The Face of Heaven (39 page)

But midnight brought Levi and the platoon only darkness and exhaustion. He grabbed Nip and made a half-hearted foray into the woods and meadows but they returned without anything to show for their efforts except canteens full of water from a hayfield.

“It tastes better than the mud,” he whispered to Nathaniel.

“Only in your imagination,” Nathaniel replied.

“Did you see Lyndel tonight?”

“She’s too far back. I have no idea where her wagon is. Posting her a letter would find her more quickly than my stomping around in the dark.”

“Bet you tried for a while anyway, didn’t you, Lieutenant?”

“A while, Sergeant. But after almost getting shot by the third picket I decided to lie down on this Virginia ground and get a farm boy’s rest.”

The next day the heat whipped their backs as mud holes and wheel
ruts continued to offer the only opportunities to wet their mouths. The food was crackers and potatoes and hardtack. When they got meat dished up it was salt pork that made their thirst worse.

Levi swore he would find Rebel chicken and well water that night but Bealeton Station on the Orange and Alexandria railway tracks stymied him.

Sunday morning they were up before daylight and marched in coolness for a few hours before the sun hammered the road and dust filled the air. At nine that night they stopped to build fires and make coffee, Captain Hanson’s brew having never been blacker or rougher, then marched another five miles on the coffee until sunrise brought them to a breakfast stop, where everyone was too exhausted to eat and just collapsed. Three hours later Nathaniel and Nicolson and Hanson were shaking shoulders and the First Corps was on the move once again to Manassas Junction, a mile away.

“What happened here?” asked Groom.

“We covered the army’s retreat as usual,” said Ham.

“Is that all?”

“No. That’s not all. This is the same place, right by the rail line here, that we camped the morning after Brawner’s Farm. And yonder—” Ham pointed. “Yonder is Brawner’s Farm. We fought Stonewall’s best there and never gave an inch until our good old General Pope made us withdraw and give them a mile. I’d walk you over there but we don’t have the time and I’m too tired. Besides, that’s where Corinth King died.”

“I’m sorry,” Groom responded.

Another five miles and General Reynolds stopped the corps so they could brew more pots of coffee. This time they used Bull Run Creek water. It had the look of Confederate uniforms, thought Nathaniel, and no wonder, since the South had won so many victories here. The coffee bought them another three hours on the road until they reached Centreville and cold water that the men gulped down, their mouths thick with dust and silt. They set up camp for the rest of the day, Monday the 15th, and before the sun had set Nathaniel was on Libby and looking for his wife.

It took almost half an hour but he spotted her red hair and white
kapp
in a cluster of ambulances and horses and galloped to her, jumping out of his saddle and swinging her in a circle.

“I thought,” she laughed, “you’d be too hot and tired to come looking for me.”

“I am. Libby found you.”

“How are your men holding up?”

“Very well. But let’s just say I thank our God this place has decent water.”

Lyndel kissed him and then stroked Libby’s flank. “The poor dear must have needed fresh water as badly as the boys.”

“She did.”

“How is my brother?”

“Levi’s fine. When I left him he was washing his face and hair.”

“Ah. My clean and tidy brother.”

Nathaniel ran his thumb gently over her eyebrows. “Tell me. Is everything all right between the two of you?”

“Why shouldn’t it be?”

“Nicolson offered Levi his horse so he could ride with me to find you and Levi said no. That’s not what he would have done a month ago.”

Lyndel looked down. “It’s something I have to fix.”

“I can’t stay long. Will you ride back with me?”

“Oh, no, I can’t—”

“The men have blisters. You would be helping us out if you took care of a few.”

“They’ll set up a station here for the regiment and the brigade—”

“Lyndy.” He kissed her blue eyes. “I need an excuse to have my wife around. And I want her around. Another day and we’ll be off again and marching as rapidly as we can. As far as your brother goes, bear in mind an engagement could come at any time. Washington is just to the east of us and Lee’s forces are only a matter of miles to the west. We’re racing to head him off. Eventually we’re going to collide.”

“All right.” She made her pixie face without being aware of it. “I’m not dressed for riding, though. I’ll need to sit sidesaddle.”

“Sidesaddle with my arm around you.”

“How is the cut on your arm?”

“Right as rain.”

“Let me get a few bandages and instruments.”

The sky was crimson as they rode into the 19th Indiana’s camp. The first person she saw was her brother, standing and talking with, of all people, the commander of the First Corps, General Reynolds, surrounded by his retinue of officers.

As she dismounted the general moved along to see how other units were faring. Levi was smiling as he watched him go. He turned and was surprised by Lyndel’s presence and lost some of his good humor, but not all of it.

“I didn’t know he was born in Lancaster,” he said to Nathaniel. “Isn’t that something? And he didn’t know he had Pennsylvanians in his Indiana regiment thanks to the good Amish of Elkhart County.”

Lyndel stood before him. “You don’t have to pretend I’m not here.”

“I see you.”

“Can we go someplace and talk?”

“Here’s fine.”

“All right.” She didn’t approach him. “I take after Father more than Mother, you know that. I have some of his good points and some of his bad. My temper is my own—and my discomfort with this war and the position it’s put us in. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to make peace with our parents. But I would like to make peace with you. You are my brother. I love you. I’m proud you have the courage to make such a sacrifice and bear arms, a sacrifice that includes losing your relationship with our father and mother and relatives, possibly for all time.

“I don’t like the war. I don’t like the grieving it brings to families in Louisiana and Mississippi and Massachusetts. But I’m grateful that it put Moses Gunnison in uniform and gave him a chance to finally fight for his freedom. I’m grateful that my brother isn’t afraid to fight for that same liberty for others who will never know his name. I don’t want you to love war or worship the army and I don’t think that’s what you want to do. You’re eager to get your hands on the plow and complete the task. I misunderstood and lashed out at you as Father might,
but the words were my own. Perhaps you don’t wish to be reconciled. If not, I’ll see to those in your company who have particularly difficult blisters and be on my way. But I’ll continue to pray for you, my brother. And…I am sorry.”

She waited a moment but Levi didn’t respond. Turning away she removed the bandages and medical instruments from the saddlebags on Nathaniel’s mare and walked toward Ham and Jones and Plesko, who were sitting on a patch of grass about a hundred feet away.

“Nurse.”

Lyndel stopped and looked at Levi. “What is it?”

Levi dropped down and pulled his boots off. “No one in the Army of the Potomac has blisters like I do. I could use your help here. If you don’t mind.”

Lyndel came slowly to her brother. “I don’t mind.”

She squatted by him to examine his toes. “You do have some pretty big ones, it’s true. I’m going to lance them and wipe them with alcohol and wrap them. You’re going to have to stay off your feet for as long as you can.”

“The way we’ve been marching that may only be another fifteen minutes.”

“Even so, that will help.”

Her head drew close to his as she brought a large needle to bear. He smiled at her. “Go easy on me, Ginger. I have a healthy dose of Papa and Mama’s stubbornness too. I could have come to you at any time to make things right between us. I’m sorry I didn’t. I love you.”

Tears slipped down her cheeks. “Oh, this is no good. Now I can’t see properly. Why do you have to be such a gentleman? It’s one of Nathaniel’s greatest faults too.”

“Come here, sister.”

Levi held her in his arms. Nathaniel smiled and then laughed.

“Is this funny?” asked Levi.

“What’s funny is our company.”

Levi glanced over his shoulder. All the men in the company had their boots and socks off and their bare feet were sticking out in front of
them, ready for Lyndel’s examination and ministrations. Levi couldn’t stop from laughing either.

“What is it?” demanded Lyndel, pulling free. “Can’t a sister have a good cry in her brother’s arms anymore?”

“It seems there’s nothing like a redheaded nurse,” replied Levi. “You’ll keep the Army of the Potomac on the march single-handed.”

The troops stayed where they were through the night and the next day. But word soon came that Lee’s Second Corps, commanded by Richard Ewell, had crossed the Potomac at Williamsport on Monday the 15th and were heading north into Pennsylvania.

Monday was the day the Iron Brigade and other units had arrived in Centreville. Once the Union soldiers received the news, they filled their canteens and got as much rest as they could, aware their fast march would begin again in the morning. Wednesday the 17th was like fire, and men dropped by the roadside as they were pushed north under the fierce sun. Morganne and Lyndel lifted the heads of the fallen soldiers and put canteens to their lips.

Day after day, through heat or rainstorm, the regiments were hurried toward Maryland and Pennsylvania. On June 25th they crossed the Potomac at Edwards Ferry at the same time as the rest of Lee’s army was crossing at Sharpsburg and the Antietam battlefield. They passed through towns and villages where crowds cheered and young women tossed bouquets of flowers and schoolchildren gazed in awe at the men in tall black hats. On the 27th the Iron Brigade reached South Mountain and made camp. This time Ham showed Groom where the brigade had fought and received its name.

The stone wall they had charged was still there. War and weather hadn’t broken it down. But the wooden boards that marked the Union dead were barely readable and the graves overgrown with tall grass. Ham walked Groom over the slope the 19th Indiana had run up, with balls kicking up mud or snapping past their heads.

“We put a knot in General Lee’s plans that day,” Ham said. “We kept him from Pennsylvania.”

“But this time he
is
in Pennsylvania, Corporal.”

“And Pennsylvania’s as far as he gets. You’ll be part of stopping him. It could be a fight as memorable as South Mountain, Private.”

He caught Groom’s look of dismay at the soldiers’ graves that had nearly been blotted out.

“Never mind,” Ham said. He turned toward the weathered boards. “We remember you. Your comrades in arms always remember you.”

On the 28th they marched through another ecstatic flag-waving crowd in Frederick and camped there overnight. The news came to them that Hooker had resigned due to a dispute with the General-in-Chief in Washington and that George Meade now commanded the Army of the Potomac. The 29th took the Union troops through heavy rain to Emmitsburg.

On the last day of June, the 19th Indiana became the first infantry in the Army of the Potomac to cross the state line into Pennsylvania. There the long march ended—the Iron Brigade bivouacked at Marsh Creek while the 19th were sent ahead to picket the road north. Most of the Indiana troops encamped at the village of Green Mount but four companies were sent farther ahead to keep watch for Rebel forces. One of them was Nathaniel’s.

“The farmers say the secesh are all around us,” Ham muttered as he checked his Springfield for the fourth time to make sure it was loaded. “Lee’s got his whole army up here and ours is still back in Maryland.”

“Don’t be getting cold feet, Corporal,” chided Captain Hanson as he walked his horse past. “The Iron Brigade’s enough to keep Lee at bay for a few hours.”

“With a bit of work, sir.”