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from bayonets.
The Sixty-third had been thoroughly drilled in the bayonet exercise, and they made splendid use of their knowledge on this occasion.
One little Irishman encountered a tall, stout Federal soldier, who seized his gun by the barrel.
The two had quite a struggle for the prize, when Pat, perceiving that the Federal soldier was about to get the best of him, with the exclamation, ‘To hell with you and the gun!’
gave his opponent a sudden shove which threw him to the ground, and then taking to his heels made his escape.
Lieutenant Polhill escaped capture by shooting one of his enemies, bringing another down with his sword, and thrusting a third out of his way. His clothing was riddled, but he came off unscathed.
On the evening before, the Sixty-third regiment had been posted in the rifle-pits, about 40 men of the ‘Oglethorpes’ had been kept in reserve in a little ravine, and when the skirmish line was broken, next morning this reserve force charged and retook the rifle-pits and fought from them until Lieutenant McLaughlin gave the timely order for every man to escape as best he could.
In this charge and retreat the company had 2 killed and 2 wounded (2 fatally), while 9 were cut off in an angle of the works and captured.
A little more than a third of them reached unharmed the brow of the hill, along which the Sixty-third halted and renewed the fight.
This position was held throughout the day, assisted by the furious fire from French's guns on Kenesaw, which stopped the enemy before he reached Walker's line of battle, and at last drove him back to the edge of the woods.
The Sixty-third was complimented on the next day in general orders by Gen. W. H. T. Walker.
It is impossible to get a statement of the losses of the entire regiment, but Lieut. Walter A. Clark, of Augusta, who was at that time orderly sergeant of Company A, and who still has in his possession the roll of the company with full list of casualties, states that from Dalton to Jonesboro his company
Atlanta, Ga. 1899.
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