by John McElroy
CHAPTER VIII. A GLOOMY NEW YEAR'S DAY
THE TWO ARMIES LIE FROWNING AT EACH OTHER.
SI WAS awakened the next morning by the rain dashing down squarely onhis upturned face. He was lying on the flat of his back, sleeping thesleep of the utterly outworn, and he got the full force of the shower.
"Plague take it, Shorty," said he, kicking his snoring partner, "you'reat your old tricks again scrougin' me out o' the tent while I'm asleep.Why can't you lay still, like a white man?"
"It's you, dod rot you," grumbled Shorty, half-awakening. "You're atyour old tricks o' kickin' the tent down. You need a 10-acre lot tosleep in, and then you'd damage the fence-corners."
They were both awake by this time, and looked around in amazement.
"We went to sleep nice and comfortable, under a wagon last night," saidShorty, slowly recalling the circumstances. "The two Lieutenants and theOrderly had the upper berth, and we slept on the ground-floor."
"Yes," assented Si; "and someone's come along, hitched mules to ourbedroom and snaked it off."
"Just the way in the condemned army," grumbled Shorty, his ill-humorasserting itself as he sat up and looked out over the rain-soakedfields. "Never kin git hold of a good thing but somebody yanks it{94}away. S'pose they thought that it was too good for a private soldier,and they took it away for some Major-General to sleep under."
A DISAGREEABLE AWAKENING FOR SHORTY AND SI. 94]
"Well, I wonder what we're goin' to do for grub?" said Si, as hisathletic appetite began to assert itself.
"Our own wagons, that we had such a time guarding, are over there in thecedars, and the rebels are filling themselves up with the stuff that wewere so good to bring up for them."
"It makes me jest sizzle," said Shorty, "to think of all we went throughto git them condemned wagons up where they'd be handiest for them."
Si walked down the line toward where the Regimental Headquarters wereestablished under a persimmon tree, and presently came back, saying:
"They say there's mighty small chance of gettin' any grub to-day.Wheeler burnt three or four miles of our wagons yesterday, and's gotpossession of the road to Nashville. We've got to fight the battleout on empty stomachs, and drive these whelps away before we kin get asquare meal."
Jan. 1, 1863, was an exceedingly solemn, unhappy New Year's Day for theUnion soldiers on the banks of Stone River. Of the 44,000 who had goneinto the line on the evening of Dec. 30, nearly 9,000 had been killed orwounded and about 2,000 were prisoners. The whole right wing of thearmy had been driven back several miles, to the Nashville Pike. Cannon,wagon-trains, tents and supplies had been captured by the rebel cavalry,which had burned miles of wagons, and the faint-hearted ones murmuredthat the army would have to surrender or starve.
There was not ammunition enough to fight an other battle. The rebel armyhad suffered as heavily in killed and wounded, but it was standing onits own ground, near its own supplies, and had in addition capturedgreat quantities of ours.{96}
The mutual slaughter of the two armies had been inconceivably awfulinexpressibly ghastly, shuddering, sickening. They had poundedone another to absolute exhaustion, and all that sullen, lowering,sky-weeping Winter's day they lay and glared at one another like twohuge lions which had fanged and torn each other until their strength hadbeen entirely expended, and breath and strength were gone. Each was toospent to strike another blow, but each too savagely resolute to think ofretreating.
All the dogged stubbornness of his race was now at fever point in Si'sveins. Those old pioneers and farmers of the Wabash from whom he sprangwere not particularly handsome to look at, they were not glib talkers,nor well educated. But they had a way of thinking out rather slowly andawkwardly it might be just what they ought to do, and then doing it ordying in the effort which made it very disastrous for whoever stood intheir way. Those who knew them best much preferred to be along with themrather than against them when they set their square-cornered heads uponaccomplishing some object.
Si might be wet, hungry, and the morass of mud in which the army waswallowing uncomfortable and discouraging to the last degree, but therewas not the slightest thought in his mind of giving up the fight aslong as there was a rebel in sight. He and Shorty were not hurt yet, anduntil they were, the army was still in good fighting trim.
The line of the 200th Ind. was mournfully shorter than it was two daysbefore, but there were still several hundred boys of Si's stamp gatheredresolutely{97} around its flag, the game little Colonel's voice rang outas sharply as ever, and the way the boys picked up their guns and gotinto line whenever a sputter of firing broke out anywhere must have beenvery discouraging to Gen. Bragg and his officers, who were anxiouslywatching the Union lines through their glasses for signs ofdemoralization and retreat.
"We licked 'em yesterday, every time they come up squarely in front o'the 200th Ind.," Si said to Shorty and those who stood around gazinganxiously on the masses of brown men on the other side of the field. "Wecan do it again, every time. The only way they got away with us was bysneakin' around through the cedars and takin' us in the rear. We're outin the open ground now, an' they can't get around our flanks." Andhe looked to the extreme right, where every knoll was crowned with abattery of frowning guns.
"They got their bellies full o' fightin' yesterday," added Shorty,studying the array judicially. "They hain't none o' the brashness theyshowed yesterday mornin', when they were jumpin' us in front, right,left and rear at the same minute. They're very backward about comin'forward acrost them fields for us to-day. I only wish they'd try iton."
But the forenoon wore away without the rebels showing any dispositionto make an assault across the muddy fields. Si's vigilant appetite tookadvantage of the quiet to assert its claims imperiously.
"Shorty," said he, "there must be something to eat somewhere aroundhere. I'm goin' to look for it."
"You'll have just about as much chance of findin' it," said Shortydolefully, "among that mob o' {98}famished Suckers as you would o'findin' a straw-stack in the infernal regions. But I'll go 'long withyou. We can't lose the regiment in the day time."
"By the way, Shorty," said Si, happening to glance at the sleeves of theovercoats which he had picked up, "we both seem to be Sergeants."
"That's so," assented Shorty. "Both these are Sergeant's overcoats.We'll take our guns along, and play that we are on duty. It may help usout somewhere."
Things looked so quiet in front that the Captain gave them permission,and off they started. It seemed a hopeless quest. Everywhere men wereravenous for food. They found one squad toasting on their rammers thepieces of a luckless rabbit they had cornered in a patch of briars.Another was digging away at a hole that they alleged contained awoodchuck. A third was parching some corn found in a thrown-away feedbox, and congratulating themselves upon the lucky find.
Finally they came out upon the banks of Stone River at the place towhich Si had wandered during the night. Si recognized it at once, andalso the voices that came from behind a little thicket of paw paws asthose of the men with whom he had had the squabble.
Si motioned to Shorty to stop and keep silent, while he stepped upcloser, parted the bushes a little, looked through, and listened.
Two men were standing by a fire, which was concealed from the army bythe paw-paws. Four others had just come up, carrying rolled in a blanketwhat seemed to be a dead body. They flung it down{99} by the fire, withexclamations of relief, and unrolled it. It was the carcass of a pig sorecently killed that it was still bleeding.
"Hello," exclaimed the others joyfully; "where did you get that?"
"Why," exclaimed one of the others, "we were poking around down thereunder the bank, and we happened to spy a nigger cabin on the other sideof the river, hid in among the willers, where nobody could see it. Wethought there might be something over there, so we waded across. Therewasn't any thing to speak of in the cabin, but we found this pig in thepen. Jim bayoneted it, and then we wrapped it up in our blanket, asif we wuz taking a boy back
to the Surgeon's, and fetched it along. Wecouldn't 've got a hundred yards through that crowd if they'd dreamedwhat we had. Jerusalem, but it was heavy, though. We thought that pigweighed a thousand pounds before we got here."
"Bully boys," said the others gleefully. "We'll have enough to eat, nomatter how many wagons the rebels burn. I always enjoyed a dinner offresh pork more on New Year's Day than any other time."
Si turned and gave Shorty a wink that conveyed more to that observantindividual than a long telegram would have done. He winked backapprovingly, brought up his gun to a severely regulation "carry arms,"and he and Si stepped briskly through the brush to the startled squad.
"Here," said Si, with official severity; "you infernal stragglers, whatregiments do you belong to? Sneaking out here, are you, and stealin'hogs instead of being with your companies. Wrap that pig up{100} again,pick it up, and come along with us to Headquarters."
For a minute it looked as if the men would fight. But Si had guessedrightly; they were stragglers, and had the cowardice of guiltyconsciences. They saw the chevrons on Si's arms, and his positive,commanding air finished them. They groaned, wrapped up the pig again,and Si mercifully made the two who had waited by the fire carry theheaviest part.
Si started them back toward the 200th Ind., and he and Shorty walkedalong close to them, maintaining a proper provost-guard-like severity ofcountenance and carriage.
The men began to try to beg off, and make advances on the basisof sharing the pork. But Si and Shorty's official integrity wasincorruptible.
"Shut up and go on," they would reply to every proposition. "We ain'tthat kind of soldiers. Our duty's to take you to Headquarters, and toHeadquarters you are going."
They threaded through the crowds for some time, and as they were at lastnearing the regiment a battery of artillery went by at as near a trot asit could get out of the weary horses in that deep mire. The squad tookadvantage of the confusion to drop their burden and scurry out of sightin the throng.
"All right; let 'em go," grinned Si. "I wuz jest wonderin' how we'd getrid o' 'em. I'd thought o' takin' them into the regiment and then givin'them a chunk o' their pork, but then I'd get mad at the way they talkedabout the 200th Ind. last night, and want to stop and lick 'em. It'sbetter as it is. We need all that pig for the boys."{101}
Si and Shorty picked up the bundle and carried it up to the regiment.When they unrolled it the boys gave such lusty cheers that the rebelsbeyond the field rushed to arms, expecting a charge, and one of ourimpulsive cannoneers let fly a shell at them.
Si and Shorty cut off one ham for themselves and their particularcronies, carried the other ham, with their compliments, to the Colonel,and let the rest be divided up among the regiment.
One of their chums was lucky enough to have saved a tin box of salt, andafter they had toasted and devoured large slices of the fresh ham theybegan to feel like new men, and be anxious for some thing farther tohappen.
But the gloomy, anxious day dragged its slow length along with nothingmore momentous than fitful bursts of bickering, spiteful firing,breaking out from time to time on different parts of the long line,where the men's nerves got wrought up to the point where they had to dosomething to get the relief of action.
Away out in front of the regiment ran a little creek, skirting the hillon which the rebels were massed. In the field between the hill and thecreek was one of our wagons, which had mired there and been abandonedby the driver in the stampede of the day before. It seemed out of easyrifle-shot of the rebels on the hill.
Si had been watching it for some time. At length he said:
"Shorty, I believe that wagon's loaded with hard tack."
"It's certainly a Commissary wagon," said Shorty, after studying it alittle.{102}
"Yes, I'm sure that it's one o' them wagons we was guardin', and Irecollect it was loaded with hard tack."
The mere mention of the much-abused crackers made both their mouthswater.
"Seems to me I recognize the wagon, too," said Shorty.
"Shorty, it'd be a great thing if we could sneak along up the creek,behind them bushes, until we come opposite the wagon, then make, a rushacrost the field, snatch up a box o' hardtack apiece, and then run back.We'd get enough to give each o' the boys a cracker apiece. The wagon'dshelter us comin' and goin', and we wouldn't get a shot."
"It might be," said Shorty, with visions of distributing hardtack to thehungry boys warping his judgment. "The fellers right back o' the wagoncouldn't shoot to any advantage, and them to the right and left are toofur off. If you say so, it's a go."
"If the boys could only have one hardtack apiece," said Si, as his lasthesitation vanished, "they'd feel ever so much better, and be in so muchbetter shape for a fight. Come on, let's try it."
The rest overheard their plan, and began to watch them with eagerinterest. They made a circle to the right, got into the cover of thebrush of the creek, and began making their way slowly and carefullyup to a point opposite the wagon. They reached this without attractingnotice, parted the bushes in front of them carefully, and took a goodsurvey of the wagon and the hill beyond.
The wagon was a great deal nearer the hill than had appeared to be thecase from where the{103} regiment lay, and even where they stood theywere in easy range of the rebels on the hill. But the latter wereutterly unsuspicious of them. They were crouching down around fires,with their guns stacked, and the cannoneers of a couple of guns were atsome distance from their pieces, under a brush shelter, before which afire smoldered in the rain.
"It's awful short range," said Si dubiously. "If they were lookin'they'd tear us and the wagon all to pieces. But our boys is a-watchin'us, and I don't want to go back without a shy at it. Them fellers seemso busy tryin' to keep warm that we may get there without their noticin'us."
"I never wanted hardtack so much in my life as I do this minute," saidShorty. "I don't care to live forever, anyway. Let's chance it."
They pulled off their overcoats, carefully tied up their shoes, shiftedaround so as to be completely behind the wagon, and then started on arush through the mud.
For several hundred steps nothing happened, and they began to believethat they would reach the wagon unnoticed. Then a few shots rang outover their heads, followed a minute later by a storm of bullets thatstruck in the mud and against the wagon. But they reached the wagon,and sat down, exhausted, on the tongue, sidling up close to the bed toprotect them from the bullets.
Si recovered his breath first, caught hold of the front board and raisedhimself up, saw the boxes of coveted hardtack, and was just putting hishand on one of them when a shell struck the rear end and tore the canvascover off. Si sank back again{104} beside Shorty, when another shellburst under the wagon, and filled the air with pieces of wheels, bed,cracker-boxes and hardtack.
"I don't want no hardtack; I want to find the bank o' that crick,"yelled Shorty, starting back on the jump, with Si just six inchesbehind.
The bullets spattered in the mud all around them as they ran, but theyreached the creek bank with out being struck. They were in such a hurrythat they did not stop to jump, but fell headlong into the water.
"Them hardtack wuz spiled, anyway," said Shorty, as they fishedthemselves out, found their overcoats, and made their way back to theregiment.
They received the congratulations of their comrades on their escape, andsomeone fished out all the consolation that the regiment could offer acouple of brierwood pipes filled with fragrant kinnikinnick. They satdown, smoked these, and tried to forget their troubles.
The cheerless night drew on. No fires were allowed, and the men huddledtogether on the wet ground, to get what comfort they could from thewarmth of each other's bodies.
The temper of the rebels became nastier as the day wore away, and underthe cover of the dark ness they pushed out here and there and openedworrying fires on the Union line. Suddenly a battery opened up onthe 200th Ind. from a bare knoll in front. The rebels had evidentlycalculated the range during daylight, and the she
lls struck around themin the most annoying way. They threw up showers of mud, scattered thegroups, and kept{105} everybody nervous and alarmed. The regiment stoodthis for some time, when an idea occurred to Si and Shorty. They went upto the Colonel and explained:
"Colonel, we've studied the ground out there purty carefully, and weknow that the knoll where that battery is is in close range o' thatcrick where we went up this afternoon. If you'll let a few of us go outthere we kin stop them cannoneers mighty soon."
"Sure of that?" said the Colonel alertly.
"Dead sure."
"Very well, then," said the Colonel promptly. "I've been thinking ofthe same thing. I'll take the whole regiment out. Put yourselves at thehead, and lead the way."
The regiment was only too eager for the movement. It marched rapidlyafter Si and Shorty up the creek bed, and in a very few minutes founditself on the flank of the obnoxious battery, which was still bangingaway into the line which the 200th Ind. had occupied. It was scarcely200 yards away, and the men's hearts burned with a fierce joy at theprospect of vengeance. With whispered orders the Colonel lined up theregiment carefully on the bank, and waited until the battery should fireagain, to make sure of the aim. Every man cocked his gun, took good aim,and waited for the order. They could distinctly hear the orders of thebattery officers directing the shelling. Three cannon were fired atonce, and as their fierce lights flashed out the Colonel gave the orderto fire. A terrible simoon of death from the rifles of the 200th Ind.struck down everything in and around the battery.
"That dog's cured o' suckin' aigs," said Shorty, as the Colonel orderedthe regiment to about face and march back.
The 200th Ind. heard no more from that battery that night.
