The Face of Heaven

by Murray Pura

  “It goes well together,” said Hanson. “The coffee and the syrup.”

  “Sure,” responded Nicolson. “One is sweet and the other sour.”

  “You can thank my coffee you’re still alive today, Lieutenant.” Hanson walked up behind Groom and clapped him on the shoulder. “Here’s more living proof. There was a time this young man poured my Indiana elixir on the ground.”

  Groom sipped from his cup. “I repented of that.”

  “Indeed you did. And that’s why your cast-iron stomach is attached to a cast-iron body and the good Lord sees fit to let the sun rise upon thee again today.” Hanson brought a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his mouth. “Now, lads. I wouldn’t wish to throw a wet blanket on your party while the rest of the brigade is gagging on sickly coffee and choking near to death on hardtack and salt pork. But we’re marching at eight and our orders are to occupy the town of Gettysburg. So let’s eat up and clean up and make sure you have the twenty rounds in your cartridge box and the extra sixty in your pack. You can have your second breakfast in town.”

  After they were squared away Nathaniel took Levi and Joshua off to the side for prayer. They removed their black hats and bowed their heads while Nathaniel prayed in German. When they looked back up after a few minutes it was to see not just each other but the platoon, and not only the platoon but the entire company. Musket stocks were on the ground and black hats had been doffed. Hanson was mounted on his horse and his own head was bare.

  “I think the lads would like to have a prayer said over them, Reverend King,” he said. “This time in English, if ye don’t mind.”

  Nathaniel took off his black hat a second time. “Yes, sir.”

  His prayer was Psalm 23. Slowly he spoke the words—Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.

  After he had pronounced Amen Nathaniel looked at the company. “March or fight, remember we’re here for our homes and our nation. We want to live in a free country. A free country for all Americans, not just a few. God bless you, boys. God bless the United States of America.”

  There was a deep silence. Then Hanson threw up his arm. “Hurrah!”

  The men grinned and, remembering Nathaniel’s first sermon at Belle Plain, threw their hats into the air, hollering, “Hurrah!”

  The troops broke apart to await the arrival of the brigade. As they parted Nathaniel caught a glimpse of a blue dress and a white kapp. Lyndel stood there in the road. The wagon was behind her with Hiram and Morganne on the driver’s seat. Lyndel smiled.

  “Hello,” she said.

  He came to her and her kapp fell in the dust. She did not care. She just wanted his arms and his smile and the eyes that saw only her.

  “How did you get up here past all the pickets?” he demanded.

  “Why, love, remember I have a pass from the president of the United States.” She drew an envelope from the pocket under her apron. “And speaking of the president of the United States, this came to me last night. It was included in a pouch of dispatches for General Reynolds.”

  She put the envelope in his hand. It had already been opened.

  “Well, read it,” she said.

  Nathaniel took out a small sheet of paper.

  My dear Mrs. King:

  I fear this note will find its way to you long after the announcement is common news. But recalling your family background I wanted to inform you personally that General George Gordon Meade has been appointed commander of the Army of the Potomac and that he is of good Pennsylvania stock. Though some of my advisors think otherwise it is my sense of things that events will conspire to bring the armies of Northern Virginia and the Potomac into battle on Pennsylvania soil. I believe therefore that having a Pennsylvanian in command, another Pennsylvanian as an officer in the Iron Brigade, and a third Pennsylvanian in attendance as a nurse can only bode well for our success against General Lee. My best wishes and my prayers in the fiery trial soon to be visited upon your husband and his men and indeed upon yourself and the medical corps. It is my hope we will meet henceforth in a stronger Republic because of what transpires in the Commonwealth in which our glorious Declaration of Independence was signed.

  Yours most sincerely,

  A. Lincoln

  “Hiram thinks it’s a good omen,” Lyndel said when Nathaniel looked up from the note.

  “Does he? When I think back on what he wrote about Port Hudson and Moses Gunnison I’m inclined to believe Hiram Wright is becoming a religious man in the best way.”

  “I think so too.”

  “So, and where does Hiram think we will do battle?”

  “Oh, you know Hiram, always swimming against the tide. Everyone else says Harrisburg or Lancaster or Philadelphia.”

  “And Hiram?”

  She put her hand to his face and her eyes turned a darker blue than Nathaniel had ever seen. “Here. Today.” Her lips tightened. “He believes most of Lee’s army is in the vicinity.”

  “And where is our army?”

  “Coming. Coming quickly. But perhaps not quickly enough.”

  “Fall in! Fall in! Form up by platoon and company!” Hanson was riding up and down the road. “Our brigade is marching!”

  Nathaniel and Lyndel both saw the dust of the approaching troops.

  “I must go,” he said.

  “I’m marching beside you,” she told him.

  “Lyndy, you can’t.”

  “Of course I can. If the students at St. Joseph’s College in Emmitsburg could march beside you on Monday I can certainly march beside you and your men on Wednesday. Is there any one of them I haven’t nursed?”

  “Lyndy—”

  “This is not open to Amish debate. I have already asked Colonel Williams and he has given his consent. I can march with the regiment until such a…” Here her strong voice faltered a moment. “Until such a time as…the situation warrants a change…”

  “I don’t scarcely believe it.”

  Her bold composure returned and her eyes turned a fire blue. “Believe what you like. I’m marching. And we’d better fall in before Hanson leans down from that charger of his and bites us. If you like, I’ll hold Libby’s reins. Unless you’d rather be mounted.”

  He stared at her. “I reckon being friends with the president has gone to your head.”

  “Are you going to ride Libby or not?”

  He kissed her forehead. “I guess you’ve put me afoot.”

  Once the 2nd Wisconsin and 7th Wisconsin had marched by, the 19th Indiana joined the column ahead of the 24th Michigan and the 6th Wisconsin. Lyndel marched beside her husband and her brother and the men cheered. Hiram and Morganne followed the brigade in the wagon.

  The sun was warm on her face. The fields were alive with green, and the sky was as blue as a river. She thanked God for what had been offered to her and hoped she might walk beside Nathaniel and Levi all day. But then she heard cannon booming ahead of them.

  “Pick up the pace!” shouted Nicolson from his horse. “General Buford’s cavalry has run into a hornet’s nest of Rebs just up the road!”

  “That’s enough now,” Nathaniel said to Lyndel.

  She lengthened her stride. “No, it is not. I’m a Pennsylvania farm girl. March as fast as you like. I’ll keep up with you.”

  The column moved swiftly. Lyndel did not drop back. The crash of musket fire became as clear as the roar of the cannon. The closer they came to the town of Gettysburg the louder the firing grew. Lyndel realized her time with the regiment was limited. She took her husband’s hand.

  “I love you,” she said and touched her ring to his.

  The rings Moses Gunnison gave us, the rings his parents wore in secrecy while they were enslaved on a Virginia plantation, rings they placed on their fingers to show the other slaves the power of a love that could not be s
topped by chains or whips.

  “Halt! Fall out!” It was Hanson. “Pile your packs at the side of the road! Noncombatants to the rear!”

  “Pray for us,” said Nathaniel, holding her a final time.

  “Of course I’ll pray for you.” She put her fingers to her eyes.

  He smiled. “I’m in love with you, you know.”

  She laughed as she struggled to keep herself from crying. “Oh, who would ever have guessed?”

  “Get the extra cartridges out of your packs!” barked Nathaniel as he broke away from her. “Stuff them in your pockets! We don’t know how long we’ll be mixed up in this!”

  “God bless you, sister.” Levi was at Lyndel’s side, his pack gone, musket at his side. “May you have a steady hand and a steady heart when the wounded come to you.”

  She put her arms around his neck and kissed his cheek. “Thank you. Be safe, my good brother. Please watch out for each other. Watch out for…Nathaniel.”

  “I will. We all will.”

  Lyndel was startled when the men began to sing, one regiment picking up the tune after another, as they stripped off their packs, checked their muskets, and pushed their black hats firmly down on their heads.

  We will welcome to our numbers the loyal, true and brave

  Shouting the battle cry of Freedom

  And although he may be poor, not a man shall be a slave,

  Shouting the battle cry of Freedom.

  The Union forever, hurrah! boys, hurrah!

  Down with the traitors, up with the stars;

  While we rally round the flag, boys, rally once again,

  Shouting the battle cry of Freedom.

  The 2nd and 7th Wisconsin were already through breaks in a fence that ran along the side of the road. The 19th Indiana came into the field right behind them. The troops were shouting and singing at the top of their lungs as they half-ran over the grass at double-quick. Nathaniel was riding at the head of his company with Hanson and Nicolson, Libby’s dark mane flying.

  The regiment crossed another road and kept going until they had passed a large brick building that turned out to be Gettysburg’s Lutheran Seminary. They stopped and caught their breath and checked their muskets. The gunfire was south of them. They could see another road just ahead.

  Suddenly an aide galloped up to Hanson and Nicolson and Nathaniel. “Orders from General Reynolds. Buford’s cavalry are being forced back on the road in front of you. Rebel infantry are advancing against them. Attack, you are ordered to attack.”

  Hanson wheeled his horse. “Fix bayonets! Prepare to assault the enemy! Get into line of battle!”

  “Form line of battle!” shouted Ham.

  “Get out of column and form line of battle!” Nathaniel yelled. “Fix bayonets!”

  The 2nd Wisconsin formed line of battle first and lunged up a nearby ridge, disappearing into the woods at its top, a terrific explosion of volley fire rolling down to the other Iron Brigade regiments. The companies of the 19th Indiana were no sooner in line of battle and ready to charge the ridge when aides raced up with the news that General Reynolds had been shot from his horse.

  “He was leading the 2nd Wisconsin!” a young aide shouted, tears slicing through the powder grime on his face. “The bullet cut him out of the saddle, just cut him out of the saddle!”

  “How is he, lad?” asked Hanson.

  “He’s dead! He was dead by the time he hit the ground!”

  “Thank you, lad.” Hanson turned to his men. “We’re needed up on McPherson’s Ridge. When Colonel Williams gives the command, move smartly. Remember our general. Knock the Rebels back to Richmond.”

  The signal came and the Indiana men hurled themselves toward the ridge and up the slope with the 24th Michigan on their left and the 7th Wisconsin on their right. Nathaniel’s horse leaped fence after fence and pounded through wheat field after wheat field.

  They halted just below the top of the ridge.

  “It’s General Archer’s brigade from Tennessee and Alabama!” yelled Hanson. “They’re tearing up the other side of the ridge screaming like thunder! All they can see is the 2nd Wisconsin! They have no idea we’re here! Once you spot their heads and chests open fire!”

  Moments later gray troops came swarming over the crest of McPherson’s Ridge, screeching and shooting at the Wisconsin regiment holding steady at the top. Nathaniel saw their eyes and then banks of musket smoke boiled over them as the Union infantry fired and they were falling or running back down the ridge the way they had come. Colonel Williams thundered up to the 19th Indiana line on his mount, waving his sword and shouting, “After them, boys!” The regiment stormed over the ridge, aiming and firing at Archer’s brigade as fast as they could reload.

  The Tennesseans caught them while they scrambled over a fence at the top and Nathaniel saw the 19th Indiana’s colors go down, go up, and then go down again. Libby vaulted the fence and Nathaniel paused to watch Plesko and Levi and Nip climb over, kneel, fire, and reload as they prepared to rush forward again. Suddenly a corporal had the Stars and Stripes and was running ahead of everyone down the slope. Nathaniel drew his sword and saw the sun burn along its length.

  “Into the ravine!” he yelled. “The Rebs don’t know what hit them! Get after them before they can regroup!”

  “Willoughby Run!” hollered Hanson. “That’s the name the good folk around here gave it! McPherson’s Ridge and Willoughby Run! Take ’em both!”

  The 19th Indiana and 24th Michigan and 7th Wisconsin hurtled down the side of the ridge into Willoughby Run, shooting and howling and ordering the Tennessee and Alabama troops to surrender. Levi was hit and spun around three or four times by the force of a ball before falling on all fours in the shallow stream. Nathaniel jumped off his horse and hauled him to his feet while the fighting filled the ravine.

  “Get back up the slope to a hospital!” Nathaniel ordered him.

  Blood streaked the side of Levi’s head. “I’ll be all right in a minute. I’m just a bit dizzy.”

  “You’ve got to go back and get looked after.”

  “They won’t have anything set up yet, brother. And to tell you the truth, I don’t have the strength to climb back up there anyhow.”

  Levi suddenly yanked Nathaniel’s Colt Navy revolver from its holster and fired. A Rebel officer went down clutching his knee and dropping his own revolver. He groaned and cried out and rolled about in the scrub brush.

  “Good you didn’t have the holster flap fastened,” Levi said. “And good I wasn’t back at that field hospital.”

  Ham was leading the platoon across the narrow run of water and up the bank on the other side, chasing fleeing Rebel troops. “Go on! Get ’em! Get ’em before they get back to Nashville!”

  Nathaniel took his Colt Navy from Levi’s hand and sat him on a boulder. Then he went to the officer Levi had shot in the knee. Squatting beside him he offered his canteen that the officer drank from with huge swallows. He brought a black handkerchief from his pocket and tied a tourniquet just above the knee that brought the blood flow to a stop.

  “How is it?” he asked.

  “Worse than getting kicked by a mule. Coulter, Memphis.”

  “King, Elizabethtown, not so many miles east of here. Can you walk?”

  “If I had a crutch.”

  “There’s an Enfield lying here.”

  “That’ll do.”

  Nathaniel helped him up and put the stock of the Confederate musket under his arm. The officer limped forward, stopped and leaned on the gun, panting. Nathaniel glanced past him. All along Willoughby Run soldiers from Alabama and Tennessee were surrendering by the hundreds. The run was littered with muskets the Southerners had dropped. He saw a Rebel general being led away and heard a captain from another Indiana company say it was General James Archer himself. Soon his Amish platoon was back with several dozen more prisoners.

  “You and you!” Hanson pointed to Ham and Joshua. “Take those Confederates back behind McPherson’s Ridge and tur
n them over to the 9th New York Cavalry. The officer with the Enfield crutch—I need you to go with them and get some medical attention.” He noticed Levi. “Have an argument with Tennessee, Sergeant?”

  “It may have been Alabama, sir.”

  “Pick up a musket and give King and Yoder a hand. While you’re at it drop in on the Lutheran Theological Seminary.”

  “Do you think I need a sermon, Captain?”

  “No doubt you do. There’s sin in us all. I was thinking of your body, though, and not your soul. The surgeons are set up there, I’ve been told. Get your head looked into. I’ll need you back here for the next round.”

  “What next round?”

  Hanson took off his hat and wiped his forehead with his sleeve. “We took the first. Our Southern cousins will come at us again to try to take the second. Go. They’ll not give us all day before they launch another assault.”

  Nip brought a rag dipped in creek water and gave it to Levi to wipe the left side of his face. When he was done Levi got slowly to his feet and almost pitched forward into the stream. Nip looked up at Hanson who nodded. He joined Joshua as they escorted the platoon’s prisoners and the officer named Coulter with his musket crutch. Nip stayed close to Levi’s side.

  “Levi,” Nathaniel said as they left. “If Lyndy happens to be at the Seminary—”

  “I know,” replied Levi as he trudged unsteadily up the ridge. “You’re madly in love with her.”

  “That’s a mild way of putting it, Sergeant.”

  Levi glanced back and managed a smile. “I’ll try to think of something stronger, Lieutenant.”

  26

  July 1, 1863