river unless something could be done to hold them back. As the general
looked silently down the road, he saw near to him Major Keenan of the
Pennsylvania cavalry. Keenan had been a porter in a Philadelphia store,
but his rare faculty for handling men and horses had made him one of
the most efficient cavalry officers of any Pennsylvania regiment. The
three companies which were with him were all the cavalry that
Pleasonton had. They were bringing up the rear of the retreat like a
pack of wolves who, though driven back from their prey, move off
sullenly only waiting for the signal from their leader to turn again
and fight. General Pleasonton had rallied his gunners and they would
stand if only they had a chance. There was no hope of bringing any
order into the mass of broken, terrified infantry rushing on toward the
river.

"Major Keenan," shouted General Pleasonton, "how many men have you
got?"

"Three hundred, General," replied Keenan, quietly.

"Major," said the general, low and earnestly, riding up to him, "we
must have ten minutes to save the Army of the Potomac. Charge the
Confederate advance and hold them!"

Keenan never hesitated. When the Six Hundred charged at Balaclava, some
of them came back from the bite of the Russian sabres and the roar of
the Muscovite guns. When Pickett made that desperate, fatal charge at
Gettysburg, there was still a chance to retreat, but Major Keenan knew
that when three hundred cavalry met the fixed bayonets of thirty
thousand infantry on a narrow road, not one would ever return. It was
not a splendid charge which might mean laurels of victory, but a
hopeless going to death, the buying of ten minutes of time with the
lives of three hundred men, yet neither Keenan nor his men questioned
the price nor flinched at the order.

The sunlight of the last day he was to see on earth caught the gleam of
his uplifted sabre as he gave the quick, sharp command to charge. He
flung his cap into the bushes, bent his head and rode bareheaded in
front of his flying column and then like an avalanche, like a hurricane
of horse, he and his three hundred men thundered down the narrow road.
Just around the curve, with a crash that broke the necks of a score of
the leading horses, this charging column hurled themselves against the
astonished, packed ranks of infantry rushing on with fixed bayonets.
For five, for ten, for fifteen minutes horses rose and fell to the
clashing of dripping sabres and the bark of revolvers thrust into the
faces of the oncoming foemen. For fifteen long minutes there was a
swirl and a flurry which held back the head of the charging forces and
then shattered by volley after volley of musketry and pierced by
thousands of charging bayonets, horse and men alike went down. Not one
ever came back. Keenan and his Three Hundred had bought the ten minutes
and had thrown in five more for good measure and the price was paid.
The head of the Confederate column reformed, passed over and by the
struggling horses and the silent, mangled men and then again swept on
around the bend and down the road toward the fords crowded with a
hundred thousand helpless, escaping soldiers. General Pleasonton,
however, had made good use of those precious moments. As the
Confederate column came around the curve, they were met by a hell of
grape and canister from the batteries which at last had been mounted in
position. Right into their front roared the guns and the road was a
shamble of writhing, struggling, dying men. No army ever marched that
could stand up against the grim storm of death that swept down that
road and in a moment the Confederate forces broke and rushed back for
shelter. The Army of the Potomac was saved. Bought at a great price, it
was yet to be hammered and forged and welded under a great leader into
the sword which was to save the Union.

    "Year after year, the pine cones fall,
      And the whippoorwill lisps her spectral call.
    They have ceased, but their glory will never cease,
      Nor their light be quenched in the light of peace.
    The rush of the charge is sounding still,
      That saved the Army at Chancellorsville."

CHAPTER XIV

THE RESCUE OF THE SCOUTS

The man who will risk his life for his friends, the leader who never
deserts his band, the soldier who will not escape alone, these are the
men whom history has always hailed as heroes. Some of the greatest
stories of devotion and courage have been those which chronicle the
rescue of men from almost certain death. Courage and devotion have
often opened the dark doors of dungeons, stricken the fetters from
despairing prisoners and saved men doomed to death from the stake, the
block and the gallows.

When the Civil War broke out, the lot of the few Union men left in the
South was a hard one. The fierce passions of those days ran so high
that not only was a Unionist himself liable to death and the
confiscation of his property, but even his family were not safe. In
1863 there was a Georgian who assumed the name of William Morford in
order to protect those of his family who lived in Georgia from the
bitter hatred which his services for the Union had aroused. He was one
of many devoted scouts who worked secretly and single-handed for their
country, claiming no reward if they won and losing their lives on the
gallows if they lost. Morford throughout 1863 was attached to the
command of General Rosecrans and performed many a feat during that
stormy year. It was Morford who burned an important bridge under the
very eyes of a Confederate regiment sent to guard it and who, when the
light from the flames made escape impossible, coolly mingled with the
guards and actually received their congratulations for his bravery in
attempting to put out the fire which he himself had lighted. It was
Morford who single-handed captured a Confederate colonel while he was
sleeping in a house surrounded by his regiment and with his staff in
the next room. Morford obtained access to him under pretense of bearing
an important oral dispatch from General Beauregard himself. They were
left alone with an armed sentry just outside the half-opened door.
Stepping to one side so that he could not be seen by the guard, Morford
suddenly placed a cocked revolver close against the substantial stomach
of the colonel.

"I have been sent, Colonel," he muttered sternly, "to either capture or
kill you. I would rather capture you, for if I kill you I shall have to
fight my way out, but it is for you to say which it shall be."

The colonel was a brave officer, but a cocked revolver against one's
stomach is discouraging even for a hero. He decided instantly that he
much preferred being a prisoner to being a corpse and said as much to
Morford.

"Well," said the latter, still in a tone so low that the sentry could
not make out the words, "I'm glad you feel that way. Get your hat and
tell the guard that you're going to take me out for a talk with some of
the other officers. I'll be right behind you with this revolver in my
sleeve and if anything goes wrong, two bullets will go through the
small of your back."

With this stimulant, the colonel arranged matters entirely to the
scout's satisfaction. He led the way out of the house and through the
lines, giving the countersign himself, in a somewhat shaky voice, and
in a short time the two found themselves within the Union lines.

"I hope I didn't startle you too much, Colonel," said Morford, as he
turned his prisoner over to the guard. "You weren't in any danger, for
my revolver wasn't loaded. I didn't find it out until just as I got to
your lines and I figured out that I probably wouldn't have to shoot
anyway."

As this is a book for good boys and girls, it would not be proper to
set down the colonel's language as he looked at the empty chambers of
Morford's revolver.

Another time the scout was sent by General Rosecrans to find out
whether certain steamboats were on the Hiawassee and if so, where they
were located. On this trip he climbed Cumberland Mountain and on
looking down over the famous Cumberland Gap, he discovered a force of
Confederates who were busily engaged in fortifying the Gap so as to
prevent any federal troops from passing through it. The force consisted
of twenty soldiers and forty or fifty negroes who were doing the work.
Morford made up his mind that it was his business as a Union scout to
stop all such work. Standing out in full sight of the troop, he fired
his revolver at the officer in command. The shot killed the leader's
horse, and horse and man pitched over into the little troop throwing it
into confusion. Morford at once fired a second time and then turning,
waved his hand to an imaginary aide and shouted so that the
Confederates could hear:

"Run back and tell the regiment to hurry up."

He then turned to the opposite ridge and shouted across the Gap to
another imaginary force:

"Lead your men down that path and close in on 'em. Hurry up. My men
will come from this side and we'll beat you down."

By this time the Confederate officer was on his feet again and started
to rally his men. Morford made a rush toward them, firing his revolver
as he came, waving his arms in both directions, shouting to his
imaginary forces and bellowing at the top of his tremendous
voice--"Come on, boys, we've got them now. Surround 'em. Don't let a
man escape!"

The negro workmen felt that this was no place for neutrals and they
dropped their shovels and made a rush for the mouth of the Gap. The
Confederate soldiers stood for a minute, but as they saw Morford
rushing toward them, they broke and followed the workmen. The scout
chased them until he saw that they were well on their way and then
started back along the ridge chuckling to himself over the way in which
they had scattered. He laughed too soon. The Confederates had not gone
far before they found out the trick which had been played upon them.
They turned back and in a short time fifty men were riding along the
ridge at full speed to capture the Yankee who had fooled them so.
Unfortunately for Morford, he had kept to the path along the ridge
which was better going, but which offered very little chance of escape,
since on one side was a sheer precipice while on the other was a long,
bare slope which offered no place for concealment. From the top of a
little knoll he caught sight of the Confederates before they saw him.
At that time they were only a half mile behind. The scout tried to
escape by running far out on a rocky spur which jutted out over the Gap
and which was filled with trees, hoping that he might dodge in among
these, double on his pursuers and so get away. The same officer,
however, whom he had unhorsed caught sight of him as he ran from one
tree to another and with a tremendous shout, the whole band galloped
after him at full speed. Morford had hoped that as the way led up a
steep hill covered with rocks, his pursuers would have to dismount, but
they were riding horses which had been bred in the mountains and which
were trained to go up and down hill-paths like goats. They gained on
him fast. Spreading out they cut off every chance of his escaping back
to the slope or skirting their ranks. There was nothing left for him to
do except to go on and on to the very edge of the precipice. The scout
knew that if he were caught he would be hung on the nearest tree and
that knowledge was a considerable incentive to keep ahead of his
pursuers as long as possible. He ran as he had never run before and as
he could follow paths too narrow for the horses, for a while he managed
to hold his lead. He could see, however, that some of the band had
ridden around the slope and held the whole base of the spur so that it
would be only a question of time before he would be hunted out and
caught. He was running now along the very edge of the precipice which
dropped six hundred feet to the rocks below. The gorge narrowed until
finally at one point it was not more than twenty feet wide. This was
too wide, however, for the scout to clear, even if he were not wearing
heavy boots and carrying a rifle. Several feet below where he stood, on
the opposite shelf a hickory tree had grown out so that some of the
branches extended within ten feet of his side of the gorge. Below that
tree was a fissure through the rock down which a desperate man might
possibly clamber. It was a slight chance, but the only one which he
had. At this point he was hidden from the Confederates by a wall of
rock. Without allowing himself to stop, for fear that he would lose his
nerve, Morford took a run and launched himself through the air ten feet
out and ten feet down against the spreading boughs of the hickory tree.
He broke through them with a rush but wound his arms desperately around
the bending limbs and though they bent and cracked, the tough wood held
and he found himself firmly hugging the shaggy bark of the trunk with
all his might. He slid down, ripping his clothes and skin, until
finally his feet touched the beginning of a possible path down to the
gorge. He could hear the shouts of his pursuers only a few rods away.
If they had gone to the edge, nothing could have saved him, as they
would have shot him down before he could have escaped, but they beat
carefully through the trees and rocks for fear lest he should crawl
back through their line. Without stopping to weigh his chances, Morford
let himself drop from one shelf of rock to another, clinging to every
little crevice and every twig and plant which he could find. Several
times he thought he was gone as his feet swung off into the space
below, but always he managed to get a hand-grip on some rock which
held, and almost before he realized the terrible chance he had taken,
he had passed down the side of the cliff and was safe around a bend in
the rock which hid him from view. From there the path was easier and in
a short time he found himself in the gorge far below. There he crawled
carefully along behind rocks and took advantage of every bit of cover
and in a few minutes was far on his way, leaving the Confederates to
hunt for hours every square yard of ground on the rocky promontory
whence he had come.

This was but one of many similar adventures which made the name of
Morford feared and hated through the Confederate states. The most
desperate as well as the most generous of his many exploits was his
rescue of three fellow-scouts who were held in jail at Harrison,
Tennessee, and were to be shot on May 1st. Morford was then in
Chattanooga and there heard of the capture of these scouts. Chattanooga
at that time was a Confederate town, although it had a number of Union
residents. There did not seem to be any chance of rescuing the
condemned men, yet from the minute that Morford heard that these scouts
were facing death, as he had so often faced it, he made up his mind
that he would rescue them if he had to do it alone.

Morford's mother's name was Kinmont and her earliest ancestor had been
Kinmont Willie, celebrated in the border-wars between England and
Scotland in the latter part of the sixteenth century. Many and many a
time had she sung to him as a child an old Scotch ballad handed down
for centuries through the family, which told of the rescue of this
far-away ancestor by his leader on the night before the day fixed for
his execution. In 1596 Salkeld was the deputy of Lord Scroope, the
English warden of the West Marches, while the Laird of Buccleuch, the
keeper of Liddesdale, guarded the Scotch border. In that year these two
held meetings on the border-line of the kingdoms according to the
custom of the time for the purpose of arranging differences and
settling disputes. On these occasions a truce was always proclaimed
from the day of the meeting until the next day at sunrise. Kinmont
Willie was a follower of the Laird of Buccleuch and was hated by the
Englishmen for many a deed of arms in the numerous border-raids of
those times. After the conference he was returning home attended by
only three or four friends when he was taken prisoner by a couple of
hundred Englishmen and in spite of the truce lodged in the grim Castle
of Carlisle. The Laird of Buccleuch tried first to free him by applying
to the English warden and even to the Scotch embassador, but got no
satisfaction from either and when at last he heard that his retainer
was to be hung three days later, he took the matter into his own hands,
gathered together two hundred of his men, surprised the Castle of
Carlisle and rescued Kinmont Willie by force of arms. The story of this
rescue is told in one of the best as well as one of the least-known of
the Scotch ballads, "Kinmont Willie," the verses of which run as
follows:

    O have ye na heard o' the fause Sakelde?
      O have ye na heard o' the keen Lord Scroope?
    How they hae ta'en bauld Kinmont Willie,
      On Haribee to hang him up?

    They band his legs beneath the steed,
      They tied his hands behind his back;
    They guarded him, fivesome on each side,
      And they brought him over the Liddel-rack.

    Now word is gane to the bauld Keeper,
      In Branksome Ha' where that he lay,
    That Lord Scroope has ta'en the Kinmont Willie,
      Between the hours of night and day.

    He has ta'en the table wi' his hand,
      He garr'd the red wine spring on hie--
    "Now Christ's curse on my head," he said,
      "But avenged of Lord Scroope I'll be!

    "O were there war between the lands,
      As well I wot that there is none,
    I would slight Carlisle castell high,
      Though it were builded of marble stone.

    "I would set that castell in a low,
      And sloken it with English blood!
    There's never a man in Cumberland,
      Should ken where Carlisle castell stood.

    "But since nae war's between the lands,
      And there is peace, and peace should be;
    I'll neither harm English lad or lass,
      And yet the Kinmont freed shall be!"

    He has call'd him forty Marchmen bauld,
      Were kinsmen to the bauld Buccleuch;
    With spur on heel, and splent on spauld,
      And gleuves of green, and feathers blue.

    And as we cross'd the Bateable Land,
      When to the English side we held,
    The first o'men that we met wi',
      Whae sould it be but fause Sakelde?

    "Where be ye gaun, ye hunters keen?"
      Quo' fause Sakelde; "come tell to me!"
    "We go to hunt an English stag,
      Has trespass'd on the Scots countrie."

    "Where be ye gaun, ye marshal men?"
      Quo' fause Sakelde; "come tell me true!"
    "We go to catch a rank reiver,
      Has broken faith wi' the bauld Buccleuch."

    "Where are ye gaun, ye mason lads,
      Wi' a' your ladders lang and hie?"
    "We gang to berry a corbie's nest,
      That wons not far frae Woodhouselee."

    "Where be ye gaun, ye broken men?"
      Quo' fause Sakelde; "come tell to me!"
    Now Dickie of Dryhope led that band,
      And the nevir a word of lear had he.

    "Why trespass ye on the English side?
      Row-footed outlaws, stand!" quo' he;
    The nevir a word had Dickie to say,
      Sae he thrust the lance through his fause bodie.

    And when we left the Staneshaw-bank,
      The wind began full loud to blaw;
    But 'twas wind and weet, and fire and sleet,
      When we came beneath the castle wa'.

    We crept on knees, and held our breath,
      Till we placed the ladders against the wa';
    And sae ready was Buccleuch himsell
      To mount the first before us a'.

    He has ta'en the watchman by the throat,
      He flung him down upon the lead--
    Had there not been peace between our lands,
      Upon the other side thou hadst gaed!

    "Now sound out, trumpets!" quo' Buccleuch;
      "Let's waken Lord Scroope right merrilie!"
    Then loud the warden's trumpet blew--
      "O wha dare meddle wi' me?"

    Then speedilie to work we gaed,
      And raised the slogan ane and a',
    And cut a hole through a sheet of lead,
      And so we wan to the castle ha'.

    They thought King James and a' his men
      Had won the house wi' bow and spear;
    It was but twenty Scots and ten,
      That put a thousand in sic' a stear!

    Wi' coulters, and wi' forehammers,
      We garr'd the bars bang merrilie,
    Until we came to the inner prison,
      Where Willie o' Kinmont he did lie.

    And when we cam to the lower prison,
      Where Willie o' Kinmont he did lie--
    "O sleep ye, wake ye, Kinmont Willie,
      Upon the morn that thou's to die?"

    "O I sleep saft, and I wake aft,
      It's lang since sleeping was fley'd frae me;
    Gie my service back to my wife and bairns,
      And a' gude fellows that spier for me."

    Then Red Rowan has hente him up,
      The starkest man in Teviotdale--
    "Abide, abide now, Red Rowan,
      Till of my Lord Scroope I take farewell."

    "Farewell, farewell, my gude Lord Scroope!
      My gude Lord Scroope, farewell!" he cried--
    "I'll pay you for my lodging maill,
      When first we meet on the Border side."

    Then shoulder high, with shout and cry,
      We bore him down the ladder lang;
    At every stride Red Rowan made,
      I wot the Kinmont's airns play'd clang.

    "O mony a time," quo' Kinmont Willie,
      "I have ridden horse baith wild and wood;
    But a rougher beast than Red Rowan
      I ween my legs have ne'er bestrode."

    "And mony a time," quo' Kinmont Willie,
      "I've prick'd a horse out oure the furs;
    But since the day I back'd a steed,
      I never wore sic cumbrous spurs."

    We scarce had won the Staneshaw-bank,
      When a' the Carlisle bells were rung,
    And a thousand men on horse and foot
      Cam wi' the keen Lord Scroope along.

    Buccleuch has turn'd to Eden Water,
      Even where it flow'd frae bank to brim,
    And he has plunged in wi' a' his band,
      And safely swam them through the strem.

    He turn'd him on the other side,
      And at Lord Scroope his glove flung he--
    "If ye like na my visit in merry England,
      In fair Scotland come visit me!"

    "All sore astonish'd stood Lord Scroope,
      He stood as still as rock of stane;
    He scarcely dared to trew his eyes,
      When through the water they had gone.

    "He is either himsell a devil fra hell,
      Or else his mother a witch maun be;
    I wadna have ridden that wan water,
      For a' the gowd in Christentie."

The memory of that brave rescue nearly three hundred years before, as
the scout afterward told his friends, was what inspired him to save his
fellow-scouts as Buccleuch had saved the first William Kinmont. By
saving the lives of these three men he would pay with interest for the
life of his ancestor. Shakespeare writes somewhere that the good which
men do is oft buried with their bones, but that their evil deeds live
on forever. No more mistaken lines have ever been written. Evil brings
about its own death. No good deed is ever forgotten or ever buried.
Hundreds of years later it may flash out through the dust of centuries
and light the path of high endeavor.

Morford scoured Chattanooga and finally found nine men who were ready
to go with him and try to rescue the condemned scouts. Leaving
Chattanooga they traveled by night and hid by day in caves and thickets
among the mountains. Occasionally they would meet or get word from men
whom they knew to be Union sympathizers. Finally they hid on the top of
Bear Mountain which towered above the river and which separated them
from Harrison where was located the jail. Although they had traveled
fast and far they were only just in time. The second noon after the
night when they reached the mountain had been fixed for the execution.
On Bear Mountain they hid in a cave which Morford himself had
discovered when hunting there many years before. It could only be
reached by a narrow path which ran along a shelf of rock which jutted
out over a precipice three hundred feet deep. The path turned sharply
and led under an enormous overhanging ledge and ended in a deep cave
with a little mountain spring bubbling up on a mossy slope only ten
feet wide which led up to the cave's entrance. Inside was a dry, high
cavern large enough to hold fifty men. It could not be reached from
above by reason of the over-hanging ledge. At that point the path
stopped and where the slope ended was a sheer drop to the rocks below
which extended around the farther side of the slope so that the only
entrance was around the path's bend along which only one man could pass
at a time. Morford reached the foot of Bear Mountain just at sunset and
led his little band up the steep side by a winding deer-path, the
entrance to which was concealed in a tangled thicket of green briar and
could only be reached by crawling underneath the sharp thorns like
snakes. The path to the cave was no place for a man with weak nerves.
It was bad enough as it skirted the precipice, but where it took a
sharp bend around the jutting point of rock, it narrowed to nothing
more than a foothold not three inches wide. He who would pass into the
cave must turn with his back to the precipice and edge his way with
arms outstretched along the smooth face of the rock for nearly ten
feet. The point at the turn was the worst. There it was necessary to
take one foot off the ledge and grope for a tiny foothold below the
path while one shuffled around the curve. It was not absolutely
necessary for Morford and his men to spend the night in this cave.
There were other places where they could have stayed in safety, as no
one suspected their presence. Morford, however, had made up his mind to
choose his men with the utmost care. It was necessary in order to save
the lives of the three condemned scouts to pass through the camp of the
soldiers and the ring of guards encircling the jail, break open the
jail, rescue the prisoners and break out again. It was a desperate
chance and Morford's only hope of success was to have men who would
show absolute coolness and daring throughout the whole adventure. The
nine men whom he had selected all bore a high reputation for courage,
but Morford decided like Gideon of old to cut out every factor of
weakness and leave only the picked men. When Gideon was chosen of God
to rescue the children of Israel from the unnumbered host of Midianites
and Amalekites and the other Bedouin hordes of the desert which were
encamped in the great valley that lay at the hill of Moreh, he started
with a force of thirty-two thousand. When this army looked down upon
the innumerable hosts of the fierce desert warriors, it began to weaken
and Gideon sent back twenty-two thousand soldiers who had showed signs
of fear. The night before the day fixed for battle, Gideon decided to
select from this ten thousand a picked band of men who would be not
only brave, but watchful and ready for any emergency. As his army
swarmed down to the water-hole Gideon watched the men as they drank.
They had kept watch and ward on that bare sun-smitten mountain top all
through the long, hot day. As they came to the water some of the
thirsty men dashed forward out of the ranks and fell on their faces and
lapped the water like dogs without a thought that there might be an
ambush at the ford and without a care that they were lying absolutely
defenseless before any enemy who might attack them. Others kneeled on
their hands and knees and drank. Of the ten thousand only three hundred
had bravery and self-control enough to maintain the discipline of a
vigilant army. Without laying down their weapons they drank as a deer
drinks, watching on every side for fear of a surprise. With one hand
they scooped up the water, in the other they held fast their weapon. It
was slower, but it was safer. These three hundred men Gideon chose for
that band which for three thousand years has been the symbol of bravery
and watchfulness. With this little force just before dawn he burst down
upon the sleeping Midianites which were as the sand by the sea for
multitude. The three hundred were divided into three companies. Each
man carried a sword, a trumpet, and an earthenware pitcher with a
lighted lamp inside. From three separate directions they rushed down
upon the sleeping foe and sounded the trumpets and brake the pitchers
and held the flashing lamps on high and then shouting as their
watchword, "The Sword of the Lord and of Gideon," they burst into the
great camp of the invaders. Roused from sleep, hearing the trumpet
notes and the crash of the breaking pitchers and seeing the flash of
lights from all sides and mighty voices shouting the fierce slogan, the
Midianites scattered like sheep and all that great host ran and cried
and fled and every man's sword was against his fellow in the darkness,
and when day dawned the ground was covered with dead men, the camp was
abandoned and nothing was left of that mighty army but a fringe of
fugitives scattered in every direction.

It may be that some such test was in Morford's mind as the little band
of nine scaled the heights of Bear Mountain. At any rate as they
approached the precipice-path he halted them.

"Boys," he said, "I got word this afternoon that these scouts have only
thirty-six hours to live unless we save them. The guards have been
doubled. It's going to be a desperate chance to get to them and none of
us may ever come back. Now if any of you fellows want to quit, the time
to do it is now rather than later. I'm going to lead the way along the
path which we used to say was the best nerve-tonic in this county. If
any of you fellows get discouraged and don't want to make the last turn
past old Double-Trouble, why back out, go over the top of the mountain
and down the other side. You know your way home and you've got
provisions enough to last for the trip. Only travel fast, for those of
us who are left are going to come right over the top of this mountain
on the run with those scouts--if we save 'em."

With this characteristic oration, Morford started along the path, first
tightening his heavy revolver belt so that it might not swing out and
over-balance him at the critical moment. He was instantly followed by
six others, quiet, self-contained men who like him had taken up
scouting as the best way of showing their devotion to the Union. The
other three hesitated a moment, looked at each other shamefacedly and
then slowly followed along the dangerous route. As Morford reached
Double-Trouble, he stopped and in a low voice told the next man how to
put one foot out into space and search for the little foothold which
jutted out below the main path and then how to swing around that
desperate curve. Slowly and with infinite caution each one of the six
followed their leader and found himself safe on the slope of the cave.
The seventh man listened carefully to the instructions of the man
before him as to how he should round the curve and gave a gasp of
horror when he found that he must balance himself on one foot on a
three-inch ledge while the other was in mid-air.

"Tell General Morford," he finally said, "that I ain't no tight-rope
walker. I draw the line at holdin' on like a fly, head downward over
this old precipice. Anyway I don't think there's any chance to do
anything and I'm goin' home."

He seemed to have voiced the exact sentiments of the other two who had
sidled up and with out-stretched necks were examining in the faint
light the curve around Double-Trouble. The last man spent no time in
any argument.

"Good-bye, General," he called in a low voice. "Go as far as you
like--but go without me."

That was the last Morford and the other six ever saw of those men. They
reached home in safety after some days of wandering, but decided to
choose another territory where the scouting would not be quite so
strenuous. Morford and his men made themselves comfortable that night.
They drank deep from the spring and then had a much-needed scrub. After
a hearty meal they turned in and slept like dead men through the next
day on the crisp springy moss, first rolling a big boulder against the
side of Double-Trouble so that no one could pass.

Late the next afternoon they awoke and found that the path was not so
bad the second time as it had been the first. Down the mountainside by
the same concealed route they marched in single file and just at dark
crossed the river and entered the little village of Harrison. There
they were met by an old man with whom Morford had previously
communicated. He had obtained by strategy the countersign which would
take them through the soldiers, the guards and to the very entrance of
the jail itself. Curiously enough, some Confederate officer had fixed
as the countersign that very one with which Gideon had conquered so
many years ago. "The Sword of Gideon" was the open sesame which would
take them past the guards and unlock the gates which ringed about the
doomed men. Morford accepted it as a good omen. The night before he had
told his companions the old story of Gideon's test and it came to them
all as a direct message that God was fighting on their side as he had
fought of old against even greater odds. Morford planned to use
Gideon's tactics. He decided to surprise and confuse his enemy and
escape in the confusion. He tied the hands of two of his band behind
their backs and with the other four marched directly to the Confederate
camp, gave the countersign, and stated that he had prisoners to deliver
to the jail. The sleepy sentry passed him through without any comment
and they marched until they came to the high board fence with a double
row of spikes on top which surrounded the prison-yard. This fence at
one point touched the edge of a marsh filled with rank grass, briars
and tussocks. To this point Morford had gone earlier in the evening and
had bored two auger-holes in one of the boards and then with a small
saw dipped in oil had carefully sawed out one of the old timbers,
leaving a space just large enough to admit of a man passing through.
There was only one entrance to the prison grounds which was through the
main gate besides which night and day sat two guards. Morford rang at
this gate and when it was opened, presented himself with his pretended
prisoners. One of the guards accompanied them to the main jail toward
which Morford marched with his prisoners and two men, leaving the other
two behind with the remaining guard. Morford had no more than passed
around the corner when these two suddenly seized the unsuspecting guard
at the gate, pressed a revolver against his temple and in an instant
gagged him, tied him up hand and foot with rope which they had brought
and started to the jail to assist the others. Usually the jail was only
guarded by the jailer and one deputy or assistant who lived there with
him. To-night, however, there was a death-watch of three extra men
heavily armed stationed around in the corridor in front of the cells of
the condemned men. The jailer opened the door and the sentry who had
accompanied Morford from the gate explained that these were two
prisoners coming under guard from Chattanooga, and Morford and his men
were admitted. Every detail had been planned out ahead and the
prisoners tottered into the corridor in an apparently exhausted
condition and approached the guards who were waiting in front of the
cells, or rather cages, in which were the condemned men. Suddenly just
as the supposed prisoners came close, the ropes dropped off their hands
and each of said hands grasped a particularly dangerous looking
revolver which was aimed directly at the heads of the astonished
guards.

"Sit still," said one of the prisoners, "and keep on sitting still
because I have very nervous fingers and if they twitch, these revolvers
are likely to go off."

The guards followed this advice and in an instant were disarmed and
roped up like the guard at the gate. So far everything had gone like
clockwork according to program. The jailer, however, had yet to be
reckoned with. As he did not seem to be armed, Morford had stepped
forward to assist in disarming the guards when with a tremendous spring
the jailer reached the door, pulled it open and with the same motion
kicked a chair at Morford who had sprung after him. Morford tripped
over the chair and before he could get the door open, the jailer had
cleared the staircase with one jump and was out of the jail, running
toward the entrance. Morford and two others ran after him, but he had
too much of a start and reached the gate fifty yards ahead. This jailer
was cool enough to stop at the gate long enough to pull a knife from
his belt. With this he slashed the ropes of the bound guard, pulled him
to his feet and they both disappeared together through the open gate in
spite of a couple of revolver shots which Morford sent after them. The
latter, however, was prepared for any emergencies. He told off two of
his men to shut and bar the gates and to guard against any attack. Two
others were to run around and around the fence on the inside shouting
and firing as rapidly and as often as their breath and ammunition would
allow. With one companion he returned to the jail and demanded the keys
from the tethered guard.

"The jailer's got them, Captain," said one of the guards; "he always
carries them with him and there isn't a duplicate key in the place."

There was no time to be lost. Already could be heard outside the
Confederate camp the shouts of the officers to the men to fall in. Only
the tremendous turmoil which apparently was going on inside saved the
day for Morford. It would have been an easy thing to force the rickety
old fence at any point or to dash in at the gate if the Confederates
had known how small a force of rescuers there were. They, however,
believed that the jail must have been surprised by some large Union
force and they spent precious time in throwing out skirmishers,
mustering the men and preparing to defend against a flank attack. In
the meantime Morford had rushed into the jailer's room and found lying
there a heavy axe. With this he tried to break into the cells of the
condemned men who were shaking the bars and cheering on their plucky
rescuers. The door of the cell was locked and also barred with heavy
chains. Morford was a man of tremendous strength and swinging the axe,
in a short time he managed to snap the chains apart and smash in the
outer lock and with the aid of an iron bar pried open the door only to
find that there was an inside door with a tremendous lock of wrought
steel against which his axe had absolutely no effect. Time was going.
Already they could hear the shouted commands of the Confederate
officers just outside the fence and Morford expected any moment to see
the door fly in and receive a charge from a couple of hundred armed
men. As he wiped the sweat off his forehead, out of the corner of his
eye he saw one of the guards grinning derisively at him. This was
enough for Morford. Dropping the axe, he cocked his revolver and with
one jump was beside the guard. Placing the cold muzzle of his weapon
against the guard's temple, he ordered him to tell him instantly where
the keys were. There's no case on record where any man stopped laughing
quicker than did that guard.

"I ain't got 'em, Captain," he gasped, "really I ain't."

"I'm going to count ten," said Morford, inflexibly, "and if I don't
hear where those keys are by the time I say ten, I'm going to pull the
trigger of this forty-four. Then I'm going to count ten more and do the
same with the next man and the next. If I can't save these prisoners,
I'm going to leave three guards to go along with them."

Morford got as far as three when the guard, whose voice trembled so
that he could scarcely make himself heard, shouted at the top of his
voice:

"There's a key in the pants-pocket of each one of us."

In spite of the emergency they were facing Morford's men could not help
laughing at the expression on their leader's face as he stood and
stared at the speaker.

"I have a great mind," he said at last, "to shoot you fellows anyway as
a punishment for being such liars and for making me chop up about two
cords of iron bars."

"You wouldn't shoot down prisoners, General," faltered one of the
Confederates.

"No, I wouldn't," said Morford, commencing to grin himself, "but I
ought to."

As he talked he had been fitting the key into the locks and with the
last words the door opened and the condemned scouts were once more free
men. There was not an instant to lose. Already the Confederates were
battering away at the front gate with a great log and a fusillade of
revolver-shots showed that the outer guards were doing all they could
to stand off the attack. It took only a moment to arm the scouts with
the weapons taken from the guards and in a minute the seven men were
out in the prison-yard. Morford himself ran to the gate, stooping in
the darkness to avoid any chance shots that might fly through and
ordered the two guards, who were lying flat on either side of the gate
shooting through the bars at the soldiers outside, to join the others
at the place where the plank had been removed. It took only a minute
for the men to rush across the dark yard and reach the farther corner
of the fence. Morford sent them through the opening one by one. Like
snakes they crept into the tall grass, wormed their way through the
tussocks into the thick marsh beyond and disappeared in the darkness.
They were only just in time. As Morford himself crept through the
opening last the gate crashed in and with a whoop and a yell a file of
infantry poured into the yard. At the same moment another detachment
dashed around on the outside in order to make an entrance at the rear
of the supposed Union forces. Morford had hardly time to dive under the
briars like a rabbit when a company of soldiers reached the opening
through which he had just passed.

"Here's the place, Captain," he heard one of them say in a whisper.
"Here's the place where they broke in."

The Confederate officer hurried his men through the gap, not realizing
that it was really the place where the rescuers had broken out. As the
last man disappeared through the fence, Morford crept on into the
marsh, took the lead of his men and following a little fox-path soon
had them safe on the other side and once again they started for Bear
Mountain. They reached the boat in safety and in a few minutes they
were on the other side of the river. Instead of getting out at the
landing, however, Morford rowed down and made the men get out and make
a distinct trail for a hundred yards or so to a highway which led off
in an opposite direction from the mountain. Then they came back and got
into the boat again while Morford rowed to where an old tree hung clear
out over the water. A few feet from this tree was a stone wall. Morford
instructed his men to swing themselves up through the tree and jump as
far out as possible on the wall and to follow that for a hundred yards
and then spring out from the wall some ten or fifteen feet before
starting for the mountain. When they had all safely reached the wall,
Morford himself climbed into the tree and set the boat adrift and again
took charge of his party. Some of the younger scouts, who had never
been hunted by dogs, were inclined to think that their leader was
unnecessarily cautious. The next morning, however, as they lay safe and
sound on the slope of the cave at the top of Bear Mountain and saw
party after party of soldiers and civilians leading leashed bloodhounds
back and forth along the river-bank, they decided that their captain
knew his business. Their pursuers picked up the trail which was lost
again in the highway and finally decided that the men must have escaped
along the road, although the dogs were, of course, unable to follow it
more than a hundred yards. For three days the scouts lay safe on the
mountainside and rested up for their long trip north. Several times
parties went up and down Bear Mountain, but fortunately did not find
the hidden deer-path nor was Morford called upon to stand siege behind
old Double-Trouble. When the pursuit was finally given up and the
soldiers all seemed to be safe back in camp, Morford led his little
troop out and following the same secret paths by which they had come,
landed them all with the Union forces at Murfreesboro.

So ended one of the many brave deeds of a forgotten hero.

CHAPTER XV

THE BOY-GENERAL

Boys are apt to think that they must wait until they are men before
they can claim the great rewards which life holds in store for all of
us. History shows that courage, high endeavor, concentration and the
sacrifice of self will give the prizes of a high calling to boys as
well as to men. One is never too young or too old to seek and find and
seize opportunity. Alexander Hamilton was only a boy when in New York
at the outbreak of the Revolution, white-hot with indignation and
patriotic zeal, he climbed up on a railing and in an impassioned speech
to a great crowd which had collected, put himself at once in the
forefront along with Patrick Henry, Samuel Adams, John Otis and other
patriots who were to be the leaders of a new nation. David was only a
boy of seventeen when he was sent to take provisions to his brethren in
the army of the Israelites then encamped on the heights around the
great battle-valley of Elah. There he heard the fierce giant-warrior of
a lost race challenge the discouraged army. By being brave and ready
enough to seize the opportunity which thousands of other men had passed
by, he that day began the career which won for him a kingdom.

George Washington was only a boy when he saved what was left of
Braddock's ill-fated army in that dark and fatal massacre and was
hardly of age when the governor of Virginia sent him on that dangerous
mission to the Indian chiefs and the French commander at Venango. On
that mission he showed courage that no threats could weaken and an
intelligence that no treachery could deceive and he came back a man
marked for great deeds. As a boy he showed the same forgetfulness of
self which he afterward showed as a man when he refused to take any pay
for his long services as general of the Continental Army and even
advanced heavy disbursements from his own encumbered estate.

Napoleon was only a boy when, as a young lieutenant, he first showed
that military genius, that power of grasping opportunities, of breaking
away from outworn rules which made him one of the greatest generals of
all time and which laid Europe at his feet. If only to his bravery and
genius had been added the high principle and the unselfishness of
Washington, of Hamilton, of David, he would not have died in exile
hated and feared by millions of men and women and children whose
countries he had harried and whose lives he had burdened.

In the Civil War the youngest general in both the Union and the
Confederate forces was Major-General Galusha Pennypacker, who still
lives in Philadelphia. He became a captain and major at seventeen, a
colonel at twenty and a full brigadier-general a few months before he
became twenty-one. His last and greatest fight was at Fort Fisher and
the story of that day, of which he was the hero, is typical of the
bravery and readiness which made him the only boy-general in the world.
By the end of 1864 the Union forces had captured one by one the great
naval ports of the Confederacy, the gates through which their armies
were fed by the blockade-runners of Europe. New Orleans, Mobile and
Savannah had at last fallen. By December, 1864, Wilmington, South
Carolina, was the only port left through which the Confederacy could
receive provisions from outside. In that month an expedition was sent
against the city by sea and land. The river-forces were commanded by
Admiral Porter while Generals Ben Butler and Witzel had charge of the
land-forces. General Butler conceived the fantastic idea of exploding
an old vessel filled with powder close to the ramparts. In the
confusion which he thought would result, he hoped to carry the place by
assault. Fort Fisher was the strongest fortress of the Confederacy.
Admiral Porter afterward said that it was stronger than the famous
Russian fortress Malakoff, which next to Gibraltar was supposed to be
the most impregnable fortification in the world. Fort Fisher consisted
of a system of bomb-proof traverses surrounded by great ramparts of
heavy timbers covered with sand and banked with turf, the largest
earthworks in the whole South and which were proof against the heaviest
artillery of that day. The powder-boat was an abandoned vessel which
was loaded to the gunnels with kegs of powder and floated up to within
four hundred yards of the fort. When it was finally exploded, its
effect upon the fortress was so slight that the Confederate soldiers
inside thought it was merely a boiler explosion from one of the
besieging vessels. General Butler and his assistant, General Witzel,
however, landed their forces, hoping to find the garrison in a state of
confusion and discouragement. General Butler found that the explosion
had simply aroused rather than dismayed the besieged. From all along
the ramparts as well as from the tops of the inner bastions a
tremendous converging fire was poured upon the attacking force. Back of
these fortifications were grouped some of the best sharp-shooters of
the whole Confederate Army and after a few minutes of disastrous
fighting, General Butler was glad enough to withdraw his forces back to
the safety of the ships. He refused to renew the battle and reported to
General Grant that Fort Fisher could not be taken by assault. General
Grant was so disgusted by this report that he at once relieved General
Butler of the command and this battle was the end of the latter's
military career and he went back to civil life in Massachusetts.
President Lincoln too was deeply disappointed at the unfortunate ending
of this first assault on the last stronghold of the Confederacy.
General Grant sent word to Admiral Porter to hold his position and sent
General Alfred H. Terry to attack the fort again by land with an
increased force. General Robert E. Lee learned of the proposed attack
and sent word to Colonel Lamont, who commanded the fort, that it must
be held, otherwise his army would be starved into surrender.

On January 13, 1865, Admiral Porter ran his ironclad within close range
of the fort and concentrating a fire of four hundred heavy guns rained
great shells on every spot on the parapets and on the interior
fortifications from which came any gun-fire. The shells burst as
regularly as the ticking of a watch. The Confederates tried in vain to
stand to their guns. One by one they were broken and dismounted and the
garrison driven to take refuge in the interior bomb-proof traverses.
The attacking forces were divided into three brigades. The attack was
commenced by one hundred picked sharp-shooters all armed with repeating
rifles and shovels. They charged to within one hundred and seventy-five
yards of the fort, quickly dug themselves out of sight in a shallow
trench in the sand and tried to pick off each man who appeared in the
ramparts. Next came General Curtis' brigade to within four hundred
yards of the fort and laid down and with their tin-cups and plates and
knives and sword-blades and bayonets, dug out of sight like moles.
Close behind them was Pennypacker's second brigade and after him Bell's
third brigade. In a few moments, Curtis and his brigade advanced at a
run to a line close behind the sharp-shooters while Pennypacker's
brigade moved into the trench just vacated and Bell and his men came
within two hundred yards of Pennypacker. All this time men were
dropping everywhere under the deadly fire from the traverses. It was
not the blind fire with the bullets whistling and humming overhead
which the men had learned to disregard, but it was a scattering
irregular series of well-aimed shots of which far too many took effect.
The loss in officers especially was tremendous and equal to that of any
battle in the war. More than half of the officers engaged were shot
that day while one man in every four of the privates went down.

When the men had at last taken their final positions, the fire of the
vessels was directed to the sea-face of the fort and a strong naval
detachment charged, with some of Ames' infantry of the land-forces, at
the sea angle of the fort. The besieged ran forward a couple of light
guns loaded with double charges of canister and grape and rushed to the
angle all of their available forces. The canister and the heavy
musketry fire were too much for the bluejackets and they were compelled
to slowly draw back out of range while the Confederates shouted taunts
after them.

"Come aboard, you sailors," they yelled; "the captain's ladder is right
this way. What you hangin' back for?"

[Illustration: Attacking the Inner Traverses of Fort Fisher]

The last words were drowned in a tremendous Rebel yell as they saw the
bluejackets break and retreat out of range. The Confederates, however,
had cheered too soon. In manning the sea-wall they had weakened too
much the defenses on the landward side and the word was given for all
three brigades to attack at once. The color-bearers of all the
regiments ran forward like madmen, headed by the officers and all
sprinting as if running a two hundred and twenty-yard dash. The
officers and the color-bearers of all three brigades reached the outer
lines almost at the same time. With a rush and a yell they were up over
the outer wall and forming inside for the attack on the inner traverses
which yet remained. It was desperate work and the hardest fighting of
the day was done around these inner bomb-proofs, each one of which was
like a little fort in miniature. The crisis came when the first brigade
was barely keeping its foothold on the west end of the parapet while
the enemy which had repulsed the bluejackets were moving over in a
heavy column to drive out Curtis' panting men. It was at this moment
that the boy-general Pennypacker showed himself the hero of the day. He
had already carried the palisades and the sally-port and had taken four
hundred prisoners and then wheeled and charged to the rescue of Curtis'
exhausted men. Ahead of them was the fifth traverse which must be
stormed and crossed before Curtis' men could be relieved. Already the
men were wavering and it was a moment which called for the finest
qualities of leadership. Pennypacker himself seized the colors of the
97th Pennsylvania, his old regiment, and calling on his men to follow,
charged up the broken side of the fifth traverse. His troops swarmed up
after him side by side with the men of the 203d Pennsylvania and the
soldiers of the 117th New York, but Pennypacker was the first man to
fix the regimental flag on the parapet and shouted to Colonel Moore of
the other Pennsylvania regiment:

"Colonel, I want you to take notice that the first flag up is the flag
of my old regiment."

Before Colonel Moore had time to answer, he pitched over with a bullet
through his heart and Colonel Bell was killed at the head of his
brigade as he came in. The gigantic Curtis was fighting furiously with
the blood streaming down from his face. Just at that moment, at the
head of his men, General Pennypacker fell over, so badly wounded that
never from that time to this was a day to pass free from pain. His work
was done, however. His men fought fiercely to avenge his fall, broke up
the enemies' intended attack, freed the first brigade and all three
forces joined and swept through the traverses, capturing them one by
one until the last and strongest fort of the Confederacy had fallen.
The only remaining gateway to the outer world was closed. After the
fall of Fort Fisher, it was only a few months to Appomattox. One of the
bloodiest and most successful assaults of the war had succeeded.
General Grant ordered a hundred-gun salute in honor of the victory from
each of his armies. The Secretary of War, Stanton, himself, ran his
steamer into Wilmington and landed to thank personally in the name of
President Lincoln the brave fighters who had won a battle which meant
the close of the war.

General Pennypacker was to survive his wounds. This was the seventh
time that he had been wounded in eight months. At the close of the war
he was made colonel in the regular army, being the youngest man who
ever held that rank, and was placed in command of various departments
in the South and was the first representative of the North to introduce
the policy of conciliation. Later on he went abroad and met Emperor
William of Germany, the Emperor of Austria and Prince Bismarck and von
Moltke, that war-worn old general, who shook hands with him and said
that as the oldest general in the world, he was glad to welcome the
youngest.

So ends the story of a great battle where a boy showed that he could
fight as bravely and think as quickly and hold on as enduringly as any
man. What the boys of '64 could do, the boys of 1915 can and will do if
ever a time comes when they too must fight for their country.

CHAPTER XVI

MEDAL-OF-HONOR MEN

To-day in the world-war that is being waged in two hemispheres among
twelve nations, we hear much of the Victoria Cross and the Iron Cross,
and the decoration of the Legion of Honor, those tiny immortal symbols
of achievement for which men are so willing to lay down their lives and
which are cherished and passed on from father to son as a heritage of
honor undying. Not since gunpowder sent armor, swords, spears, arrows,
bows, catapults and a host of other outworn equipment to the scrap-heap
has the method of warfare been changed as it was in the year 1914.
Battles are now fought in the air and under the water and armies move
forward underground. Automobiles and power-driven cars, trucks and
platforms have succeeded the horse. Aeroplanes have taken the place of
cavalry. Vast howitzers carried piecemeal on trucks, which can run
across a rougher country than a horse, have made the strongest fortress
obsolete. Bombs which kill every living thing within a circle one
hundred and fifty yards in diameter, vast cylinders of gas which turn
the air for miles into a death-trap, airships which can drop high-power
explosives while invisible beyond the clouds, aerial and submarine
torpedoes which can be automatically guided by electric currents from
vessels miles away, guns that send vast shells a mile above the earth
to carry death and destruction to a point twenty miles away, concealed
artillery equipped with parabolic mirrors and automatic range-finders
which can shoot over distant hills and mountains to a hair's breadth,
and destroy concealed and protected bodies of men, rifles which shoot
without noise and without smoke, machine-guns that spray bullets across
a wide front of charging men as a hose sprays water across the width of
a lawn, wireless apparatus which send messages thousands of miles
across land and sea, all these and hundreds of other devices would be
more of a mystery to Grant and Lee and the other great commanders of
the Civil War than the breech-loading magazine rifles and artillery and
iron-clads of their day would have been to Napoleon. The warfare of
to-day is farther removed from the period of the Civil War of half a
century ago than the Napoleonic wars were from those of Hannibal over a
thousand years before.

Methods have changed, but men are the same to-day as they were when
they first built that great tower on the plain of Shinar. The
eternities of life are still with us. Brave deeds, acts of
self-sacrifice, truth, honor, courage, unselfishness still stand as in
the days of old. Every man or woman or child, small or great, can
achieve such deeds. At the end of this chronicle of the brave deeds
wrought by our fathers and grandfathers in a war which was fought for
an ideal, it is most fitting that the boys and girls of to-day should
read what was done by commonplace men as a matter of course. From the
great list prepared by the War Department of the United States of those
whom their country have honored have been selected a few stories of the
way different men won their Medal of Honor.

In 1864 General Sherman was in the midst of his great march to Atlanta.
Grant had begun the campaign against Lee's army which was to end at
Richmond, while to Sherman was given the task of crushing his rival,
Joseph E. Johnston. Inch by inch the whole of that march was fought out
in a series of tremendous battles. One of these was the hard battle of
New Hope Church in sight of Kenesaw Mountain. The battle was fought as
a successful attempt on the part of Sherman to turn the flank of
Johnston's position at Alatoona Pass. During the battle, Follett
Johnson, a corporal in the 60th Infantry, did not only a brave, but an
unusual deed. While his company was awaiting the signal to take part in
the battle which was raging on their left, they were much annoyed by
the deadly aim of a Confederate sharp-shooter concealed in an oak tree
a quarter of a mile away. Every few minutes there would be a puff of
smoke and the whine of a minie bullet, too often followed by the thud
which told that the bullet had found its billet. When at last the sixth
man, one of Johnson's best friends, was fatally wounded through the
head, Johnson made up his mind to do his share in stopping this
sharp-shooting permanently. Unfortunately he was only an ordinary shot
himself, but he crawled down the line and had a hasty conference with
one of the best shots in the regiment.

"You get a good steady rest," said Johnson, "and draw a bead on that
oak tree. I'll kind of move around and get the chap interested and when
he gives you a chance, you take it."

The Union sharp-shooter agreed to carry out his part of the bargain.
Johnson suddenly sprang to his feet and ran in a zigzag course to a
position farther down the line. A bullet from the watcher in the tree
shrieked close past his head.

"Lie down, you fool," shouted his captain. "Are you trying to commit
suicide?"

"Captain, we're fishing for that fellow over in the tree," returned
Johnson. "I'm the bait."

"Well, you won't be live-bait if you keep it up much longer," said his
captain as Johnson again took another run while a bullet cut through
his coat hardly an inch from his side. Johnson did keep it up, however.
Now he would raise his cap on a stick and try to draw the enemy's fire
in safety. Again he would suddenly spring up and make divers
disrespectful gestures toward the sharp-shooter in his tree. Sometimes
he would lie on his back and kick his legs insultingly up over a little
breastwork that had been hurriedly thrown up. One bullet from the
Confederate marksman nearly ruined a pair of good boots for Johnson
while he was doing this, taking the heel off his left boot as neatly as
any cobbler could have done. The hidden marksman, however, commenced to
show the effect of this challenge by this unknown joker. Little by
little he ventured out from behind the trunk of the tree in order to
get a better aim. By the captain's orders no one fired at him in the
hopes that he would give the watching Union sharp-shooter a deadly
chance. At last his time came. Johnson started his most ambitious
demonstration. He suddenly stood up in front of the breastworks in an
attitude of the most irritating unconcern. Yawning, he gave a great
stretch as if tired of lying down any longer, then he kissed his hand
toward the sharp-shooter and started to stroll down the front of the
line, first stopping to light his pipe. The whole company gave a gasp.

"That will be about all for poor old Folly," said one man to his
neighbor and every minute they expected to see him pitch forward. His
indifference was too much for the Confederate. Emboldened by the
absence of any recent shots, he leaned out from behind the sheltering
trunk in order to draw a deadly bead on the man who had been mocking
him before two armies. This was the chance for which the Union
sharp-shooter had been waiting. Before the Confederate marksman had a
chance to pull his trigger there was the bang of a Springfield rifle a
few rods from where Johnson was walking and the watching soldiers saw
the Confederate sharp-shooter topple backward. The rifle which had done
so much harm slipped slowly from his hand to the ground and in a minute
there was first a rustle, then a crash through the dense branches of
the oak as the unconscious body lost its grip on the limb and pitched
forward to the ground forty feet below. Johnson's captain was the first
man to shake his hand.

"It takes courage to fish for these fellows sometimes," he said, "but
it takes braver men than I am to be the bait."

Nearly thirty years later this occurrence was remembered and Corporal
Johnson awarded the medal of honor which he had earned.

Another man who drew the enemy's fire in order to save his comrades was
John Kiggins, a sergeant in one of the New York regiments. It was at
the battle of Lookout Mountain on November 24, 1863. The terrible
battle of Chickamauga had been fought. The Union Army had been reduced
to a rabble and swept off the field, except over on the left wing where
General George H. Thomas with twenty-five thousand men dashed back for
a whole afternoon the assaults of double that number of Confederates
and earned the title which he was henceforth to bear of the "Rock of
Chickamauga." The defeated army, followed afterward by General Thomas'
forces, withdrew to Chattanooga, that Tennessee battle-ground
surrounded by the heights of Missionary Ridge and Lookout Mountain.
Here the Union forces were invested on all sides by the Confederate
Army under General Bragg. The supplies of the Union Army gave out. The
Confederates commanded the Tennessee River and held all of the good
wagon-roads on the south side of it. The Union Army was nearly starved.
General Rosecrans had never recovered from the battle of Chickamauga.
Not only was his nerve shattered, but he seemed to have lost all
strength of will and concentration of purpose. General Grant, who had
just been placed in supreme command of all the military operations in
the West, decided to place Thomas in command of the Army of the
Cumberland in place of the dispirited Rosecrans. He telegraphed Thomas
to hold Chattanooga at all hazards.

"We'll hold the town until we starve," Thomas telegraphed back.

When Grant reached Chattanooga on October 23d, wet and dirty, but well,
he realized as he saw the dead horses and the hollow-cheeked men how
far the starving process had gone. Although he was on crutches from
injuries received from a runaway horse, yet his influence was
immediately felt throughout the whole army. He was a compeller of men
like Napoleon and, like him, had only to ride down the line and let his
men see that he was there in order to accomplish the impossible. He at
once sent a message to Sherman, who was coming slowly along from
Vicksburg. His messenger paddled down the Tennessee River in a canoe
under a guerrilla-fire during his whole journey and handed Sherman a
dispatch from Grant which said, "Drop everything and move your entire
force toward Stevenson." Sherman marched as only he could. When his
army reached the Tennessee River he laid a pontoon bridge thirteen
hundred and fifty feet in length in a half day, rushed his army across,
captured all the Confederate pickets and was ready to join Grant in the
great battle of Chattanooga. General Hooker marched in from one side on
November 24th and fought the great battle of Lookout Mountain above the
clouds, through driving mists and rains and on the morning of November
25th the stars and stripes waved from the lofty peak of Lookout
Mountain. The next day eighteen thousand men without any orders charged
up the almost perpendicular side of Missionary Ridge and carried it,
and the three-day battle of Chattanooga was ended in the complete
defeat of Bragg's army and the rescue of the men whom he thought he had
cornered beyond all hopes of escape.

It was during this first day's battle in the mist on Lookout Mountain
that Kiggins distinguished himself. The New York regiment, in which he
was a sergeant, had crawled and crept up a narrow winding path,
dragging their cannon after them up places where it did not seem as if
a goat could keep its footing. They had already come into position on
one side of the higher slopes when suddenly a battery above them opened
fire and the men began to fall. Through the mists they could see the
stars and stripes waving over this upper battery, which had mistaken
them for Confederate soldiers. They were shielded from the Confederate
batteries by a wall of rock, but it was necessary to stop this mistaken
fire or every man of the regiment would be swept off the mountain by
the well-aimed Union guns. Sergeant Kiggins volunteered to do the
necessary signaling. He climbed up on the natural wall of rock which
protected them from the Confederate batteries and sharp-shooters and
waved the Union flag toward the battery above him with all his might.
They stopped firing, but evidently considered it simply a stratagem and
wigwagged to Kiggins an inquiry in the Union code. It was necessary for
Kiggins to answer this or the fire would undoubtedly be at once
resumed. Unfortunately he was a poor wigwagger and as he stood on the
wall, he was exposed to the fire of every Confederate battery or
rifleman within range. The perspiration ran down his face as he
clumsily began to spell a message back to the battery above. Over his
head hummed and whirled solid round shot and around him screamed the
minie balls from half-a-dozen different directions. Once a shot pierced
his signaling flag right in the middle of a word. He not only had to
replace the flag, but he had to spell the word over again which was
even worse. The whole message did not take many minutes, but it seemed
hours to poor Kiggins. His life was saved as if by a miracle. Several
bullets pierced his uniform, his cap was shot off his head and when the
last word was finished, he dropped off the wall with such
lightning-like rapidity that his comrades, who had been watching him
with open mouths, thought that at last some bullet must have reached
its mark. Kiggins, however, was unharmed, but made a firm resolve to
perfect himself in wigwagging. We have no record whether he carried out
this good resolution, but his unwilling courage saved his regiment in
spite of his bad spelling and won for himself a medal of honor.

It was at the end of that terrible Wilderness campaign of Grant's which
in a little more than a month had cost him fifty-four thousand nine
hundred and twenty-nine men, a number nearly equal to the whole army of
Lee, his antagonist, when the campaign was commenced. Grant's first
object in this campaign was to destroy or capture Lee's army. His
second object was to capture Richmond, the capital of the Confederacy.
A special rank of Lieutenant-General had been created for him by
President Lincoln with the approval of the whole country. His victory
at the dreadful battle of Shiloh, his successful siege of Vicksburg and
his winning above the clouds the battle of Chattanooga, had made the
silent, scrubby, commonplace-looking man, with the gray-blue eyes, who
never talked but acted instead, the hope of the whole nation. In this
campaign, Grant's one idea was to clinch with Lee's army and fight it
as hard and as often as possible. He fought in the wilderness, tangled
in thickets and swamps. He fought against strong positions on hilltops,
he fought against entrenchments defended by masked batteries and
tremendous artillery. He fought against impregnable positions and
although he lost and lost and lost, he never stopped fighting. Lee had
beaten McClellan and Pope and Burnside and Hooker, all able generals,
who had tried against him every plan except that which Grant now tried,
of wearing him out by victories and defeats alike. Grant's army could
be replenished. There were not men enough left in the Confederacy to
replace Lee's army. It was a terrible campaign and only a president of
Lincoln's breadth of view and only the supreme confidence which the
American people have in a man who fights, no matter how often he is
beaten, kept Grant in command. If, after the bloody defeats in the
Wilderness and at Spottsylvania or at Cold Harbor, he had turned back
like any of his successors would have done, undoubtedly his past record
would not have saved him the command. It was like the celebrated battle
between Tom Cribb, the champion of England, and Molineaux, the giant
black, in the eighteenth century for the championship of the world.
Again and again and again Cribb was knocked down by blows so tremendous
that even his ring generalship could not avoid them. Battered and
bloody he always staggered to his feet and bored in again for more.
Molineaux at last said to his seconds, "I can't lick a fellow like
that; the fool doesn't know when he is beaten." It was so with Grant
and Lee. Grant never knew when he was beaten. Lee's generalship could
knock him down, but could not keep him back, and the Confederate leader
realized himself that sooner or later some chance of war would give
Grant the opportunity for a victory from which the Confederate Army
could not recuperate.

Cold Harbor was the last of this series of defeats which helped wear
out Lee's army and ended in its capture and the occupation of Richmond.
At the time, however, it was bitter to be borne by the millions of men
and women and children who were hungering and thirsting for a victory
of the Union arms. Marching and fighting and fighting and marching
every day for a month, Grant was almost in sight of the spires of the
Confederate capital. About six miles outside the city Lee had taken his
last stand at Cold Harbor. He held a position of tremendous natural
strength and had fortified and entrenched it so that it was practically
impregnable. Grant tried in vain to flank it. On June 30th he ordered
an assault in front. Against him was the flower of the Confederate Army
commanded by the best general of the world and securely entrenched in a
position than which no stronger was ever attacked throughout the whole
war. Grant first gave his command to attack on the afternoon of June
2d, but then postponed it until the early morning of June 3d. Officers
and men alike knew that they were to be sacrificed. All through the
regiments men were pinning slips of paper, on which were written their
names and addresses, to the backs of their coats, so that their dead
bodies might be recognized after the battle and news sent to their
families at the North. The battle was a short one. The second corps of
General Hancock, one of the bravest and most dashing of all of Grant's
generals, was shot to pieces in twenty-two minutes and fell back with
three thousand of its best men gone, including most of its officers.
All along the line the story was the same. At some places the Union men
were beaten back without any difficulty and at other spots they
penetrated the salients, but were driven back. Attack after attack was
in vain against the generalship of Lee, the bravery of his men and the
almost impregnable strength of his position.

Eugene M. Tinkham, of the 148th New York Infantry, was in that corps
directly under the eye of Grant himself which attacked and attacked the
Confederate position throughout that bloody morning, only to be driven
back each time with tremendous losses. The 148th Infantry, in which
Tinkham was a corporal, charged right up to the very mouth of the guns.
Flesh and blood could not stand, however, against the volleys of grape
and canister which ripped bloody, struggling lanes right through the
masses of the charging men. As the corps of which Tinkham's regiment
was a part was stopped by the wall of dead and wounded men piled up in
front of them, the Confederates with a fierce Rebel yell charged over
the breastworks on the confused attackers. For a minute the New York
regiment held its own, but were finally slowly forced back fighting
every foot to the shelter of their own rifle-pits. There they made a
stand and the Confederate sally stopped and the men in gray dashed back
to their own fortifications. In this charge, Tinkham received a bayonet
wound through his left shoulder while a jagged piece of canister had
ripped through his left arm. Not until he found himself back in the
rifle-pit, however, did he even know that he was wounded. His bayonet
and the barrel of his rifle were red clear up to the stock and he did
not at first realize that the blood dripping from his left sleeve was
his own. It was only as he lay on the dry sand and saw the red stain
beside him grow larger and larger that he realized that he was hurt.
One of the few men who had returned with him stripped off his coat, cut
away the sleeve of his shirt and made a couple of rough bandages and
extemporized a rude tourniquet from the splinters of one of the wheels
of a battered field-piece which had flown into the pit. When that was
over, Tinkham lay back and shut his eyes and felt the weakness which
comes over a man who has lost much blood. To-day there was not the
tonic of victory which sometimes keeps even wounded men up. He had seen
his comrades, men with whom he had eaten and slept and fought for over
two years, thrown away, as it seemed to him, uselessly. He was yet to
learn, what the army learned first and the country last, that Grant was
big enough and far-sighted enough to know that some victories must be
wrought from failure as well as success. This was one of the
hammer-strokes which seemed to bound back from the enemy's armor
without leaving a mark, yet the impact weakened Lee even when it seemed
that he was most impervious to it. It was absolutely necessary to
Grant's far-reaching plans that Lee be fought on every possible
occasion. Whether he won or lost, Grant's only hope lay on keeping Lee
on the defensive. None of this, of course, could a wounded corporal in
a battered, beaten and defeated regiment realize. All he knew was that
his friends were gone, that he was wounded and, worst of all, had been
forced to again and again retreat. He shut his eyes and there was a
sound in his ears like the tolling of a great bell. It seemed to swell
and rise until it drowned even the rattle and roar of the battle which
was still going on. When Tinkham opened his eyes everything seemed to
waver and quiver before him. Suddenly there came a short, thin, wailing
sound which cut like a knife through the midst of the unconsciousness
which was stealing over him. It was the cries of two wounded men lying
far out in the field over which he had come. Tinkham raised his hand
and strained his eyes. He could recognize two of his own file, men who
a moment before had been by his side and who now lay moaning their
lives away out on that shell-swept field. Tinkham listened to it as
long as he could. Then he set his teeth, scrambled to his feet and in
spite of his comrades who thought that he was delirious, climbed
stiffly over the edge of the rifle-pit and began to creep out between
the lines toward the wounded men. At first every motion was an agony.
He was weakened by the loss of blood and he could bear no weight on his
left arm, yet there was such a fatal storm of bullets and grape-shot
whizzing over him that he knew that, if he rose to his feet, there
would be little chance of his ever reaching his friends alive. Slowly
and doggedly he sidled along like a disabled crab. Sometimes he would
have to stop and rest. Many times bullets whizzed close to him and cut
the turf all around where he lay. As soon as he had rested a few
seconds, he would fix his eye on some little tuft of grass or stone or
weed and make up his mind that he would crawl until he reached that
before he rested again. It was a long journey before he reached his
goal. On the way he had taken three full canteens of water from silent
figures which would never need them more. When at last he reached the
men, they recognized him and the tears ran down their faces as they
called his name.

"God bless you, Corporal," said one; "it's just like you to come for
us."

Tinkham had no breath left to talk, but he gave each wounded man a
refreshing drink from the canteens. Both of them were badly, although
not fatally, wounded. One had a shattered leg and the other was slowly
bleeding to death from a jagged wound in his thigh which he had tried
in vain to staunch. Tinkham bandaged them up to the best of his ability
and started to drag them both back to safety. With his help and
encouragement, each of them crawled for himself as best he was able. It
was a weary journey. During the last part of it, however, he was helped
by other volunteers who were shamed into action by seeing this wounded
man do what they had not dared. All three recovered and lived to take
part in the latter-day victories which were yet to come.

Tinkham was but one of the thousands of brave men who risked their
lives to save their comrades. There was Michael Madden who at Mason's
Island, Maryland, was on a reconnaissance with a comrade within the
enemy's lines. His companion was wounded. A number of the enemy's
cavalry started out to cut off the two men who were at the same time
exposed to concentrated fire from the enemy's sharp-shooters. Madden
picked his comrade up as if he had been a child, hoisted him to his
back and ran with him to the bank of the Potomac, and plunged off into
the water. Swimming on his back, he kept his comrade's head up and
crossed the river in safety with the bullets hissing and spattering all
around him.

Then there was Julius Langbein, a drummer-boy fifteen years old. In
1862 at Camden, N.C., the captain of his company was shot down.
Langbein went to his help, but found that unless he received surgical
treatment, he could not live an hour. Unstrapping his drum, he ran back
to the rear and found a surgeon who was brave enough to go out to the
front with him and under a heavy fire give first-aid to the wounded
officer. Then the two carried the unconscious captain back to safety.

It is a brave man that can rally himself in a retreat. Usually men go
with the crowd. Once let the tide of battle begin to ebb and a company
or a regiment or a brigade commence a retreat, it takes not only
unusual courage, but also unusual will-power for any single man to
stand out against his fellows and resist not only his own fears, but
theirs. Such a man was John S. Kenyon. At Trenton, S.C., on May 15,
1862, the whole column of his regiment, the 3d New York Cavalry, was
retreating under a murderous fire from the enemy. Kenyon was in the
rear rank. The retreat had started at a trot, had increased to a gallop
and finally the whole column was riding at breakneck speed away from
the shot and shell which crashed through their ranks. At the very
height of their speed a man riding next to Kenyon was struck in the
right shoulder by a grape-shot. The force of the blow pitched him
headlong from the saddle. He still held to his reins with his left hand
with a death-grip and was dragged for yards by his plunging, snorting
horse. Kenyon was just ahead and knew nothing of the occurrence until
he heard a faint voice behind him calling breathlessly, "Help, John,
help!" He looked back and saw his comrade nearly fifty yards behind
lying on the ground. Already his fingers were loosening their grip on
the rein and the blood was flowing fast from the gash on his shoulder.
Behind him the Confederate cavalry came thundering along not a quarter
of a mile away while the massed batteries behind them swept the whole
field with a hail of lead and steel. John hesitated for a minute and
for the last time he heard once more the call of help, this time so
faint that he could hardly hear it above the din of the battle. With a
quick movement, he swung his horse to one side of the column.

"Don't be a fool, John," shouted one of the men ahead; "it's every man
for himself now. You can't save him and you'll only lose your own
life."

It was the old plausible lie that started when Satan said of Job, "Skin
for skin, all that a man hath will he give for his life." It was a lie
then and it is just as much a lie to-day.

"Greater love hath no man than that he lay down his life for his
friend," said our Master. Every day when the crisis comes we see men
who will do that. Kenyon was one of these men. As he said afterward, "I
should never have been able to get Jim's voice out of my mind if I
hadn't stopped."

It only took an instant to cover the distance from the column to the
wounded man. Kenyon reached him just in time to catch the riderless
horse which had at last freed his bridle from the weak grip of his
wounded master. Kenyon swung himself to the ground and holding the two
plunging horses with his right hand, pulled his friend to his feet and
with a tremendous effort finally hoisted him into his saddle again. By
this time the pursuing cavalry was within pistol-shot and the revolver
bullets began to sing around the heads of the two men.

"You hang on to your saddle, Jim," said Kenyon, "and I'll take care of
your horse."

Bending low in his saddle, he dug his spurs deep into his horse's
sides, at the same time keeping his grip on the reins of the other
horse and in a few minutes the two were back again in the rear of the
retreating column. All through the retreat Kenyon stuck to his comrade
and finally landed him safely in the field-hospital in front of which
the Union Army had thrown up entrenchments which stopped all further
pursuit.

War, like everything else, is always a one-man job. It was the one man
Hannibal that took a tropical army of sunburned Arabs, Carthaginians,
Abyssinians, Berbers and soldiers from half a score of other southern
nations and cut and built and tunneled his way through the ice and snow
and cold of the Alps. Not only did his indomitable will carry his men
through an impossible and unknown region, but it was this one man who
for the first time in the history of the world marched elephants up
over the Alps. Over two thousand years later it was one man again who
took a ragged, battered, beaten army and marched over the same route
and through the avalanches and snow-covered peaks and blinding
snow-storms of the Great Bernard Pass. When the men turned trembling
back from the brink of immeasurable precipices and before cliffs which
seemed as if they could be climbed only by the chamois, Napoleon would
order the drums and bugles to strike up the signal for a charge and up
and over his soldiers went. It was this one short, frail, little man
that fused this army into a great fighting machine, marched it over
impossible mountains and swept down into Italy to win as great
victories as did his fierce predecessor twenty centuries before.

The records of the War Department are full of instances where men
singly did seemingly impossible things. There was Patrick Ginley, a
private in a New York regiment. At Reams Station, Virginia, the command
in which he fought deserted important works which they occupied and
retreated under the tremendous fire of the advancing enemy. Patrick
remained. It seemed impossible that only one man could do anything
except throw away his life, but Patrick made up his mind that he would
accomplish everything that one man could. Accordingly as the enemy
surged up to occupy the works with cheers and laughter at the sight of
the retreating bluecoats, they were suddenly staggered by receiving a
tremendous cannonade of grape-shot which cut down the entire first two
ranks of the approaching company. It was Private Ginley who,
single-handed, had loaded and sighted the gun and coolly waited until
the enemy were within pointblank range. The Confederates were thrown
into confusion. They suspected a Yankee trick and thought that the
retreat had been made simply to lure them into close range. In the
confusion they fell back, although they could have marched in without
any further opposition, for as soon as Ginley had fired the gun, he
escaped out of the rear of the earthworks and hastened to another Union
regiment which was holding its ground near by. Waving his arms over his
head and shouting like a mad-man, he rushed up to the astonished men
and grabbed the colors out of the hands of the bewildered
color-sergeant.

"Come on, boys!" he shouted. "I've got some good guns and a nice bit of
fortification just waitin' for you. Look at the way I drove them back
all by myself."

And he waved the colors toward the shattered Confederates who were
slowly forming into line again preparatory to an assault, and started
back for the works as fast as his legs could carry him.

"Come on, you fellows," he yelled over his shoulder; "do you want me to
drive them back twice?"

His example was all that was needed. There was a cheer from officers
and men alike and close behind him thundered the charge of the
regiment. With a rush they swept up over the earthworks, drove the
Confederates, who had just entered from the other side, out headlong,
manned the whole works and in a minute were pouring charges of grape
and canister from the retaken guns which completed their victory. A
defeat had been changed into a victory, eleven guns and important works
had been retaken from the enemy and a regiment of Confederates
disorganized and driven from the field. One man did it.

The deeds that most appeal to our imagination are single combats--one
man against a multitude when daring and dash and coolness and skill
take the place of numbers. History is full of such stories. We love to
read of that great death-fight of Hereward the Wake, the Last of the
English, when with sturdy little Winter at his back, he fought his last
fight ringed around with hateful, treacherous foes. At his feet the
pile of dead and wounded men grew high and higher until no one dared
step within the sweep of that fatal sword. At last when Winter had
fallen, some treacherous coward thrust a spear into Hereward's
defenseless back. As he lay fallen on his face, apparently dead, one of
his foemen stepped over to rob him of his sword when Hereward struggled
to his knees and struck forward with his shield so fiercely, the last
blow of the last Englishman, that he laid his man dead on the field.

Then there was the death-fight of Grettir the Outlaw which Andrew Lang
calls one of the four great fights in literature of one man against a
multitude. No boy should ever grow up without reading the Grettir Saga
which tells how after being unjustly driven into outlawry Grettir
finally took refuge on a rocky island which could only be climbed by a
rope-ladder. There with his brother and a cowardly, lazy servant he
lived in safety until his enemies hired a witch-wife to do him harm. At
midnight she cut grim runes into a great log of driftwood and burned
strange signs thereon and stained it with her blood and then after
laying upon it many a wicked spell, had it cast into the sea by four
strong men. Against wind and tide it sailed to Drangy, Grettir's island
of refuge. There he found it on the beach, but recognized it as
ill-fated and warned the servant not to use it for fire-wood. In spite
of this the lazy thrall brought it up the next day and when Grettir,
not recognizing it, started to split the accursed log, his axe glanced
and cut a deep gash in his leg. The wound festered and the leg swelled
and turned blue so that Grettir could not even stand on it. When he was
at last disabled, the witch-wife raised a storm and under her direction
a band of his bitterest enemies went out to the island and found that
his servant had left the rope-ladder down. One by one they climbed the
sheer cliff and made a ring around the little hut where Grettir and his
young brother slept. They dashed in the door. Grettir seized his sword
and shield and fought on one knee so fiercely that they dared not
approach him. Some of the attackers tried to slip behind his watchful
sword.

"Bare is the back of the brotherless," panted Grettir and his
boy-brother stood behind him and fought over him until they were both
overborne by the sheer weight of heavy shields, and Grettir killed,
although not until six men lay dead in front of the great chieftain.
Illugi, the brother, was offered his life if he would promise to take
no vengeance on the murderers of his brother. He refused to do this
because they had killed Grettir by witchcraft and treachery and not in
fair fight. So they slew him, trying in vain to avoid the vengeance
which came to them all many years later at the hands of another of
Grettir's kin.

We read also of battles won against what seem to us impossible odds.
The Samurai stories of old Japan have several instances where
chieftains defeated whole armies single-handed by their wonderful
swordsmanship. The Bible contains several such stories. There is the
story of Jonathan and his armor-bearer who together captured a
fortress. Jonathan said to the young man that bare his armor, "Come and
let us go over unto the garrison. It may be that the Lord will work for
us." And his armor-bearer said unto him, "Do all that is in thine
heart, behold I am with thee." Then they agreed to wait for a sign. If
when they came before the garrison the men should invite them to come
up, then they would go. If not, they would not make the attempt. The
account goes on to say that when they both discovered themselves unto
the garrison of the Philistines, the men of the garrison cried out to
Jonathan and his armor-bearer and said, "Come up to us and we will show
you a thing." And Jonathan said unto his armor-bearer, "Come up after
me for the Lord hath delivered them to us." And Jonathan climbed up
upon his hands and upon his feet and his armor-bearer after him and
they fell before Jonathan and his armor-bearer slew after him. In a
half-acre of ground which a yoke of oxen might plough, these two fought
and slew and cut their way back and forth until the band that held the
fort broke and fled and the stronghold was captured by the two.

Then there was Jashobeam the Hachmonite, one of the first three men of
David's body-guard of heroes who slew with his spear three hundred men
at one time. There was Eleazar, who with David fought in that bloody
barley field when these two warriors single-handed dispersed a company
of Philistines. There was Abishai who slew three hundred men. These
were the three mighty men who were besieged with David in the cave of
Adullam in the midst of a parched and burning desert and David longed
and said, "Oh, that one would give me to drink of the water of the well
of Bethlehem that is at the gate." The three heard what their captain
said and alone they broke through the ranks of the Philistines, drew
water out of the well of Bethlehem and brought it back to David. And
David did not drink of it, but poured it out to the Lord and said,
"Lord forbid that I should drink the blood of these men that have put
their lives in jeopardy for me."

When we read these and other hero-stories, we are apt to think that the
time for such deeds is past and that the men of to-day can never equal
the accomplishments of the fighters of olden time. Yet the Civil War
shows stories just as stirring and accomplishments seemingly as
impossible. There was George Wilhelm, a captain in the Ohio Infantry.
At Bakers Creek he was badly wounded in the breast and after he had
fallen was captured by a Confederate, forced to his feet and though
faint from loss of blood marched to the Confederate camp. As he saw
himself farther and farther away from his own army a Berserkir rage
came over him which made him forget his wound and his weakness. With
one tremendous spring he caught his captor around the neck, wrested his
drawn sabre from out of his hand, slashed him over the left shoulder
and then picking up the loaded revolver which had dropped from the
disabled hand faced him around and marched him back to the Union lines
a prisoner although, toward the end of that journey, Wilhelm was so
weak that he had to lean on the shoulder of his unwilling attendant.

There was William G. Whitney a sergeant in the 11th Michigan Infantry,
at the battle of Chickamauga who, just as his men were about to face a
fierce charge from the Confederates, found that their ammunition had
given out. Outside the Union works was a shell-swept field covered with
dead and wounded men. Whitney never hesitated. He leaped over the works
and ran back and forth over that field, cutting off and loading himself
down with cartridge-boxes, although it did not seem as if a man could
live a minute in that hissing storm of bullets and shell. Just in time
he brought back the ammunition which enabled his men to beat back the
charge and hold their position.

At Rappahannock Station, Virginia, J. Henry White, a private in the
90th Pennsylvania Infantry, like David's men brought back water to his
thirsty comrades at the risk of his own life. The enemy had
concentrated their fire on the only spring from which Union men could
get water, but White crawled through the grass like a snake, covered
from head to foot with canteens, filled them every one and crawled back
under a fire which seemed as if it must be fatal. The Union forces were
able to hold out and win the fight through his brave deed.

On May 12, 1864, Christopher W. Wilson, a private in the 73d New York
Infantry at the battle of Spottsylvania in a charge on the Confederate
works, seized the flag which the wounded color-bearer had dropped, led
the charge and then for good measure cut down the color-bearer of the
56th Virginia Regiment, captured the Confederate colors and brought
back both flags in safety to the Union lines.

Another color-bearer who won his share of battle-glory was Andrew J.
Tozier, a sergeant in the 20th Maine Infantry at the battle of
Gettysburg. Tozier believed that it was the duty of a color-bearer
having done all to stand fast. At the very flood-tide of the fight when
it was a toss-up which side would be the victor of that crisis-battle
of the war, Tozier's regiment, which was in the forefront, was borne
back leaving him standing with the colors in an advanced position.
Tozier stood there like a rock and coolly picked off with his musket
every Confederate that attacked him until his ammunition gave out. He
then pushed forward a few yards until he reached the body of one of the
soldiers of his regiment who had fallen and stooping down, still
keeping his colors flying, he managed to loosen some cartridges from
the dead man's belt. With these he recharged his rifle and fought a
great fight alone. Again and again he would stoop for a minute to get
more cartridges, but the flag never went down. From all over the field
the officers from the scattered regiment rallied their men and hurried
toward the colors and just as a Confederate troop thundered down on
Tozier, intending to ride over him and carry away the precious flag,
from every part of the field little squads of fighting men reached him
in time to pour in a volley that saved the colors which Tozier for many
minutes had been protecting single-handed. That was the turning-point
of this part of the battle. The Maine regiment pressed on and never
retreated a foot again through all those days of terrible fighting.
Tozier was one of the many men who saved that day for the Union by
being brave in the face of tremendous odds.

Freeman C. Thompson of the 116th Ohio Infantry won his medal of honor
at Petersburg, Virginia. On April 2, 1865, the Union forces were
storming Fort Gregg. Both sides had poured in murderous volleys at
short range and then had rushed to close quarters, fighting desperately
with bayonet and butt. Thompson scrambled up on his hands and knees,
but had no more reached the parapet when he was knocked off it headlong
by a tremendous blow on the head from a clubbed musket. When he
returned to consciousness he found himself lying in the ditch with two
dead men on top of him. Thompson made up his mind that this was not the
kind of company which he ought to keep and springing to his feet, he
started again for the parapet. This time he was more fortunate for he
gained a footing and managed to bayonet the first man who attacked him,
but before he could withdraw the bayonet, once again he received a
tremendous smash full in the face from a clubbed musket and went clear
over backward with a broken nose. He struck on the heap of bodies from
which he had just emerged and though not unconscious, lay for a few
minutes unable to move. Finally he managed to wipe the blood out from
his eyes and spit out the blood and broken teeth from his battered
mouth. Some men would have felt that they had had enough, but not so
with this one. For the third and last time he scrambled up and as he
reached the edge of the parapet caught sight of the man who was
responsible for his battered face. Thompson rushed at him and there was
a battle royal between the two, bayonet to bayonet, but Thompson at
last by a trick of fence which he had learned, suddenly reversed his
musket and smashed the heavy butt down on his opponent's right forearm,
breaking the latter's grip on his own weapon. Before he could recover,
Thompson's bayonet had passed through his throat and Thompson himself
had gained a foothold within the works. Shoulder to shoulder he fought
with the rest of his comrades in spite of the streaming blood and only
stopped when the garrison surrendered.

It is a brave man in civil life that will give up his vacation and it
takes a hero to relinquish a furlough, that precious breathing spell
away from battles and hardships back at home with his dear ones. Martin
Schubert, a private in the 26th New York Infantry, had gained this
respite and had paid for it by his wounds. Hearing that his regiment
was about to go into battle again at Fredericksburg, he gave up his
furlough, hurried back to the front and fought fiercely through all
that brave day. Six men of his regiment, one after the other, had been
shot down that fatal afternoon while carrying the colors. Schubert,
although he already had one half-healed and one open wound, seized the
flag when it went down for the last time and carried it to the front
until the very end of the battle, although he received an extra wound
for doing it. Thirty-one years later he received a medal of honor for
that day's work.

It is easier to save a wounded friend or wounded comrade than a wounded
enemy. He who dares death to save one whom he is fighting against shows
courage of the highest type. Such a deed occurred during the battle of
Chancellorsville. Those four fatal May-days were filled as full of
brave deeds as any days of the Civil War. Though General Hooker, the
Union general, flinched and lost not only the battle, but forever his
name of Fighting Joe Hooker, his men gave up only when they were
outflanked and out-fought and unsupported.

Elisha B. Seaman was a private in one of the regiments which was
surprised and attacked by the twenty-six thousand infantry of Stonewall
Jackson, the best fighters in the Confederate Army. The Union men were
not suspecting any danger. Word had been sent a number of times both to
Hooker and to General Howard who commanded the eleventh corps under him
that Jackson was crossing through the woods to make a flank-attack.
Neither general would believe the message. Both were sure that Jackson
was in retreat. When the attack came the Union troops were attacked in
front and from the flank and rear at once. They held their ground for a
time, but they were new troops and even veterans could not have long
sustained such an assault. At first they attempted to make an orderly
retreat, but the Confederates pressed on them so close and fought so
fiercely that the retreat became a run and the corps of which Seaman's
regiment was a part was not rallied until they met reinforcements far
over in the wilderness and gradually came to a halt and threw up
defenses. There they were too strong to be driven back further by the
Confederates and managed to hold their ground although attacked again
and again. After the last attack the Confederate forces withdrew and
took up a strong position on the Union front, brought up artillery and
opened up a tremendous rifle-fire mingled with the cannonade from all
their available batteries, hoping to throw the Union forces into
disorder so that they would not stand another charge. During the
fiercest of the fire while every man was keeping close under cover,
Seaman's attention was caught by the sight of a Confederate officer who
lay writhing in terrible agony not a hundred yards outside of the Union
lines. He had been shot through the body in the last charge and had
been left on the field by the retreating Confederates. The pain was
unbearable. Seaman could see his face all distorted and although not a
sound came through the clenched teeth, the poor fellow could not
control the agonized twitching and jerking of his tortured muscles.
Seaman tried to turn his face away from the sight, but each time his
eyes came back to that brave man in torment out in front of him. At
last he could stand it no longer. He slipped back to the rear and got
hold of a surgeon.

"Doctor," he said, "there's a fellow out in front pretty badly wounded.
If I get him to you, do you think you can ease his pain?"

"I certainly can," said the surgeon, "but judging from the noise out
there in front, you'll lie out there with him if you go beyond the
breastworks."

"You get your chloroform ready," said Seaman, "and I'll get the man."

A few minutes later Elisha was seen by his astonished comrades crawling
along the bullet-torn turf on his way to the wounded man.

"Hi there, come back, you lump-head!" yelled his bunkie. "Don't you see
the fellow is a Reb? You'll get killed."

"I wouldn't let a dog suffer the way that fellow's suffering," yelled
back Elisha, waddling along on his hands and knees like a woodchuck. He
finally reached the officer, forced a little whiskey into his mouth and
prepared to lift him up on his back.

"Cheer up, old man," he said. "I've got a good surgeon back there who
says he can fix you up. If I can only get you on my back, we'll be safe
in a minute."

"You'll be safe enough," gasped the other somewhat ungratefully, Seaman
thought, "but there will be a dozen bullets through me."

There seemed to be something in that statement. Elisha decided that it
would be a cruel kindness to turn this man into a target for the
bullets which were coming across the field and make him act as his
involuntary shield.

"I'll tell you what I'll do, General," Seaman said finally; "I'll get
you up and then I'll back down to our lines. If any one gets hit, it'll
be me.

He was as good as his word. Although the wounded officer was a large
man, Seaman got a fireman's-lift on him, swung him over his shoulders
and then facing the Confederate lines, slowly backed his way toward
safety. At first the Confederate fire redoubled as the men in gray
thought that he was simply effecting the capture of one of their men.
When, however, they realized that he was protecting one of their own
officers from their fire with his own body, all along the line the
fusillade of musketry died down and there came down the wind in its
place the sound of a storm of cheers which swept from one end of the
Confederate position to the other. Seaman covered the last fifty yards
of his dangerous journey without a shot being fired at him except the
shot and shell from the batteries which were being worked too far back
for the gunners to know what was going on. The surgeon with whom he had
spoken had been attracted to the front by the shouts and cheers both
from the Confederate lines and from Seaman's own comrades and was the
first to help him over the breastworks.

"You're a great fool," he said. "I thought you were talking about one
of our men, but so long as you brought this poor Reb in at the risk of
your life, I'll certainly cure him."

And he did.

Another man whose courage flared up superior to wounds and mutilation
and who was brave enough to do his duty in spite of the agony he was
suffering, was Corporal Miles James, who on September 30, 1864, at
Chapins Farm, Virginia, with the rest of his company was attacking the
enemy's works. They had charged up to within thirty yards of the
fortifications when they were met by a murderous storm of grape and
canister, the enemy having held their fire until the very last moment.
A grape-shot cut through Corporal James' left arm just above the elbow,
smashing right through the middle of the bone and cutting the arm half
off so that it dangled by the severed muscles. The force of the blow
whirled James around like a top and he fell over to the ground, but was
on his feet again in an instant and started for the Confederate line
like the bulldog that he was.

"Go back, Corporal," shouted one of his men. "Your arm's half off and
you'll bleed to death."

"No I won't," yelled James; "my right arm is my fighting-arm anyway."

"Let me tie you up then," said the man, pulling him to the ground where
the rest of the regiment lay flat on their faces waiting for the storm
to pass so that they might charge again. "There's plenty of time."

An examination of the arm showed that it was past saving.

"Corporal," said the other, "you had better let me take this arm right
off. I can make a quick job with my bowie-knife and bandage it. If I
don't you'll bleed to death."

"All right," said Miles; "go ahead."

A minute later the amateur surgeon tied the last knot in the bandage
which he had made out of a couple of bandanna handkerchiefs which had
been contributed by others of the file.

"Now, Corporal," he said, coaxingly, "let me get you back where you can
lie down and rest."

"No," said Corporal James, "the only resting I'm going to do will be
inside those works."

He reached back for the Springfield rifle which he had dropped when
first struck and fitting it carefully to his right shoulder, fired a
well-aimed shot at a Confederate gunner who was serving one of the
cannons on the breastworks. As the man toppled over the corporal smiled
grimly and in spite of offers of help from all sides, loaded and fired
his gun twice again. By this time the fire had died down and the
corporal suddenly sprang to his feet and started for the breastworks.

"Hurry up, fellows," he shouted to his men; "don't let a one-armed man
do all the work."

With a tremendous cheer the whole force sprang again to their feet and
swarmed over the ramparts in a rush which there was no stopping. James
was right with them, two of his men hoisting and pushing him up, for he
found that although he could shoot, it was more difficult to climb with
one arm. As the last Confederates who were left surrendered, James sat
down against one of the captured cannon and smiled wanly at the man who
had helped him and said:

"Now I'll take a rest and later on I'll go to the rear with you if you
like."

This he did and a regular surgeon completed an operation which he said
had, under the circumstances, been most efficiently performed. Corporal
James always said that the medal of honor which the government gave him
was worth far more than the arm which he gave the government.

In the days of David there came a great famine. Year after year the
crops failed and the people starved. At last the priests and
soothsayers told David that this doom had fallen upon the nation
because of a broken oath. Many centuries before Joshua, one of the
great generals of the world, was fighting his way into the Promised
Land. He was contending with huge black giant tribes like the Anakim,
and against blue-eyed Amorite mountaineers with their war-chariots of
iron, whose five kings he was to utterly destroy on that great day when
he said in the sight of the host of Israel, "Sun, stand thou still upon
Gibeon and thou Moon in the valley of Ajalon," and the sun stood still
and the moon stayed until the people had revenged themselves upon their
enemies. He had captured the fortified city of Jericho and had razed it
to the ground and laid that terrible curse which was afterward
fulfilled on the man who should again lay the foundation and rebuild
the city. He had destroyed the city of Ai, little but inhabited by
fierce fighters who had hurled back even the numberless hordes of
Israel. The terror and the dread of the invaders had spread through the
length and breadth of the land. On the slopes of Mount Hermon lived the
Hivites. They were not great in war, but like the men of Tyre they
asked to be let alone to carry on the trade and commerce in which they
were so expert. Not far away from Ai was their chief city of Gibeon and
the elders of that city planned to obtain from Joshua safety by
stratagem. They sent embassadors whose skin bottles were old and rent
and bound up and whose shoes were worn through and clouted and whose
garments were old and worn and their provision dry and mouldy. These
came to Joshua pretending to be embassadors from a far country who
desired to make a league with them. Not knowing that their city was in
the very path of his march, Joshua and the princes of the congregation
made peace with them. Later on they found that they had been deceived,
but the word of the nation had been passed and the sworn peace could
not be broken. So it happened from that day that the Gibeonites became
hewers of wood and drawers of water for the congregation and lived in
peace with the Israelites under their sworn protection. The centuries
passed and at last Saul, the first king of Israel, began his reign. In
spite of the oath of his forefathers, he slew the Gibeonites and sought
to root them out of the land. It was this broken oath that had brought
upon the nation the years of famine and suffering. Under the advice of
their priests David sent for the remnants of the Gibeonites and asked
them what atonement could be made for the cruel and treacherous deed of
King Saul who had long been dead, but whose sin lived on after him. The
Gibeonites said that they would have no silver or gold of Saul or of
his house, but demanded that seven men of the race of Saul be delivered
unto them. It was done and they hung these seven prisoners as a
vengeance on the bloody house of Saul. Two of them were the sons of
Rizpah whom she bore unto Saul, the king. When they were hanged, she
took sackcloth and spread it on the rocks and guarded those bodies
night and day and suffered neither the birds of the air to rest upon
them by day or the beasts of the field by night. Sleeplessly she
guarded all that was left of her sons until the news of her
faithfulness was brought to David, who gave back to her the bodies for
burial and for the last rites of sepulchre and sanctuary which mean so
much to all believers.

In the Civil War at Cold Harbor, Virginia, Sergeant LeRoy Williams of
the 8th New York Artillery, like Rizpah, saved the body of his dead
colonel and brought it back at the risk of his own life for honored
burial. During that terrible battle in one of the charges of his
regiment, his colonel was shot down close to the enemy's lines. When
the shattered remnants of the regiment rallied again after they had
been driven back by the entrenched Confederates, it was found that the
colonel was missing. Williams had a profound admiration and affection
for his colonel. When he found he was missing, he took an oath before
the men that were left that he would find him and bring him in dead or
alive. All the rest of that weary afternoon he crept back and forth
over the battle-field exposed to the fire of the enemy's
sharp-shooters. Again and again his life was saved almost by a miracle,
so close did the well-directed bullets strike. Finally just at twilight
close to the enemy's lines he found his colonel. He lay as he had
fallen, facing the entrenchments which he had fought so hard to win,
with a bullet through his heart. Within a few feet of where he lay the
Confederate pickets were stationed who watched the field and fired at
the least suspicious movement. Just as Williams identified the body, he
saw one of the sentries approaching in the dusk and had just time to
throw himself down with outstretched arms beside the dead officer when
the guard was upon him. Something in his attitude aroused the man's
suspicions and he prodded Williams in the back with his bayonet.
Fortunately the sharp steel struck him glancingly and only inflicted a
shallow wound and Williams had the presence of mind and the fortitude
to lie perfectly quiet without a motion or a sound to indicate that he
lived. The sentry passed on convinced that only dead men lay before
him. Williams waited until it became perfectly dark and started to drag
in the dead body of his officer. Inch by inch he crept away from the
enemy's lines in the darkness until he was far enough away so that his
movements could not be seen. All that weary night he dragged and
carried the rescued body of the dead officer until just at dawn he
brought it within the Union lines to receive the honors of a military
funeral.

Space fails to tell of the many brave deeds which gleam through the
blood of many a hard-fought field and shine against the blackness of
many a dark defeat. There was David L. Smith, a sergeant in Battery E
of the 1st New York Light Artillery, who, when a shell struck an
ammunition chest in his battery, exploding a number of cartridges and
setting fire to the packing tow, instead of running away from the
exploding cartridges which threatened every minute to set fire to the
fuses of some of the great shells, had the coolness and the courage to
bring a bucket of water and put out the flames as quietly as if he were
banking a camp-fire for the night.

There was Isaac Redlon, a private in the 27th Maine Infantry, who
shortly before the battle of Chickamauga was put under arrest for a
gross breach of discipline. Isaac saw a chance to wipe out the disgrace
which he had incurred. Instead of staying at the rear with the wounded
and other men under arrest, he managed to get hold of a rifle and
fought through the two terrible days of that disastrous battle. So
bravely did he fight, so cool was he under fire and so quick to carry
out and to anticipate every order that was given, that when the battle
was at last over, his captain decided that not only had Redlon wiped
out the memory of his former misdoing, but that he had earned the medal
which was afterward awarded to him.

Another man whose bravery wiped out his mistakes was Colonel Louis P.
DiCesnola of the 4th New York Cavalry. On June 17, 1863, he was under
arrest when the battle was joined at Aldie, Virginia. It was the
bitterest day that the colonel had ever known when in the guard-house
he watched his regiment go into action without him. He felt that he had
ruined his whole career and that his life through his folly and
hot-headedness was a complete failure. There was granted to him,
however, as there is to all of us, the opportunity to make amends.
While he was still moodily watching the progress of the battle,
suddenly he saw the men, whom he had so often led, waver. Then
stragglers began to slip back through the lines and suddenly the whole
regiment was in full retreat. Colonel DiCesnola did not hesitate a
moment.

"Open that door," he said to the guard. "I'll show those fellows how to
fight and I'll come back when it's all over."

Without a word the sentry unlocked the door and the colonel rushed out
just in time to meet the first rank of the flying men. Almost the first
man that he met was the officer who had taken his place, riding the
colonel's own horse. DiCesnola gripped the animal by the bridle.

"Get off that horse," he shouted, "and let some one ride him who knows
which way to go. He's not used to retreating," and before his
bewildered successor could answer, he was hurled out of the saddle and
Colonel DiCesnola was on the back of his own horse.

"About face, charge!" he thundered to his men. Most of them recognized
his voice and the familiar figure that so often led them and without
hesitating a moment, wheeled about and followed him toward the front.
Every few yards his troop was increased by men who were ashamed to ride
to the rear when they saw him charging to the front unarmed but waving
his hat and cheering them on. Before the Confederates could realize
what had happened they were fairly hurled off their feet by the
tremendous rush of hurtling men and horses. Of all the attacks which
are hard to withstand, the charge of a body of men who have rallied and
are trying to wipe out the shame of their retreat is most to be feared.
It was so here. Although the Confederates fought hard nothing could
hold back the rush of this cavalry regiment. They were led by their own
colonel who though unarmed stayed in the forefront of the battle. As
they finally broke through the Confederate line, a burly cavalryman
slashed at him with his sabre. Colonel DiCesnola stooped low to avoid
the cut, but the point of the sabre caught him on the right shoulder
and ripped deep into his chest while almost at the same moment he
received a pistol shot in his left arm which broke it. Unable to hold
the reins, he slipped forward and would have fallen to the ground, but
was held in his saddle by his first assailant who forced his horse up
close beside the colonel's and dashed back through the Confederate
lines carrying DiCesnola and his magnificent horse. There the colonel
was made prisoner, but was carefully nursed and by the time that he had
recovered his strength, was exchanged and rejoined his old regiment. He
reported to his general as still under arrest.

"You are mistaken," said the latter. "I saw the way you rallied your
men that day and when you were reported missing, we thought you had
been killed. The charges against you are dismissed and your record is
just as clean as it ever was and your old regiment is waiting for you."

The story of William W. Noyes, a private in the 2d Vermont Infantry,
and his charmed life is still told by the veterans who fought at
Spottsylvania. On that day the madness of battle came over him. When
that happens, life has no value except to spend it for the cause for
which one is fighting. Noyes' regiment had charged up to the
breastworks of the enemy from which was poured into the attacking
forces tremendous volleys. Noyes had charged with the others, but when
they stopped to rally at the breastworks preparatory to forcing them,
Noyes never paused. Right up the parapet he scrambled and stood on top
of the breastworks with his musket in full range of a thousand men.
Taking deliberate aim he shot the man just below him who was aiming his
gun at him not more than two yards away. In full sight of both armies
he stood there and loaded and fired no less than fifteen shots. Not one
of them missed its mark. It was in vain that the men all around him who
were exposed to his fire shot at him. The bullets cut through his
clothing, carried off his cap and one stripped the sights off his rifle
and ricochetted off the hammer itself, but not a wound did he receive.
His example spurred his comrades on and in a few minutes the whole
regiment struggled over the earthworks and drove out the garrison.

Joseph von Matre, a private in the 116th Ohio Infantry, did the same
thing at Petersburg on April 2, 1865, during the assault on Fort Gregg.
He climbed up the parapet and fired down into the fort as fast as his
comrades could pass up to him loaded guns. No bullet could harm him and
single-handed he drove the men out of that embrasure after killing
several and forced a gap which was filled by the men who climbed up
when he shouted down to them what he had done.

This chronicle of brave deeds would not be complete without the stories
of the men who were brave enough to disregard all odds either in
numbers or in circumstances. There was Delano Morey, a private in the
82d Ohio Infantry, who at McDowell, Virginia, found himself, after the
charge of the Confederates had been repulsed, with an empty gun and no
ammunition. Just in front of him were two of the enemy's sharp-shooters
who had been picking off the Union officers all through the charge.
Each of them was a dead shot and each of them had a loaded gun.
Menacing them both with his empty piece, Morey rushed forward and
called on them to surrender. The superb confidence of the man was too
much for them and without a word each of them handed him his loaded
rifle and walked meekly back with him as prisoners to the Union lines.

There was Frank W. Mills, a sergeant in a New York regiment, who while
scouting at Sandy Cross Roads in North Carolina, with only three or
four men under him, suddenly came upon a whole troop of the enemy.
Without orders and seemingly without the possibility of succeeding,
Mills charged down upon the Confederates at the head of his regiment,
consisting of four men. Courage took the place of numbers. The
Confederates scattered like sheep and Mills and his men rounded up no
less than one hundred and twenty prisoners who stacked their arms and
marched obediently into the Union lines.

Augustus Merrill, a captain in the 1st Maine Infantry, performed a
similar feat at Petersburg when with six men he captured sixty-nine
Confederate prisoners and recaptured and released a number of Union
soldiers whom they had made prisoners.

The 4th of May, 1863, was a great day for John P. McVean, a corporal in
the 49th Infantry. On that day at Fredericksburg Heights, Virginia, he
fought at the forefront of his company and when the order to charge was
given, outstripped them all, reached the Confederate lines entirely
alone, shot down the Confederate color-bearer, seized the colors and
fought back all attempts to retake them until his comrades could come
to his assistance. Later in the day he showed that he could be just as
brave away from the inspiration and excitement of battle. Between the
lines stood a barn which was occupied by a number of Confederate
sharp-shooters who were greatly annoying the Union forces by picking
off men at every opportunity. McVean's captain finally ordered his men
to charge on the barn and drive them out.

"Wait a minute, Captain," said the corporal; "I believe I can make
those fellows surrender without losing any men. Let me try anyway."

Without waiting for the captain to reply, the corporal laid down his
gun and alone and unarmed and beckoning as he walked with his hand
toward the barn, started for the sharp-shooters. Seeing that he was not
armed they allowed him to come within speaking distance.

"I have come to take you men prisoners," he said positively; "we don't
want to kill you, but if you don't come now, we are going to charge and
this is your last chance."

The men inside hesitated a minute, but there was such an air of supreme
confidence about McVean that first one and then another and then the
whole band of twelve men marched out and followed him back to the Union
lines. Once more a brave man had accomplished the impossible.

There were no braver men in all the Union Army than were found in the
ranks of the different batteries whose guns did so much to bring about
the final victory of the Union arms. The courage of our cannoneers, men
who saved the guns in spite of every attack and who often saved them in
many a defeat, has never been surpassed. The affection of a gunner for
the piece which he has manned and served in many a hard-fought battle
is like that which a cavalryman has for his horse. Like the rider, the
crew of a battery will risk all to save their gun. At Wilson's Creek,
Missouri, on August 10, 1861, Nicholas Broquet, a private in one of the
Iowa batteries, showed the spirit that was in him when the gun that he
was serving was disabled. The battery-horses had been shot down, all
the crew except himself had been killed by the tremendous fire of the
enemy and across the field appeared a detachment of the enemy's forces
sent to capture the gun. Broquet cut the traces of the dead horses,
rushed out between the lines in the face of a fierce fire and succeeded