USA > Pennsylvania > Northampton County > History of the One hundred and fifty-third regiment Pennsylvania volunteers infantry which was recruited in Northampton County, Pa., 1862-1863 > Part 18
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through our line .... I fired my gun and as I was taking a cart- ridge a man behind me was shot. He fell half his length ahead of me, his face towards me. Here was the only time in my life when I tried to look cross-eyed. I was trying to get a cartridge into the muzzle of my gun on my left and watch that fellow dying on my right .... and just at this moment the man on my left was killed .... the thought occurred that I might be the next ; and there was no use being excited about it .... there was no running, but good, solid fighting. We had fired four or five rounds when I heard the order to fall back. Just at this time I was very much interested in a Rebel color-bearer. The enemy was only two or three rods from us. Our line was broken in the left and our right was attacked in flank. There was nothing left for us to do but to retire or surrender. The only protection on our right flank was the men with Lieutenant Barnes and Orderly Sergeant Seiple of our company .... We were ordered to fall back, but I did not obey this order with the rest of the regiment, for I was very much interested in the color-bearer .... he was coming through the creek in front of us. The creek was about twenty feet wide, and about three feet deep ... . he was yelling like an Indian. At the time I was returning ramrod. ... I thought for the moment I will fix him as soon as I can get a cap on my gun, but while I was placing the cap I changed my mind as the thought occurred he could do very little harm with that Rebel rag, that I had better shoot a man with a gun. There was a low fence between us-about four or five rails high-and about two rods in our front. A Johnnie reb was a little in advance of the wild color-bearer, with his gun at trail arms, and was about reaching for the top rail with his left hand, which was about hip high. When I fired he struck his hand against his side and dropped. He did not come over the fence. Up to this time I had been down on my right knee with my left one cocked, which gave me a very good rest for my elbow in firing. After I had stopped the reb on the other side of the fence, I arose and drew a cartridge, and while I was tearing it, I looked to the rear and our men had all fallen back about two rods, firing as they retired. This gave me
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a good view of those that were left dead on the first line of battle. It presented a regular swath of blue coats, as far as I could see along the line. They were piled up in every shape, some on their backs, some on their faces, and others turned and twisted in every imaginable shape. There was a dead man on each side of me. As I stood between those two lines of battle, viewing the windrow of human dead composed of my old comrades, it pre- sented a picture which will never fade from my memory while I remain on earth-a picture which tongue cannot tell nor pen describe. The bullets were whistling about like hail. I seemed to wear a charmed life, and the bullet was not yet made that could hit me. But I was soon undeceived. I had not gotten back much over two rods when I felt something strike my left knee, as we were in the woods I thought a bullet had struck a chip, and that the chip had hit me on the knee. When I looked at my knee I saw a bullet hole in my pants. I had not gone over five steps when I felt a similar sensation in my other knee. This one had cut a little deeper, which I discovered by pulling up my leg. I was between two brush piles as we were passing out of the woods ... . after I was hit the second time, I went over the brush pile and toward the enemy, into an open field. It was a very hot place as we were under two cross-fires and a good fire from the rear. Both balls that hit me were from the cross-fire. There was a battery about three or four hundred yards in our rear on what they call Barlow's Knoll now. It was at this place we were ordered to fall back. I expected we would fall back to this place and there make a stand. But as soon as I got out of the woods I saw the battery was limbered up and was retiring. This was not all I saw. The first thing to mention was my partner Chunky. He was about a rod ahead of me wading through a stream of bullets. I thought Chunky was all right, that his legs were so slim no bullet could touch them. But he must have been in- jured just after I saw him, and was hit after all; his leg was saved, but he was left a cripple for life. He lay on the field all that night and was not picked up until the next day. There was a young fellow in our company by the name of Trombower, and just as we were coming out of the woods he stepped up along-
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side of a big oak and drew up his gun to fire. Instead of going behind the tree he stood beside it and leaning his gun against the tree said, 'Come boys, let us give them what they deserve.' Just at that instant a ball passed through his right shoulder, his gun dropped, and I will not attempt to describe the looks on his face, which had wonderfully changed in a second. But he was inade of the good old stuff, and worked the gun up against his other shoulder and fired.
Everybody has heard of Jake Snyder's ride, but nobody has heard of John Snyder's run, or retreat, at Gettysburg. We had an old fellow in the company by the name of John Snyder, whom nobody supposed could be moved to go faster than a walk. He was hard of hearing, and being too slow for drill, he was used for doing the chores about camp. But he always carried a gun. He was good enough to go into battle, for he could stop a bullet as good as anybody. Just as I came out of the woods I looked toward where the battery had been posted on the hill and I saw John Snyder in full retreat, with his head drawn down behind his knapsack and his heels flying. He was the only man in our company that I saw running at Gettysburg. It is true that we were driven back for two miles. After I got into the open field, I took that way out. Our right was now our left in retiring .. .. I here saw a long line of the enemy closing in on our right (or what had been our right in advancing). This line of battle, over a mile long, was closing in on us like a gate. By the time our troops had gotten on Barlow's Knoll I had worked myself along in a straight line with the red barn at the Almshouse. To my right our troops were dropping like flies, and to my left was that solid line advancing and firing. I was at no time one hundred yards from the Rebel line. I passed along their front for nearly a mile till I got to the red barn. Long before I got to the barn, I could hear the voice of General von Gilsa. He was dismount- ed. A bay horse came along the line with saddle and bridle on. The general called on the men to catch his horse, which was soon surrounded and the general was in his saddle in less than a minute. By the twitches of the horse's tail the old man must
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have been tickling the horse with his spurs. It did not take him long to form a line of battle about half way between our first position and the town. He rode up and down that line through a regular storm of lead, meantime using the German epithets so common to him. I could hear the words 'rally boys'. ... This line was ordered to fall back before I got into it, which still left me between two fires. I finally got to the red barn, where the highest post fence I had ever seen confronted me. I threw my gun over it, then commenced to climb it, but it was quite a job to get over that fence with my lame leg. How I would have lik- ed to enter that barn for rest, but I must move on or be taken prisoner. When I got around the barn I niet Captain Howell .... and Lieutenant Walton of Company H, both members of my regiment. Howell took me by the left arm and Walton by the right, which was a great improvement, and I felt very much pleased with my escort, but it did not last long. The captain stated how he was wounded, and presently the lieutenant fell from a wound and came near dragging me with him. Walton was a large man, weighing about two hundred and forty pounds. Barnes and Beidelman tried to lift Walton into a window, and being very heavy they could not lift him. They pressed two big privates into the service, and I kept on as the enemy was only about fifty yards behind us. After this I met Feldy. A piece of a shell had struck his knee-cap and he was quite lame .... after getting into the town I saw a young lady with a pail of water, and as I was very thirsty I stopped to take a drink. While I was in the act of drinking I looked toward the back end of the house and at the back porch I saw Captain Meyers of our regi- ment. He was seated on a chair, his head hanging on his chest and his hands by his side. We both concluded he could not live long. The lady invited me into the house, but I thanked her and told her that the enemy was not far behind and that I did not wish to be captured. This was the last time I saw the captain. Some years ago I saw an article in the National Tribune, written by Captain Meyers of Kansas, and that was the first that I knew he was still alive and that he had been shot through the lungs. I retreated until I got to York Street. Here I came up to and
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through our line of battle, which must be a mile and a half from our first line of battle. I found General Gilsa just in the rear of the line, and as the men came into the line, those who were not wounded were ordered to rally on their colors, and I was ordered into the hospital. About this time I here saw the actions of a man which I could not understand. He had his gun on his shoulder, the line of battle could not stop him; the pro- vost marshal could not stop him; I saw a cavalryman strike at him with his sabre which barely missed his head, being warded off by the gun barrel on which the blow struck fire. But this thing in the shape of a man did not wink or dodge, but marched through the guard as if there was nothing in his line of retreat ; and for all I know he is still retreating. Instead of going to the hospital .... I sat down on a stone mounting block by the curb. I was too tired to think of any danger, for I felt confident that this was the end of the retreat for the present. I saw a brigade of infantry and a battery of artillery were coming up the street and going into action not eight rods from where I was seated .. An amusing sight was to see the batteries cross the stone wall. The fence had been thrown down, leaving it about two feet high, and these batteries came over the fence on a dead run. There was fun to see the cannoneers bounce. They unlimbered in short order, and were warming the Rebs in great shape .... I thought it was no more than right and proper that they should be encouraged a little .... I made noise enough to attract the at- tention of General von Gilsa, who told me to get back to a hos- pital, for if I did not they would kill me where I was .... I saw a red flag on a church on the southeast corner of the town . I found the house full. I saw a sight which I will never forget. I should call it a slaughter-house. There must have been ten or twelve amputation tables in this room .... they were all busy ... . the doctors had their sleeves rolled up to their shoul- ders and were covered with blood. I saw all I wanted to of this part, and I climbed the stairs to the floor above. I found an empty pew .... an old doctor came through the church and told us that all who could travel should get out of the church .... that our line was breaking again .... I saw there was no chance
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for a cripple to get out of the church, so I went back to my pew and waited for service to commence. The first thing I did was to destroy my cartridges ... . a guard came through and relieved me of my gun.
On investigating the position of the Union line of battle I saw they were in possession of a stone wall or fence running from Cemetery Ridge to Culp's Hill. This line they held till the end of the battle ... . It was after 4 o'clock p. m. and as I had but a light breakfast and no dinner, I thought I would have something to eat. When I opened my haversack I encountered a terrible stench. On further investigation I found that the ration of fresh beef which we had drawn the night before and cooked, I had forgotten to salt and it had spoiled. I asked a fellow to throw it out of the window. I could not eat the hard-tack for they were flavored by the meat. So I divided them between the boys who had arms and legs off. I think I would have eaten those hard-tack myself before I got out of that place, for I saw nothing to eat until the morning of the 4th, which made it just three days on an empty stomach. All we had for those days was tea made from leaves my partner got off some mint growing on the graves back of the church. It was nearer a grave-yard tea. Feldy was very uneasy about Chunky. They were brothers. I told him where I had seen him last, and he was all right. But Feldy was not satisfied, and the next morning he went back to where I had seen him last. He found him wounded, as I had described before. There were but three of my Company in the church-Sergeant John Seiple, Feldy and myself. Seiple was wounded through the wrist and very nearly through the thigh. His wrist was shattered and his courage low .... Seiple was a good soldier, and during the first day's fight and retreat did all any man could do to keep the company in order and retreat in order, until he was wounded. I left Seiple in the church after the battle and learned that he died three or four days after I left, with lockjaw. (The writer saw him die in the 11th Corps hospital).
The man in the pew just back of me was shot in the foot ..
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he turned out to be an old acquaintance of mine .... about four years before this meeting we had worked together on a farm. He belonged to the 72d or 74th Pa., and the man in the pew in front of me had a flesh wound in the hip. He belonged to the 134th N. Y. This man's whole conversation was about home. If he were only at home. I got very tired of his talk and told him they were getting along at home without him. I tried every way I could to draw his mind from home, but he was the worst home- sick man I ever saw. I think it was on the second day he got sort of childish. He wanted me to hold his hands, and I gave him some short answer. He turned around and laid his arm on the rail of the pew in front of him as if he were going to sleep. I thought he had gone to sleep, having been quiet for half an hour, when a doctor came through the aisle and asked us if there was anything he could do for us. I told him to look at the New York man, for he had not said anything for half an hour, and that I thought he was dead. The doctor looked at him and found him dead and stiff ..... I looked out of the window. The Rebel line of battle had settled down not over a rod from the church, and old glory was waving over the stone wall, but between the lines the sharpshooters were banging away until night put a stop to the fighting .... The night in a hospital after a battle I will not attempt to describe .... I heard cheering in the Union lines in the night, and by it knew that reinforce- ments had come up .... so the night wore away until just about. daylight, when the cannon opened up and left us know that they were still with us.
The morning of the 2d of July, I got down stairs to see what was going on. Here I met a Johnnie on guard. He belonged to a North Carolina regiment and as he seemed to be a nice kind of a Reb I struck up a conversation with him. I asked what the cheering meant in the Union lines. I had an opinion of my own, but I wanted his. He told me that it was reported that General Mcclellan was in command of the Army of the Potomac, and if such was the case that the Rebel army had better pull out and leave, that Mack would surely lick them. He said there was
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no use fighting the North, for he had never seen such a rich country as Pennsylvania, and that our towns were yet full of men, in fact a fellow would not miss those that were in the army. I told him that we could fight the South for the next twenty years, and still have lots of men at home to do the farming. I was giving him a bluff. I told him that he had better stay north when the Rebel army retreated south, which they would in a day or two. That our people would not kill him and that he should stay north till the war was over. He told me that the old flag was good enough for him, that he lived in a rented house, and never owned a negro, that he would take my advice and stay north but for one thing. He had a wife and two children. .. . and if he did stay north, and the Rebels found it out they would use his family meaner than dogs ... .
After this conversation .... I went back upstairs. My pew was so situated as to come between two windows. The brick wall protected me from stray bullets that occasionally came through the windows. I had a grand view of the greater part of the battlefield .... I could see both sides pitted against each other, but the main fighting during the day was out by the Peach Orchard, Wheat Field and Devil's Den and Round Top. Of course I was too far from these places to see much of it, but at the same time the fighting was coming nearer to where I was, and a little before sundown I saw a stir and a moving about of the Rebs under the window where I was sitting, as if they were getting ready for some kind of a move. I also saw them drink- ing out of a barrel. The head of the barrel was knocked in. One would get a tin cup full and three or four would drink out of the same cup before it was empty. It could not have been water, for a tin of water would not have so many drinks in it. It was straight whiskey and they were getting ready to charge the Eleventh Corps. It was between sundown and dark when they started in three lines of battle. Between the Rebel and Union positions was a ridge about six or eight feet high. The Johnnies started stooped over, scattered like a drove of sheep, till they got to this ridge. Then every man took his place, and
.
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giving the Rebel yell, by this time our grape and canister began to plow gaps through their ranks. They closed up like water, and advanced on a double-quick. This was a very in- teresting sight to me, for I was sitting back and looking on .... no one can see much of a fight while he is in it. To see grape and canister cut gaps through ranks looks rough. I could see heads, arms, and legs flying amid the dust and smoke .... it re- minded me much of a wagon load of pumpkins drawn up a hill and the end gate coming out, and the pumpkins rolling and bounding down the hill. The only fault I found with this charge was that it got dark too soon, and I could not see the end of it.
This charge was made by Early's division of Ewell's Corps, and was led by the famous Louisiana Tigers. The moment they emerged to view Stevens to the right opened with all his guns and Wiedrick and Ricketts joined in the chorus. The slaughter was terrible. It got dark, still the fight was on .* I watched the batteries on Cemetery Hill shelling the woods on the right of Culp's Hill till way into the night. I slept awhile and some- where about II o'clock yelling around the church woke me. I did not know whether our men held their position or not, but was anxious to know the result. But as I could get no information and the cannonading stopped I went to sleep again. I woke up before daylight. The cannonading commenced about three o'clock. I was longing for daylight and trying to see if our line was still at the stone wall. As soon as I could see I saw long lines of Rebel infantry moving around Culp's Hill on the Union right. There the battle opened just at the break of day. This
*While at the State Encampment of the G. A. R., at Gettysburg, June, 1900, the writer met several citizens who gave him very valuable infor- mation respecting the attack of the Louisiana Tigers on Cemetery Hill on the evening of July 2, 1863. Mr. Amos U. Miller, No. 218 West Middle Street, Gettysburg, at whose old-fashioned home many of the comrades lodged during the encampment, accompanied the writer to the said church, where, by the courtesy of R. M. Elliot, the janitor, we were taken to the identical window from which our informant, Mr. Ruch, watched the assault on that memorable evening of the battle. The place was pointed out where the Rebel troops formed in the low ground near the old prison.
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was an infantry fight, and one continual rattle of musketry, and continued till nearly noon. But as soon as it was light enough to see our line I saw old glory still on the stone wall. I went downstairs to interview the guard, but this fellow was not as pleasant as the North Carolinian. I said to him you are shoving in your infantry on our right this morning. 'Yas,' he said, 'there was a regiment or so in thare.' He was mad at the Eleventh Corps. His answer was that they had killed too many of their men the night before. I told him that turn about was fair play. He wanted to know what I meant. I asked if they did not lick the Eleventh Corps at Chancellorsville. He answered, 'Yes we did.' And didn't you lick two divisions of the Eleventh! Corps day before yesterday? I told him the Eleventh Corps owed them another licking to get even with them. He thought I was about right ... ..
I retired upstairs and watched the Rebel sharp-shooters. I saw one get on the roof of a two-story house. He was firing over the chimney, and I thought it a bad position. If he were to get hit and stunned the fall would kill him. He had fired four rounds and was getting ready for another, and in the act of looking over the chimney was hit and fell off the gable end. After the battle I looked up the fellow to see where he was hit, and found that a ball had pierced his forehead .... After the infantry fighting on the right things were very quiet until about 2 o'clock, when a sul- phuric tornado of shells broke loose. The Rebels opened the ball with a hundred and fifty cannon and the Unions replied with nearly one hundred. The brick church was rocking and the windows rattling as though there was an earthquake. This lasted one hour and three quarters. I saw lots of men turn pale. In a joking way I asked Sergeant Seiple to go out and stop the noise. But the fun was all out of him, and he answered me very solemnly that we had better leave them alone .... The church was not a very safe place, for we did not know what minute some of these shells would come down through the roof .... but when the end came another grand view came. This was Picketts' charge .... I had a good view of this. .... This was the
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end of the heavy fighting at Gettysburg. It was not long after this till we received a call from a Rebel doctor and Major re- questing all those who could walk to get out and start for Rich- mond .... the old doctor pronounced me unable to travel, and they made out a parole for me. ... The Rebel army left us during the night .... I was not sorry when they were gone. The citi- zens of the town paid us a visit and brought with them baskets of bread, ham, and apple butter. After breakfast we got orders for all who could to leave the town .... Before I left Dr. Stout filled my pockets with bandages, lint, and sticking plaster. He told me I would find lots of the boys who had not yet seen a doctor, and that I could dress a wound as well as anybody, and to keep plenty of water on the wounds. I came to Gettysburg a mere private, and when I left I was a sort of full-fledged doctor. I had two ramrods for canes, and my face had not been washed for four days, my pants were ripped for two feet on the outside seam .... so I started out with professional dignity. I struck Baltimore Street and started for Cemetery Hill. To get to the hill I had to walk stooped over, as the bullets from the sharp- shooters were whizzing over my head. The Rebs were keeping up a bold front.
I got back to where Picketts' charge had been repulsed the day before. The sight was horrble. The dead Rebs were hang- ing on the stone wall and on both sides of the fence it was full of dead men. On the Union side they were being carried into rows. They had three rows started and it reminded me of gathering the sheaves in a harvest field. I took a seat on a large stone near the wall and watched the men at their work for over an hour. Then started on for the rear, and must have gotten back about two miles from the town when I came to a barn. Of course the barn doors were open, and I asked a man where I could find the Eleventh Corps hospital. Just as I spoke I heard voices in the barn which was full of wounded .... the boys of our regiment who were there cheered for me, and said they had room for me. The reason why I had such a reception was that it had been reported that I was killed. This barn was full of
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