The scene in the Wilderness.
General Lee soon sent a message to
Longstreet to make a night march and bring up his two divisions at daybreak on the 6th.
He himself slept on the field, taking his headquarters a few hundred yards from the line of battle of the day. It was his intention to relieve
Hill's two divisions with
Longstreet's, and throw them farther to the left, to fill up a part of the great unoccupied interval between the
Plank road and
Ewell's right, near the
Old turnpike, or use them on his right, as the occasion might demand.
It was unfortunate that any of these troops should have become aware they were to be relieved by
Longstreet.
It is certain that owing to this impression,
Wilcox's division, on the right, was not in condition to receive
Hancock's attack at early dawn on the morning of the 6th, by which they were driven back in considerable confusion.
In fact some of the brigades of
Wilcox's division came back in disorder, but sullenly and without panic, entirely across the
Plank road, where
General Lee and the gallant
Hill in person helped to rally them.
The assertion, made by several writers, that
Hill's troops were driven back a mile and a half, is a most serious mistake.
The right of his line was thrown back several hundred yards, but a portion of the troops still maintained their position.
The danger, however, was great, and
General Lee sent his trusted Adjutant,
Colonel W. H. Taylor, back to
Parker's store, to get the trains ready for a movement to the rear.
He sent an aid also to hasten the march of
Longstreet's divisions.
These came the last mile and a half at a double-quick, in parallel columns, along the
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Plank road.
General Longstreet rode forward with that imperturable coolness which always characterized him in times of perilous action, and began to put them in position on the right and left of the road.
His men came to the front of disordered battle with a steadiness unexampled even among veterans, and with an elan which presaged restoration of our battle and certain victory.
When they arrived, the bullets of the enemy on our right flank had begun to sweep the field in the rear of the artillery pits on the left of the road, where
General Lee was giving directions and assisting
General Hill in rallying and reforming his troops.
It was here that the incident of
Lee's charge with
Gregg's Texas brigade occurred.
The
Texans cheered lustily as their line of battle, coming up in splendid style, passed by
Wilcox's disordered columns, and swept across our artillery pit and its adjacent breast-work.
Much moved by the greeting of these brave men and their magnificent behavior,
General Lee spurred his horse through an opening in the trenches and followed close on their line as it moved rapidly forward.
The men did not perceive that he was going with them until they had advanced some distance in the charge; when they did, there came from the entire line, as it rushed on, the cry, “Go back,
General Lee I go back!”
Some historians like to put this in less homely words; but the brave
Texans did not pick their phrases.
“We won't go on unless you go back!”
A sergeant seized his bridle rein.
The gallant
General Gregg (who laid down his life on the 9th October, almost in
General Lee's presence, in a desperate charge of his brigade on the enemy's lines in the rear of
Fort Harrison), turning his horse towards
General Lee, remonstrated with him. Just then I called his attention to
General Longstreet, whom he had been seeking, and who sat on his horse on a knoll to the right of the
Texans, directing the attack of his divisions.
He yielded with evident reluctance to the entreaties of his men, and rode up to
Longstreet's position.
With the first opportunity I informed
General Longstreet of what had just happened, and he, with affectionate bluntness, urged
General Lee to go farther back.
I need not say the
Texans went forward in their charge and did well their duty.
They were eight hundred strong, and lost half their number killed and wounded on that bloody day. The battle was soon restored, and the enemy driven back to their position of the night before.
