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while subjected to a terrific fire from the enemy, somewhat on our right.
I saw General Gordon passing, and obtained permission to move the regiment to the right.
He ordered me to take it to the point where the fighting was hardest.
In moving to the right Colonel Hunt was informed that all his seniors had been killed or wounded and he took command of the brigade.
He found the right of the brigade in a short line of reserve works, and perceiving that his men must either charge or retreat or die where they stood, he ordered a charge, and drove the enemy from the salient, or ‘bloody angle.’
In occupying that work the left of the brigade connected with and possibly lapped other troops, but the right was unprotected, and as far down the right as Hunt could see, the Federals held the opposite side of the works, with the captured Confederate guns turned against him. The ammunition soon began to give out, and although it appeared to be certain death to leave the shelter of the works, Privates William Kelly and Chance Evans of the First volunteered to, and did bring ammunition from, the rear in boxes and tent flies during the entire engagement.
At 1 p. m., the enemy about ten paces distant, raised a white flag, and a general advanced who, when met by Hunt, demanded a surrender, which was promptly refused.
Soon afterward Col. J. N. Brown took command.
The fierceness of this close engagement by McGowan's brigade,1 in which Harris' Mississippians bore an
1 Colonel Hunt says: ‘Accident gave the brigade the position in front of the salient, and it sustained its reputation by charging, retaking and holding it for seventeen hours. No one can describe what we endured during that struggle. The trunk of that oak tree now on exhibition in Washington tells better than words the heroic endurance of the Confederate soldier, and gives a faint idea of the storm of minie balls hurled at us. When we took the works, the bark on it was in tact. It stood near the right center of the salient. A little to the left and in front of it stood a hickory tree about eight inches in diameter, of which I have never seen any mention. The hickory was shot down before night and fell across the works, catching some of the men in its branches. Its body and branches were chipped into splinters by minie balls. . . . I saw some very reckless acts of individuals, for instance Private W. W. Davenport, of the Thirteenth, and a boy of the Twelfth, whose name I cannot recall, mounted ammunition boxes, not over ten feet from the hickory, and fired over the salient while three or four men loaded guns for them until the minie balls almost stripped the clothing from them. During the afternoon the enemy's front line would seek protection under cover of our works and fire by placing the muzzles of their guns below the top logs of the works, while their second line would fire over their heads. Frequently our men would seize their muzzles and direct their fire to the rear.’
Atlanta, Ga. 1899.
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