Southern Historical Society Papers, Volume 10.
Reverend J. William Jones, Ed.

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[454] accuracy and the weight of this fire may be imagined from a few illustrations. Early in the morning, Captain H. L. King, a gallant aid of General McLaws, while carrying an order to General Cobb, fell dead on this hill, pierced with five balls. A member of the Twenty-fifth North Carolina, who came a little behind his regiment, when descending this slope, fell dead and rolled to the bottom, perfectly riddled by the storm of balls directed at him.

On the left of the Plank-road, where there was but little fire from sharpshooters, Major Latrobe, of General Longstreet's staff, and Lieutenant Landry, of Maurin's battery, removed a gun out of its pit to fire at a body of the enemy standing behind a hill. By the time that three shots could be fired the gun was disabled, and four out of six cannoneers were killed or wounded.

The Third South Carolina, while fighting in front of Marye's house, lost in succession, in a very short while, six commanding officers,¹ and suffered a loss of one hundred and sixty-seven out of four hundred present. On the cessation of this attack the Third South Carolina, which had perhaps been unnecessarily exposed in meeting it, was moved at the suggestion of Colonel Nance (who still lay wounded on the field) to a road a short distance in rear and to the left, where it was able to find shelter and still fire upon the enemy. At the same time the Seventh South Carolina moved to the right, and in front of Marye's house, to the support of the Fifteenth North Carolina. It formed behind a slope, where, in the subsequent fighting, it would load, march in line to the crest, fire, and fall back to reload.

On the repulse of Sturgis's and Getty's divisions, Burnside, who was looking on from the Phillips house, and receiving particulars from his balloonists and couriers, ordered Hooker to cross the river with the Fifth corps, which was still in reserve, and to “carry that crest.” Accordingly the dense columns of this corps, which had heretofore been mere spectators of the stirring scene, now poured down toward the pontoon bridges, while General Hooker in person hurried across to examine the position. On the Confederate side the Fifteenth South Carolina, from the cemetery, and the Sixteenth Georgia, Colonel Bryan (the remaining regiment of Cobb's brigade), joined the force behind the stone wall. There were now eleven regiments in the Telegraph road