“So we should not count on the arrival of any reinforcements until the day after tomorrow?”
“If that,” Hardee said sourly. “It depends on how badly the tracks have been damaged and how well the railroad transfer goes. Even then, it will be several days before the bulk of our troops get back to us.”
“And until then, we’re outnumbered three or four to one.”
“Probably more than that. I won’t sugarcoat it, Patrick. We’re hanging on by our fingernails here.”
The dull thudding of artillery from nearby caused both men to look up. A few seconds later, explosions begin pounding the earth a few hundred yards away. The Federals were shelling Cleburne’s front line. Reflexively, Confederate batteries began returning fire, seeking to silence the guns of their foes.
“It begins,” Hardee said. “What are your dispositions?”
“Granbury’s Texans are on the left, Warfield’s Arkansans in the center and Hardcastle is on the right, linking with Bate’s division.”
Hardee nodded. “Good, except for the left flank. It’s completely in the air.”
“I know. I had Granbury refuse his flank with the 15th Texas Dismounted Cavalry, but that only protects the flank for a distance of a few hundred yards.”
“I’ll have Bate station his reserve brigade on your left flank. It’s the best we can do.”
“The Orphans?” Cleburne asked hopefully.
Hardee shook his head. “No, they were too badly beat up in their spoiling attack yesterday. It will be Finley’s Floridians.”
“Very well,” Cleburne said. The Florida brigade was a tough enough unit.
“Walker is in the line just south of Atlanta and Maney’s division is holding the west side of the Atlanta defenses themselves. The Army of the Cumberland is beginning to feel for the end of Maney’s line, so he’s having to deploy one brigade to the north side of the city as well. I’m trying to place the Georgia Militia in the gaps that are starting to form between divisions. Not sure how that will go.”
“The Georgia Militia did not impress me yesterday. Many of them dropped their weapons and ran as soon as the Yankees got close to the line.”
“Bad troops are better than no troops.”
Cleburne snorted. He was not sure he agreed with this sentiment.
“Answer me truthfully,” Hardee said with grim seriousness. “Do you think you can hold the line?”
Cleburne thought carefully. In his heart, he could not honestly answer the question in the affirmative, but neither was he a man who could succumb to defeatism.
“William, if any troops can hold the line, my men will hold the line.”
*****
September 25, Noon
Johnston felt an enormous sense of relief when he sensed the train jerked slightly as it finally began moving forward. Every mile it traveled brought him closer to Atlanta, where the true battle was being fought, and farther away from Lafayette, which he would forever associate with the humiliation of having fallen for a classic ruse de guerre.
Johnston and his staff, along with General Cheatham and his officers, had been allocated a regular passenger car. Needless to say, most of the thousands of soldiers now filling the trains chugging between West Point and Atlanta were crammed into uncomfortable boxcars, with barely enough room to sit down on the hard wooden floors.
Mackall sat across from him, intent on some paperwork. The rest of the officers in the car were doing much the same. For the first time in as long as he could remember, Johnston had nothing to do. He relished the moment, staring out the window as the west Georgia countryside rushed past him.
The few telegrams which had reached him from Richmond had been furious and disjointed demands for an explanation as to what had happened and what he intended to do about it. He could easily imagine the insulting and disrespectful clamor going on between President Davis, Secretary Seddon and General Bragg. Johnston had no doubt that some of them, particularly Bragg, were getting a certain satisfaction at seeing him in such difficulties. They would see it as confirmation that Davis had made a mistake when he had appointed him to command the Army of Tennessee in December and when he had decided against replacing him with Hood in July.
Johnston burned with resentment. As he gazed out the window, he silently shook his head. If the Confederacy were going to be destroyed, the architects of its destruction would be Jefferson Davis and Braxton Bragg far more than Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses Grant.
Hardee’s frantic requests for assistance had been almost as difficult for him to read. He loved the Army of Tennessee as though it were his own child and the idea that he had left thousands of his men in a position of terrible danger gnawed at him remorselessly. His men had put their trust in him. They had faithfully followed his orders from the earliest days of the campaign at Dalton, which now seemed a lifetime ago. They had sacrificed their lives to win the great victory at Peachtree Creek and now he had put at risk all that had been gained by their valor and blood.
Johnston’s head suddenly jerked up. The train was slowing down. He glanced about with irritation, but the looks of confusion on the faces of the other officers in the car told him that they had no more idea what was happening than he did. Eventually, the train lurched to a halt.
Mackall was sent to find out what was going on. When he returned five minutes later, he reported that they had come upon the first break in the track caused by enemy cavalry. The earlier train that had departed West Point with Manigault’s brigade had been stopped for a few hours. Although it was only a few hundred yards long, it would take some time for it to be repaired.
Johnston sat back heavily in his seat, frustration eating away at him. It was going to be a long ride to Atlanta.
*****
September 25, Afternoon
The sun had peaked in the sky and begun its long descent to the west. McFadden walked back and forth behind the line of the 7th Texas, staring out over the parapet. He had thought the Union force which had assaulted them the previous day had been enormous, but the number of bluecoats he saw assembling for an attack this time was much larger.
Up on the fire-step of the position, Private Pearson shook his head.
“We’re dead men, sure as hell.”
“You said that just before Peachtree Creek,” Montgomery replied.
“Odds were even then,” Pearson replied. “Today, they’re about as lopsided as they can be.”
McFadden had to admit that Pearson was correct. Granbury’s brigade had been so weakened that it was now considerably smaller than a regiment would have been at the outset of the war. The day before, they had been assaulted by a full-strength division and had barely survived. By the look of things, the Yankees were about to throw an entire corps at them.
He shook his head. Even Granbury’s Texans couldn’t beat those odds. Without thinking, he glanced up at the regimental battle flag, posted firmly in the dirt of the parapet and fluttering defiantly. Next to it was the distinctive blue and white flag of Cleburne’s division.
He glanced anxiously back to the northeast. Pillars of smoke continued to rise from the city, which made his stomach clench more than even the upcoming Union attack. Any one of those fires might signify the death of Annie Turnbow. He tried not to think about it. Major Collett had asked a brigade commissary officer to ask after the Turnbows when he went into the city to collect ammunition and rations, but the man had come back with absolutely no information. McFadden had to concentrate on leading his half of the regiment and thoughts about what had become of Annie would only distract him.
Another half-dozen artillery shells landed on or just in front of the parapet, exploding and sending up showers of dirt. The Yankees had been bombarding them all day. Altogether they had lost two men killed and four wounded, but the defenses had been constructed so stoutly as to be essentially unharmed by the artillery fire. McFadden speculated that the main purpose behind the barrage was to keep the Confederates from getting any rest.
“Lie
utenant!” Pearson’s voice called out. “They’ve started forward!”
McFadden ran up to the fire-step and peered out from beneath the head-log. The enormous formation of Union infantry, at least three divisions strong, had indeed begun marching slowly forward. McFadden was struck by the disturbing image of an elephant about to stomp on a mouse.
“So many Yankees,” Montgomery said soberly.
“Yeah,” Pearson answered. “Where the hell are we going to bury them all?”
Laughter resounded through the position of the 7th Texas. Despite himself, McFadden chuckled as well. For once, he was happy with Pearson, as his joke helped steady the nerves of the men. If one could laugh, he mused to himself, then all was not lost.
Confederate batteries intensified their fire as the Union infantry advanced. Each exploding shell took several Yankees with it, just like the previous day. But the Northerners simply closed up whatever gaps were created and kept on coming. The buglers and drummers in their ranks sounded the double quick and they moved from a walk to a jog.
“Get ready, men,” McFadden said with as much firmness as he could muster. He glanced over at Major Collett, a dozen yards away, and received a reassuring nod. His men loaded their weapons and held them steady. He had ordered them not to fix their bayonets, for they would interfere with the reloading process. Only when the Yankees got into the trench and started scrambling up the parapet would he order the blades affixed to their rifles.
As he watched the Yankees advance at the double quick, the only thing which gave McFadden any reassurance was the large surplus of ammunition. Being so close to the depots of Atlanta, all of the troops holding the defenses of the city had been issued more cartridges than they could possibly fire before the barrels of their rifles melted. Whatever the outcome, McFadden was certain that a good number of Northern men would be slain before the defenses of the 7th Texas.
As the Union attackers approached the abatis fronting the trench, the buglers blew the signal for the charge, the Northern battle cry went up, and the drumbeating accelerated to a swift pounding. During the night, McFadden and his men had worked to link the sharpened wooden stakes together with chains brought in from the city. It was hoped that this would make it more difficult for the Yankees to tear them down. But McFadden now saw that the leading men in the attacking columns were wielding axes rather than muskets. They must have been pioneers, whose role would be to cut gaps in the abatis.
The moment the first Union soldier hacked at one of the stakes, McFadden gave the order to fire. Collett and Lieutenant Russell did the same, and the whole line of the 7th Texas exploded in a rattle of musketry. On either side of them, the other regiments of Granbury’s brigade fired their first volleys at almost the same instant. A sheet of lead flew forth from the Southern defenses into the exposed Union troops struggling through the abatis on the other side of the trench.
Union troops began falling in droves, but McFadden saw that the fire was not intense enough. At various points, pioneers succeeding in hacking down the wooden stakes. Like water bursting through a cracked dam, blue-coated soldiers poured through these small gaps, dropped down into the trench, and charged forward toward the parapet.
McFadden drew his sword and pistol. The wound he had suffered the day before, minor though it had been, still seethed with pain and he worried it would affect his ability to fight. He would simply have to ignore the agony if he was to do his duty.
His men continued firing. Scores of Union men were falling beneath a hail of Southern lead, but more and more of the abatis stakes were being hacked away and the trench before the parapet was rapidly filling up with Yankees. Some were beginning to scramble upwards. McFadden fired six shots from his Navy Colt down into the trench. He didn’t bother to see whether he hit anything, although there were so many enemies in front of him that it seemed impossible to miss. He quickly reloaded his weapon, wondering if he would ever get a chance to do so again.
The first Union soldier appeared on top of the parapet, firing his musket down into the space on the other side. One of the Texans was hit in the stomach, but the Yankee was immediately struck by five bullets and tumbled backwards into the trench. Almost instantly, though, three more Yankees rose to take his place. They fell immediately, two tumbling back into the trench and one falling forward over the parapet.
McFadden pulled three of his men out of the line, ordering them to fire only at enemy troops who appeared on top of the parapet. The others remained on the fire-step, pouring fire as quickly as they could down onto the Yankees in the trench. As they had done the day before, some of his men tossed lit artillery shells over the head-log, so that they tumbled down the parapet and exploded in the midst of the attackers.
A bullet snapped the flagpole holding up the 7th Texas battle flag. One of the men dropped his rifle and scrambled up onto the parapet toward the fallen banner. McFadden screamed for the man to get back to the fire-step, but he either didn’t hear the order or decided to ignore it. Bravely, he raised the flag and shook it in the direction of the attacking Yankees, screaming defiantly. Almost instantly, he was struck by three or four bullets, dropping the flag abruptly onto the parapet and tumbling down into the trench.
Rage filled McFadden at the loss of the regimental flag. Almost as disturbing, a Union flag bearer topped the mount and planted his colors into the parapet. Glancing at it quickly, McFadden saw that it was the flag of the 48th Illinois. The man turned and waved his flag, calling for his comrades to join him.
“Come on, men! Come on!”
McFadden expected the man to fall, pierced by Southern bullets, at any moment. But he yet remained unharmed, continuing to wave his flag and call to his comrades. Frustrated, McFadden raised his pistol and fired six shots in rapid succession. All missed.
More and more Yankees were now appearing on the top of the parapet, firing down into the space behind it. Several of the Texans were hit. Even worse, many of the blue-coats were now jumping down into the defenses, swinging their rifles like clubs and jabbing with their bayonets.
“Fix bayonets, men!” McFadden shouted, feeling stupid for having waited so long to issue the order. “Fix bayonets!”
It took only a few seconds for his well-trained men to unsheathe their bayonets and fix them onto their rifles, but their fire slackened during that brief space of time. Seeing their chance, Union officers screamed for their men to go over the top. Their battle cry increased in intensity as hundreds of Union soldiers scrambled upwards at the same moment, flooding over the parapet like a tidal wave over a tiny breakwater.
As the bluecoats plunged down into the defenses, a vicious hand-to-hand struggle ensued. McFadden had managed to reload his revolver, but within seconds he had expended all six shots once again. He looked around for Major Collett, but could not find him. The men of the 7th Texas were now intermingled with the other regiments of Granbury’s brigade, but all told they numbered only a few hundred men, drowning in a sea of federal troops. More and more Union battle flags were now waving from the top of the parapet.
He plunged into the melee, swinging his sword. He realized that the Yankees using their muskets as clubs would have an advantage over him, for their muskets were so much heavier than his sword. Still, he gashed the arm of the nearest Yankee, just before slamming his head into the man’s nose and then embedding his saber deeply into the man’s chest.
The roar of a cannon fired from very close by nearly deafened McFadden. It took him a few seconds to realize that the gun crews of one of the nearest artillery batteries had pulled their pieces back from the parapet, turned them toward the Yankees massing inside the defenses, and were now firing at point blank range. Although they killed huge numbers of enemy soldiers with a single blast, they also cut down some of their own men in the process.
As he watched, dozens of Yankee soldiers descended vengefully on the offending battery. In a matter of seconds, the artillery crews had been clubbed or bayoneted. There was nothing now to stop the Yankees
from turning the artillery pieces against the Confederates.
“Major Collett!” McFadden called, looking about frantically for his commander.
One of the Texans pointed and McFadden saw Collett leaning heavily against the parapet, sword in one hand and clasping a bloody leg with the other. He dashed over.
“Get them out, James!” Collett screamed in his ear. “Get as many of the men together and get out!”
There was no time parting words. McFadden backed away from the parapet, waving his sword in a circle over his head.
“Rally to me, Texans! Rally to me!”
He realized that his shouting and waving made him a prime target for Yankee bullets and several did zip past his head. But by ones and twos, soldiers in gray and butternut extracted themselves from the fighting and backed away from the parapet, slowly coalescing around him in a rough semicircle. They began reloading their rifles and firing at the Yankees. Within three or four minutes, perhaps a dozen survivors had assembled around McFadden. Keeping up a weak rate of fire, they slowly backed away from the position they had held with such tenacity.
The enemy fired back but made no effort to follow them. Dozens of Yankee battle flags were now firmly posted on the parapet, while cheering bluecoats were waving captured Confederate standards about them as trophies. One of them, McFadden could see, was the flag of the 7th Texas.
“Let’s go,” he said loudly to the group.
They turned and marched away, determined to put as much distance between them and their victorious enemies as possible. As they departed, the cheers of the victorious Union troops grew louder.
*****
Through his field glasses, Grant could see his men waving captured rebels flags about, while the standard of the United States was firmly planted on the enemy defenses in many places. The sound of shooting had nearly stopped, indicating that whatever rebel defenders had not been killed or captured had run away.
Shattered Nation Page 85
