Talons of Eagles (7 page)

The Union army had broken through the Rebel lines and very nearly put the Confederates in a rout. Jamie and his men were trapped.

When the news of the Confederate retreat reached the spectators behind the Union lines, they cheered and shouted and waved flags. Two divisions of Federal troops had now crossed Bull Run, and a third division was not far behind. General McDowell's goal for this day was to cross the turnpike and head straight for the railroad and seize it. Once there, he believed, he would have a clear route to Richmond.

For more than an hour, General McDowell rode up and down the ranks of his advancing Federal troops, a smile on his lips. He would occasionally shout triumphant words to his men, who grinned and waved their caps at him.

McDowell was certain the battle was very nearly won. Victory was his.

However, the Rebels had other plans.

Astonishingly enough, General Beauregard did not really know what was going on for some time. He was at his headquarters and could only occasionally hear some gunfire. But to his way of thinking, it was coming from the wrong direction. The bulk of his army was far to the right of the scene of the actual fighting.

He finally sent an aide to find out what was going on, and the aide returned, pale and shaken. “Our boys are in a rout!” he shouted. “The Yankees are hard upon us, sir!”

Beauregard was stunned into momentary silence. It was then that General Joe Johnston took over as commander of all Confederate forces in Northern Virginia. He grabbed the situation in a strong hand and began issuing orders.

It was just after noon, on the 21 st of July, 1861.

Jamie and his men, and the three-hundred-odd regular Rebel infantrymen with him were trapped in a pocket on the north side of the Warrenton Turnpike, with the stream called Young's Branch behind them. Jamie quickly counted heads. He had just over five hundred men, all armed with plenty of ammunition. He thought fast, knowing he had to get out of this pickle.

“Dupree,” Jamie said. “Take your company and act as vanguard. The infantry will be in the center of the column and Sparks' company behind that. I'll take ten men and try to plug up the hole that we make getting out of here. We'll cross the turnpike and throw up a line. If anything happens to me, you're in command. Now move out.”

Jamie turned to Little Ben Pardee. “Ben, ride like the wind and find whoever the hell is in command and tell them what I'm doing. Go, boy!”

Sparks' company just barely made it out before Union forces came charging into the thicket after them. Bad mistake. Jamie and the ten men with him opened up with rifles and pistols, and those Yankees who survived that fusillade decided it would be a very wise move to get gone from that area of the woods.

Jamie and his group found themselves alone and unchallenged as they crossed the turnpike and threw up a line on the south side. The heaviest fighting was about two miles away, to their right. Jamie and command found themselves with nothing to do. But that was not going to last long, for Little Ben came galloping back with orders from General Joe Johnston himself.

“Our boys have abandoned the line, Major,” Ben said, leaping off his horse. “Some South Carolina boys under the command of Colonel Hampton is on the way up to the front, and they damn near got stampeded over by those retreatin.' They're all alone, sir. General Johnston says if at all possible, get over there and lend a hand.”

Jamie turned to the infantrymen. “Shuck out of those heavy coats and tie them over a shoulder.” He looked at Sergeant Major Huske. “Top Soldier, double time them over to the fight. We'll see if we can't pull some Yankee stingers before you get there.”

“We'll be right behind you, sir.”

But the Federal forces hesitated in attacking. They had suffered terrible losses that morning, due to the stupidity of their leaders. When the battle first began, Evans' men were grossly outnumbered, and the Union leaders could have sent a division, or at least a brigade in to overwhelm the Gray by sheer numbers. They did not. They wasted human lives by sending small units in what amounted to suicide charges, instead of committing fully. Now they were simply unable to attack in anywhere close to full strength because their commands had been so badly mauled and chewed up.

But McDowell could muster about ten thousand troops . . . some six brigades, holding one in reserve. Still, McDowell did not attack immediately.

As Jamie and his Marauders were galloping toward the battle, General Jackson was moving there also, with five regiments of Rebel infantry. However, at the time, Jackson's 33rd Virginia wore blue uniforms, and some Union troops wore gray. Jackson later said, “It was a hell of way to fight a war.” Jackson instructed his men to tie white pieces of cloth around their arms so they would not be shooting each other.

One sage in the ranks got a withering look from Jackson when he called out, “You gonna tell them Yankees all dressed up in gray to do the same, sir?”

History does not record Jackson's reply, but it was probably rather salty.

Jackson formed up his men just behind the crest of a hill and waited. By now, parts of five batteries of Confederate artillery were in place, commanded by an Episcopal minister turned colonel.

He looked at the retreating line of Gray. “Give those gallant boys some support!” he thundered. “Fire!”

“Where the hell is Jackson?” a captain shouted out.

General Bee pointed to the crest of a hill. “Standing over there like a stone wall.”

Jackson's nickname was born.

Bee rallied his men and urged them on to one more charge, riding among them, waving his saber. It was to be his last effort of the Battle of Manassas. He was shot off his horse and died a short time later.

It was one o'clock in the afternoon.

Johnston and Beauregard arrived on the hill just after General Bee was killed and just in time to see Jamie's Marauders hit the Union troops on the left side of the line, firing their pistols point-blank and slashing with Bowie knives at the clearly startled Federal forces, who had not expected anything like this wild bunch of screaming men flying a pirate's flag. About three quarters of a mile behind the Marauders, the two generals could see several hundred Confederate soldiers double-timing their way toward the fight.

There was damn little for the commanding general to smile about that day, but he smiled at the battle flag of the Marauders and shook his head in disbelief at the bravery of the guerrillas and at the efforts of the battered men of Colonel Nathan Evans, who, with the action of the Marauders, was now able to regroup and fall back out of the Union trap.

Johnston watched as Jamie hand-signaled Sergeant Major Huske to position his men between the Union forces and the hill. Then Jamie and his Marauders galloped away to safety. The Marauders had lost two men dead and five wounded in this latest action.

Seeing what was happening right before their eyes, witnessing five hundred or so men abruptly stop the Yankee advance cold for a few moments, what was left of the Fourth Alabama once more surged forward, as Bartow managed to piece together what was left of his Georgia men and joined him. And the line held.

Moments after Jamie and his men staged their daring charge, Colonel Jubal Early and General Bonham's brigade rushed into battle, further strengthening the line. Within moments, Colonel Jeb Stuart's First Virginia Cavalry put some more steel into the Rebel defenses.

Jamie rode up the hill to Johnston. Johnston looked at him and said, “Fine work, Colonel MacCallister.”

“I'm a major, sir,” Jamie replied.

“Not any more, sir,” General Johnston said. “Pull your men back here to me and act as my guards while I set up a new HQ.”

He looked more closely at Jamie. “You've been wounded, Colonel.”

“In several places, General. But they're minor.” He waved toward the battle below them, a battle which was softening in sound and fury now as the Union forces were beginning to understand that their earlier jubilation at victory was a bit premature. “Nearly every man down there has a cut or a tear.”

“Indeed,” Johnston agreed. “Take over here, Pierre,” he said to Beauregard. “Come, Colonel.”

Jamie turned to his color bearer. “Case that flag, Jones.”

“Oh, no, Colonel,” Johnston said. “Let it fly. It helped to save the day. I'd feel proud to ride under its banner for a time.”

“Very well, sir.”

Johnston found new quarters for his HQ about three quarters of a mile behind the front while Beauregard began repositioning his men as reinforcements arrived. The Forty-ninth Virginia marched onto the scene, plus about a dozen other companies from various units. Beauregard stiffened left and right flanks and rode up and down the line, quietly talking to his men, urging them to stand and hold.

By mid-afternoon, Beauregard now had about seven thousand men on the line and several batteries of cannon placed on the crests of hills, and the Union troops were ready for a charge.

“That's fine with me,” Stonewall Jackson said, and ordered his men to fix bayonets.

Meanwhile, Jamie had pulled in his reserve to bring his two companies of Marauders up to strength. But Johnston ordered him to hold his people around his HQ, saying he had other plans for the Marauders.

At the front, the Yankees began their charge against Stonewall's position.

“Let them come,” Jackson told his men. “Let them come.”

Just as the Union troops were close enough to be almost eyeball to eyeball with the Rebels on the hills and ridges, Jackson ordered his men to stand and fire.

It was slaughter for the Federal troops. Jackson's men cut them down with volley after volley, and the Union troops broke and ran.

The first reported civilian to die in the battle was killed by enemy artillery. Yankee gunners believed the house to be a stronghold of Rebels and poured round after round into the home, blowing a leg off of an elderly, bed-ridden woman. She died a few hours later. The man responsible for ordering the shelling of the civilian home was later made a general in the Union army.

A Virginia regiment, one of the few whose uniforms were blue, began an advance on a Federal artillery and infantry position. The commander of the Union forces mistakenly thought they were Federal reinforcements. The advancing troops were less than fifty yards away when the Union commander realized they were Confederate troops. But it was too late. The Rebels swarmed over the position and slaughtered the Union troops, seizing valuable cannons, powder, shot, shells, and horses. What remained of the Union troops fled.

Many of the Federal troops at the front began retreating, some in wild panic as the battle now turned. The Southerners, although badly outnumbered, had begun fighting with a ferocity that was frightening to the Northern troops. The fear spread as those retreating mingled with inexperienced fresh troops coming up from the rear.

The Federal commanders finally stopped the retreat before it got completely out of hand and pushed their men back to the front with threats and curses and taunts.

The cheering of the hundreds of civilians behind the front had ceased when the retreating began, now it resumed as the Yankees rallied.

For the next three hours, the battle lines changed and shifted, and positions were lost, retaken, lost again, and retaken many times. In many areas along the front, the fighting was cut and slash with bayonet, saber, and Bowie knife, eyeball to eyeball and nose to nose; so close the men of the Blue and Gray could smell the sweat and the fear of the other. The Rebels would use the captured cannon against the Yankees; the Yankees would retake the pieces and use them against the Rebels without having to move the cannon except to turn them around.

Johnston kept MacCallister's Marauders close to his HQ until one event caused the general to call Jamie in and ask him to lead his men briefly into battle. It appeared Beauregard himself was so caught up in the heat of battle he personally led the Fifth Virginia in a wild charge up a hill, waving his saber and cursing the Yankees. He and his men took the hill and captured more Union artillery pieces. They turned the cannon around and began shelling the retreating Federal forces.

“Colonel, take some of your men and get my field commander off that damn hill, please!”

Jamie personally escorted a reluctant-to-leave Beauregard off the hill just as Colonel Frances Bartow, commander of the Seventh Georgia, was shot through the chest. He died urging his men to never give up.

Men on both sides were dropping not only from grievous wounds, but from the terrible heat of the day, choked with dust and arid gunsmoke. Drinkable water was scarce, and besides, the battle was so intense, no one had the time to waste drinking what water could be found. The creeks were running red with blood from the bodies of the Blue and the Gray.

Johnston came up to view the battle from atop a high hill and told Beauregard to stay with him. “I need you,” was his explanation.

“They could overwhelm us at any time,” Jamie muttered. “But they don't. Why?”

Why indeed? Why, because McDowell would never commit his Union troops to a charge in anything other than brigade strength. He needlessly lost several hundred lives because of his timidity. But even had he committed all his troops, he might not have won the battle, for the Rebels were fighting for loved ones and homeland, and there is no stronger incentive to stand or die.

As one Union brigade was driven back, another took its place, and they, too, were driven back by the men of the Gray. The New York Highlanders charged up a hill and were slaughtered by Rebel rifle fire and the lowered barrels of point-blank cannon using grapeshot.

It was four o'clock in the afternoon when McDowell finally called up his unbloodied reserves, men from Vermont and Maine, nearly four regiments strong. But by now the Union lines were so disorganized and confused, with commanders from the company level up and the essential sergeants wounded, dead or missing, McDowell was about to hurl his last fresh troops into and through the gates of death, the gate masters the men of the Gray.