up the bluff and into the wood again, we would melt away
as soon as they turned their heads. Or maybe they figured being scared was
catching and they didn’t want us up there spreading it amongst the men who had held.
But there was one fellow who didn’t feel that way about it.
He was a chaplain, tall and raw-boned, and he ranted at us in a hard New
England voice. You’d have thought he was back in the pulpit, the way he ranted.
He stood in the middle of the road, halfway up the bluff, waving his arms at a
group of men who sat on the sand and watched him with leers on their faces.
Then the head of a column of Buell's men off the steamboat came up to where he
was.
"Rally for God and country!" he was saying.
"Oh rally round the flag!"
He was square in the middle of the road, blocking it and
calling the skulkers to rally oh rally, when the colonel heading the column
came up behind him.
"Shut up, you goddam old fool," the colonel said.
"Get out the way!"
And the column brushed him aside and went up the bluff while
the group of skulkers sat there laughing at the parson and calling him to rally
oh rally, rally. They whistled and hooted at him till he stomped off fuming mad
and didn’t come back.
Night was closing in, first a blue dusk darkening, then just
blackness, the big stretch of sky across the river sprinkled with stars winking
at us through rifts in the smoke blown back from the battlefield. The firing
had died to occasional sputters, sounding dull in the darkness, but every ten
or fifteen minutes the gunboats would throw two shells up over the bluff. They
went past with a noise like freight cars in the night, their fuzes drawing long curved lines across the sky. The
explosions sounded faint and far in the woods above, the way it is back home
when a farmer two fields off is blowing stumps.
Torches were burning down by the Landing where Buell's men
were still unloading. They came up the bluff in a steady column, cheering with
hoarse voices when they reached the top. Nobody hooted at them now. We just sat
there watching them. Their faces looked strange in the torchlight, eyes glinting
out of hollow sockets, teeth flashing white against mouths like deep black
holes when they cheered. From sundown until the stars burned clear with no
smoke to fog them, Buell's men went on unloading and marching up that steep
road to the woods above. When they reached the overlook, they would put their
caps on the tips of their bayonets and raise them, cheering. Out over the water
we heard the voices of the sailors as they took the steamboats across again,
going back for more.
Then the stars went out and the sky across the river was
only blackness. There began to be a sound of sighing in the air—the wind was
rising. Then the rain came. First it was only a patter, little gusts of it as
if somebody up on the bluff was dropping handfuls of birdshot down on us. Then
the wind died; the rain turned to a steady, fine drizzle almost like mist. You
could see it against the torches, falling slantwise on the men marching up the
slope and the retreaters huddled on the sand with their faces to the bluff and
their backs to the rain.
Sitting there getting wetter and wetter I began to think
about the long day that was past. I saw it from then to now; I went back over
it, beginning with three o’clock in the morning when I lay warm in my blankets
and heard the infantry going out, then back to sleep again and the long roll
sounding and we stood to the guns, anxious for the johnnies to come because we
still didn’t know what it was going to be like. I saw Captain Munch getting
bowled over by a cannon-ball. I looked at myself in my mind, watching myself as
if I was another person—God, maybe—looking down and seeing Otto Flickner
fighting the rebels on Shiloh battlefield.
He did all right, considering. He was scared from time to
time, no different from the others, but he did all right until word came down
to retreat from the sunken road. That
as soon as they turned their heads. Or maybe they figured being scared was
catching and they didn’t want us up there spreading it amongst the men who had held.
But there was one fellow who didn’t feel that way about it.
He was a chaplain, tall and raw-boned, and he ranted at us in a hard New
England voice. You’d have thought he was back in the pulpit, the way he ranted.
He stood in the middle of the road, halfway up the bluff, waving his arms at a
group of men who sat on the sand and watched him with leers on their faces.
Then the head of a column of Buell's men off the steamboat came up to where he
was.
"Rally for God and country!" he was saying.
"Oh rally round the flag!"
He was square in the middle of the road, blocking it and
calling the skulkers to rally oh rally, when the colonel heading the column
came up behind him.
"Shut up, you goddam old fool," the colonel said.
"Get out the way!"
And the column brushed him aside and went up the bluff while
the group of skulkers sat there laughing at the parson and calling him to rally
oh rally, rally. They whistled and hooted at him till he stomped off fuming mad
and didn’t come back.
Night was closing in, first a blue dusk darkening, then just
blackness, the big stretch of sky across the river sprinkled with stars winking
at us through rifts in the smoke blown back from the battlefield. The firing
had died to occasional sputters, sounding dull in the darkness, but every ten
or fifteen minutes the gunboats would throw two shells up over the bluff. They
went past with a noise like freight cars in the night, their fuzes drawing long curved lines across the sky. The
explosions sounded faint and far in the woods above, the way it is back home
when a farmer two fields off is blowing stumps.
Torches were burning down by the Landing where Buell's men
were still unloading. They came up the bluff in a steady column, cheering with
hoarse voices when they reached the top. Nobody hooted at them now. We just sat
there watching them. Their faces looked strange in the torchlight, eyes glinting
out of hollow sockets, teeth flashing white against mouths like deep black
holes when they cheered. From sundown until the stars burned clear with no
smoke to fog them, Buell's men went on unloading and marching up that steep
road to the woods above. When they reached the overlook, they would put their
caps on the tips of their bayonets and raise them, cheering. Out over the water
we heard the voices of the sailors as they took the steamboats across again,
going back for more.
Then the stars went out and the sky across the river was
only blackness. There began to be a sound of sighing in the air—the wind was
rising. Then the rain came. First it was only a patter, little gusts of it as
if somebody up on the bluff was dropping handfuls of birdshot down on us. Then
the wind died; the rain turned to a steady, fine drizzle almost like mist. You
could see it against the torches, falling slantwise on the men marching up the
slope and the retreaters huddled on the sand with their faces to the bluff and
their backs to the rain.
Sitting there getting wetter and wetter I began to think
about the long day that was past. I saw it from then to now; I went back over
it, beginning with three o’clock in the morning when I lay warm in my blankets
and heard the infantry going out, then back to sleep again and the long roll
sounding and we stood to the guns, anxious for the johnnies to come because we
still didn’t know what it was going to be like. I saw Captain Munch getting
bowled over by a cannon-ball. I looked at myself in my mind, watching myself as
if I was another person—God, maybe—looking down and seeing Otto Flickner
fighting the rebels on Shiloh battlefield.
He did all right, considering. He was scared from time to
time, no different from the others, but he did all right until word came down
to retreat from the sunken road. That
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