they crowed for his death, beating him and striking him with their fists and rifles. Talk about entering the lion’s den. The pilot took the heavy blows as best as you could expect for a man in his position. Just when I thought the man would suffer a prolonged death of beatings and torture at the hands of the mob of blood lusting rebels, a Lieutenant from a neighboring company stepped forward and shot him twice in the chest. We went back to our holes unsatisfied and angry.

  Once the Apaches were well enough away, someone sounded the all clear. I grunted with pain and weakness as I lifted myself off the ground. I let my rifle hang low to my side. My shoulder sling keeping it easily accessible.

  A trove of tired infantrymen reappeared from the woods like a horde of sleep walkers.

  “Hold,” came the order down the line. We relayed it backwards and cursed under our breath. What now?

  Elroy summoned all the platoon sergeants and squad leaders. Elroy was promoted to Captain and placed in charge of Echo Company two weeks before, when our acting Company Commander was blown in half by a tank shell. I liked having Elroy as my Lieutenant, but I liked him even more as my Captain.

  He took good care of all Echo Company soldiers. When a replacement in Third Platoon lost his shoes in an artillery barrage, Elroy stole a pair off a dead Yankee and gave them to him.

  When I had night watch one evening and I had trouble staying awake, Elroy jumped in my slit trench, pulled out a portable kerosene stove from his pack and brewed me the best cup of coffee I ever had.

  When they finished their meeting, Alex hobbled back to us. He had tweaked his ankle the day before by tripping over a root.

  “What’s the news boss man?” Hayes asked.

  “We’re hunkering down for twenty minutes and then we hit the road again,” he said.

  “Hallelujah. I’ve had a pebble in my shoe that’s been pestering the shit out of me the past two hours,” Junior said.

  We shuffled back to the shade of the woods for a wonderful gift of twenty minutes rest.

  “Leah, your shoulder’s bleeding again,” I said, noticing the reddening bandage on her back.

  “Damn,” she said. “Would you mind?”

  Carrigan threw her pack to the ground and sat down straddling a log. I sat down behind her and peeled the soiled bandage off her back. She winced in pain. The grisly gash stretched down her shoulder blade. The stitches that the medics sewed her up with had opened up. She reached into her bag, pulled out a first aid kit and handed it back to me.

  I took off my combat gloves, opened up the kit and slipped on a pair of surgical gloves. The futility of the gloves stroked an inquisitive nerve in me. In theory, you’re supposed to protect yourself when dealing with another’s injuries, but when I thought back on all the combat injuries I’d dealt with those past few weeks, it made me chuckle.

  In combat you don’t have time to spend putting on a pair of latex gloves. When a friend’s life is on the line, you forgo caution to the wind and put your own life at risk without the slightest hesitation.

  War is unique. It’s unparalleled in every aspect. I had come to learn that how it affects the individual is something miraculous. Combat overwhelms all of your senses. The gunfire of dozens of rifles firing at once, explosions, people yelling and screaming for help or barking out orders, the groan of vehicles, everything meshes together into a loud buzz that rattles your brain to numbness. You can feel the ground shake with every exploding grenade or feel the air around you part from the path of a searing bullet.

  In battle, you have mere seconds to apprehend what’s going on around you and delineate who’s friendly and who’s not. It’s easy to get turned around on the battlefield and forget which way is which. There is too much going on to comprehend everything accurately.

  But somehow, in the midst of all the chaos, a soldier has a sense of clarity, a singular vision that keeps his focus and his instincts on point. When you get past the initial fright, you begin to realize that it’s not just you out there, your buddies are going through the same thing.

  Elroy was right. And when you finally realize that, you are freed from the paralyzing shackles of shock. Only then can you can react with your true potential and perform your duty justly.

  Justly? There was nothing just about what we were doing. When I killed my first man, I felt like I had betrayed the very life I was given. It was wrong. I wanted to punish myself. The soldier had done nothing to me, yet still I took his life.

  Four days after initial contact we were positioned along the outside edge of a trailer park. It was well after midnight and I was on night watch. I stayed on my feet looking east into the woods. The rest of Second Squad slept silently ar
ound me in the dried up creek we had bedded in for the night. The night was especially dark and overcast. I had to squint real hard to discern shapes, even with my eyes adjusted.

  Toward the end of my shift my eyelids had grown heavy with exhaustion. I was nearly asleep at my post when I heard the dry crackling of pine needles. I stayed as still as possible as the noise got closer. If I moved, I risked being seen.

  Mosquitos buzzed around my face and ears. I resisted the urge to swipe at them in fear for my life. Whatever was moving toward me was getting closer. My heart beat violently as I wished for the noise to turn and go the other way.

  When I heard the sharp snapping of a twig directly in front of me, I panicked and fired a shot into the darkness. In the immediate blue and yellow flash that burst from the muzzle of my rifle I saw a man’s face contorted in agony. It had only lasted for half a second, but the image remained etched in my memory.

  His body slumped forward, falling flat on his face a mere three feet from me. Echo Company awoke at the sound of my rifle and began firing at the rest of the Yankee scouting party. My rifle had dropped to the ground by my feet as I stared at the man whose life I had taken. Sleep did not come for me that night. I lied awake unable to shake the horrid image of the man’s face.

  The next morning I found myself staring at the soldier’s body. A black pool of congealed blood had leaked down the slope of the creek and caked the bottom of my boots in gore. I finally forced myself to look away. What’s done is done.

  We all were dirty, tired and beat up. As I looked around at what was left of Second Squad it was a stark contrast to what we looked like over a month ago. We went in as green recruits, but quickly established ourselves as fierce warriors. We came in looking immaculate in our freshly pressed combat uniforms and unsoiled rifles, but now we looked like we marched to hell and back and decided to do the whole trip a second time.

  None of us had taken a shower in over a month. We were covered in dirt, blood, sweat and feces. We smelled of body odor and urine and foxhole rot, but after a while, nobody really noticed. Living in the woods and sleeping in the dirt every night will do that to you.