previous next
[61] enemy's force was much larger than supposed, and strongly posted, and the gallant Eighteenth was compelled to seek cover. It continued to pour heavy volleys from the edge of the woods, and must have done great execution. The steadiness with which the desperate charge was made reflects the highest credit on officers and men. . . . The combined attack of the Eighteenth and Thirty-seventh compelled the enemy to leave his battery for a time and take shelter behind a ditch bank. Official Report.

This attack fell on Martindale's Second Maine regiment, Forty-fourth New York, some detachments of the Ninth and Twenty-second Massachusetts and of the Fourth Michigan, and what Lane had left of the Twenty-fifth New York, all supporting a section of Martin's battery. The Federal line was broken and the gunners driven from their pieces. General Martindale says: ‘The battle had now lasted for quite an hour, and although the center of my line was broken, under a cross fire that was entirely destructive and unsupportable, still the Second Maine on the right and the largest body of the Forty-fourth New York on the left, maintained their ground without flinching. (It is now disclosed that they were assailed by four times their number.)’1 Federal reinforcements soon arrived. Generals Porter and Morell hastened personally to the firing, and at this crisis sent in the Thirteenth and Fourteenth New York and Griffin's battery to reform Martindale's broken line. The Ninth Massachusetts and Sixty-second Pennsylvania were hurried back from toward Hanover. Their line of march threw them on Branch's left flank and rear, and, already far outnumbered before the arrival of this new force, Branch was left no option except to retreat. The Seventh North Carolina and Forty-fifth Georgia, which had been held in reserve and not at all engaged, covered

1 This ‘four times their number’ was, as seen above, only Cowan's and Lee's regiments.

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.

An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.

hide Places (automatically extracted)

View a map of the most frequently mentioned places in this document.

Sort places alphabetically, as they appear on the page, by frequency
Click on a place to search for it in this document.
Hanover Court House (Virginia, United States) (1)
hide People (automatically extracted)
Sort people alphabetically, as they appear on the page, by frequency
Click on a person to search for him/her in this document.
Martindale (3)
L. O'B. Branch (2)
Fitz John Porter (1)
Morell (1)
James Green Martin (1)
C. C. Lee (1)
J. H. Lane (1)
Griffin (1)
R. H. Cowan (1)
hide Display Preferences
Greek Display:
Arabic Display:
View by Default:
Browse Bar: