A. J. Bennett, private , First Massachusetts Light Battery, The story of the First Massachusetts Light Battery , attached to the Sixth Army Corps : glance at events in the armies of the Potomac and Shenandoah, from the summer of 1861 to the autumn of 1864.

[61] counted upon a demoralization of our troops, as a result of the six days campaign just concluded. Perhaps he was forced to make a concession to generals and troops who, flushed with the victory at Gaines' Farm, burned to wipe out the defeat sustained yesterday and the day before.

The condition of our company guns, owing to the undue enlargement of the vents by the melting of the rims, was such the morning after the affair at Charles City Cross Roads, as to render them temporarily unserviceable. Nevertheless, though relieved about noon from the position occupied since morning, our command was again in the afternoon placed in position farther on the right. While marching in column along the brow of Malvern Hill, toward the right and rear of our line, the enemy fired at us from the lower ridge before alluded to, their shots passing harmlessly over our heads, and beyond us. This did not provoke any return from the Federal batteries which we were passing.

While we were reaching this position in the afternoon, July I, 1862, the French princes were flitting down the river, having taken abrupt leave of Gen. McClellan, on whose staff they had served during the campaign which was drawing to a close. Having come hither to pursue a full course as students of military science and art, they seem to have contented themselves with a single term's instruction.

The battle of Malvern Hill was peculiarly illustrative of the superior advantage which that one of two equally brave and ably commanded armies possesses, even if numerically inferior, which acts upon the defensive; and this advantage is enhanced in proportion to the natural strength of the position assailed.

The left and centre of our line was on Malvern Hill, with part of a division in the low ground to the left of the eminence, watching the road to Richmond. The right was along a line of ridges, to the east, bending back toward the river. Before this part of the line, timber was felled and the roads were blocked. It is said that, when at four o'clock the attack was made upon our lines, Jackson, with the divisions of D. H. Hill, Whiting, and Ewell, in the order named, struck our right, weakest in its natural defences, while Longstreet, A. P. Hill, and Magruder essayed to storm and carry the hill held by our left. Till half-past 5, the Confederates, with characteristic ardor and stubbornness, advanced by regiment