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The route of the retreating.army was directly ing in hopeless defeat to save their lives. The through the heart of White Oak Swamp. Mul-order was not issued, and it is due to General titudes of wounded men hobbled along in the M'Clellan to state that he testifies, before the melancholy train. All the ambulances which same committee, that he had no recollection of could be found were loaded with such sufferers having given such an order.* as it was possible to move. A large number who could not be moved were left to the tender mercies of the enemy.

The sun of the Sabbath morning, June 29, rose over this scene of tumult and consternation. It ushered in one of the most glaring The rebels, not fully comprehending the plans and sultry of summer days. The heat was all of General M'Clellan, were at this time confi- but insupportable. One hour after midnigl.t dent of his capture, and of the destruction of his General M‘Clellan, with his staff and escort, left whole army. He had abandoned his intrench-Savage's Station, and, advancing five or six ments on the north side of the Chickahominy. miles, established his head-quarters at White His disordered divisions, in long extended lines, Oak Swamp. General Smith was intrusted with were in all the confusion of a tumultuous re- the post of honor-the charge of the rear. He treat. He was cut off from all communication was to beat the pursuing enemy back until the with the base of his supplies at the White House. wagons were at a safe distance, and was then The Chickahominy, with broken bridges, was in slowly to follow them. As the apparently inhis rear. The rebel generals, Longstreet, Ma- terminable train, through the hours of the night, gruder, and Huger, were pressing him fiercely. filed painfully along, Generals Sumner, HeintHis escape seemed impossible. zelman, and Keys gradually brought their forces into position to repel the foe rushing upon them from Richmond and from the Chickahominy.

At 10 o'clock Saturday night the last of the Union troops left Woodbury Bridge. A single company of cavalry had been left to guard the passage. As night came on, that they might deceive the rebels, they lighted camp-fires as for a vast army. The fires of the rebels gleamed brilliantly on the opposite banks. The scene presented was solemnly sublime. The night was dark, and gathering clouds threatened a tempest. The exhausted soldiers could not stop for rest. All the night long onward they dragged their weary limbs.

Early in the morning the whole army, with all its vast artillery and baggage trains, were on the move. Soon the enemy discovered the line of the retreat and commenced a vigorous pursuit. The patriot army took the road directly through White Oak Swamp toward Charles City. On this march General Heintzelman protected the rear. The rebels made several attempts to flank him; but he baffled all their efforts, repelled all their assaults, and throughout the day It was about six miles from Savage's Station the pursuit was conducted by this thorough solto White Oak Swamp bridge. This whole dis- dier with great ability and success. Our troops tance was jammed full of wagons, horses, can- had not reached more than a mile and a half non, ambulances, pontoon-boats, and all the in- beyond Savage's Station when the pursuers comdescribable materiel of a great army. There menced a furious assault. We slowly retired, were frequent halts when the current became beating back the advancing foe by an incessant clogged. The scene of confusion which then storm of shot and shell from our artillery, which ensued beggars description. Twenty wagons made a stand at every commanding point, and would often be side by side. The efforts of the pierced the dense columns of the rebels with officers to push the line along, the shouting of terrible destruction. There was not a breath the teamsters, the struggling of the horses, the of air. The sun poured down fiercely upon the occasional break-downs, presented a picture of unsheltered heads of the troops. There was an tumult which Babel could hardly have surpass-incessant rattle of musketry and roar of artiled. During the whole of the day there was butlery. As we were slowly driven along we were little fighting, as our movements were concealed from the knowledge of the enemy. Colonel B. S. Alexander was sent to the James River to order the gun-boats to be in position to protect the soldiers upon their arrival—to obtain guides for the different columns of the army, and to have supplies in readiness for the troops. He testifies that, while at head-quarters receiving his instructions, he was shown a printed order from General M'Clellan, then not issued, directing the destruction of the baggage of officers and men, and the tents, camps, equipage, and all things of that kind, appealing to the army to submit to this privation, as it would be only for a few days. He remonstrated with General M'Clellan against this extraordinary measure, assuring him that it would have so depressing an effect as seriously to demoralize the army, convincing the soldiers that they were retreat

compelled to leave our dead and many of the severely wounded behind us. The hurry was so great and the heat so intolerable, that the troops threw away their knapsacks and their outer garments, but desperately clenched their weapons, which they would surrender only with their lives.

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Many from the effect of sun-stroke dropped by the way-side, foaming at the mouth and raving in delirium. During most of this time round shot and shells from the enemy's artillery were dropping in the midst of our ranks. casionally, as our rear-guard made a stand, a fierce battle ensued, with the most desperate charges of infantry and cavalry. Meagher's Irish Brigade rendered itself very conspicuous by the gallantry with which it rushed, with cheers which made the welkin ring, upon the * Report of Congressional Committee, p. 12.

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swarming rebels. The Fifteenth Massachusetts also performed deeds of chivalric valor never surpassed. But it seems invidious to single out for special mention individual regiments or brigades where all ennobled themselves.

Gathering clouds in that rainy land brought the day to an early close, and a stormy night set in. The assailants had been effectually repulsed on every charge they had made, and the loud cheers of our troops announced the patriot victory; for it was indeed a victory for the rearguard alone, of the retreating army, to beat back all the mighty hosts of rebellion which had emerged from Richmond in the pursuit. Still the National troops were ordered to press on as rapidly as possible through the darkness and the rain, and the pools of the swamp. They were compelled to leave their wounded comrades, groaning and dying on the little hillocks, to the mercilessness of the barbaric rebels.

On, on pressed the rear-guard through the Egyptian darkness of the tempest-riven night

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the forest illumined by incessant flashes of lightning, and the heaviest peals of thunder breaking over their heads. All arms of the service were mixed and crowded together in the narrow road, while still a degree of order was preserved far better than could have been supposed possible. Columns of infantry, gun-carriages, squadrons of cavalry, were all commingled, while the gleaming lightning flashed along the bayonets and bright bands of the muskets, in strong contrast with the dark mass surging onward like a swollen stream.

The entire capacity of the road was filled with the moving multitude, as were also the fields beside the road wherever the ground was sufficiently firm. The whole line of the retreat was marked by abandoned baggage wagons, brokendown caissons, and all the débris of a routed army. It was observed that the men spoke in low tones of voice. All loud noises were avoided as the rear-guard pressed on, hoping to get through the swamp before the dawn of morn

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ing. One of the officers on this dreadful retreats says:

"My breakfast was nothing. My dinner at four o'clock was a raw egg and a biscuit. My supper consisted of two hard crackers. My drink was the stagnant, muddy water of the swamp, scooped up with my hand."

There is a little stream called White Oak Creek, which passes through the heart of the swamp. The bridge was destroyed as soon as the troops had crossed it. Now and then, all along the lines, soldiers, utterly exhausted, would throw themselves down for a few moments' sleep,

and then, terrified lest they should fall into the hands of the enemy, would spring up, and, not more than half awake, toil painfully on.

In the earliest dawn of the morning of this day, as the army torrent was surging forward in its choked and narrow channel, few knew why or where, the Rev. J. J. Marks, the devoted, heroic chaplain of the Sixty-third Pennsylvania Regiment, rode to Savage's Station to see what could be done toward removing the thousands of sick and wounded men collected at that place. At General Heintzelman's tent he found the officers met in council, and orderlies, surgeons,

commissaries, and colonels hurrying backward the hills watching the rushing meteor it seemed and forward in the wildest haste. The air was as though a serpent of fire, lashed with demoniae full of rumors of peril and disaster. General tortures, had escaped from the pit and was rushHeintzelman, with the calmness of one accus-ing it knew not where. Suddenly there was a tomed to danger, was issuing his commands; tremendous crash. Tons of powder and hunand after listening to Dr. Marks's appeal in be- dreds of shells were exploding. An eye-withalf of the wounded, said that nothing could be ness writes: done to save them; that all the wounded must be "Bomb after bomb sprang from the fiery left at Savage's Station to meet such doom as the mass, hissing and screaming like fiends in rebels might award to them. General M'Clel-agony, and coursing in every direction through lan had ordered all the ambulances to depart the forests and the clear heavens. Rarely has empty. He deemed that five thousand wound- there been a spectacle of greater wonder and ed men in the train of the army would so retard grandeur. Such was the momentum of this and embarrass its movements as to render es- train that when it reached the chasm it sprang cape impossible. It was therefore deemed a out fully forty feet; and the engine and first stern necessity to leave the wounded in the car leaped over the first pier in the stream, and hands of the rebels. It is sadly to be deplored there they hang suspended, one of the most imthat the sick could not have been all removed a pressive monuments of the Peninsular disasters." few days before the retreat commenced. Nobly It was not until three o'clock in the afternoon Dr. Marks, and his friend Mr. Brunot, resolved that General Heintzelman and his staff left the to remain with the sufferers to minister to their station. A very affecting scene was now witwants and to share their fate. A colonel rode nessed as the troops bade adieu to their sick and into the hospital grounds and said, as he with- wounded friends, whom they were compelled to drew the pickets, that within half an hour the leave behind-to abandon as prisoners to the rebels would be there. Every patient who could rebels. leave his cot now endeavored to escape.

"I beheld," says Dr. Marks, "a long scattering line of the patients staggering away, some carrying their guns and supporting a companion on an arm, others tottering feebly over a staff, which they appeared to have scarcely strength to lift up. One was borne on the shoulders of two of his companions, in the hope that when he had gone a little distance he might be able to walk. One had already sat down, fainting from the exertion of a few steps. Some had risen from the first rest, staggered forward a few steps and fell in the road; but after a few moments in the open air, and stimulated by the fear of the enemy, they could walk more strongly. Never have I beheld a spectacle more touching and more sad."*

"Fathers had to drag themselves away from the couches of their sons; and after they had gone a few steps would return to look once more. Up to this time the disabled had not known that they were to be left behind; and when it became manifest, the scene could not be pictured by human language. I heard one man crying out, 'O my God! is this the reward I deserve for all the sacrifices I have made, the battles I have fought, and the agony I have endured from my wounds?' Some of the younger soldiers wept like children; others turned pale and some fainted. Poor fellows! they thought this was the last drop in the cup of bitterness, but there were many yet to be added."

There is a large open plain of several hundred acres opposite Savage's Station. Along this An immense amount of provisions, which had plain the Williamsburg Road passes, by which been accumulated for the army, was here de- our troops were mainly to effect their retreat. stroyed to prevent it from falling into the hands Beyond the plain is a dark pine forest. It was of the enemy. Hundreds of barrels of flour, here on the edge of this forest that General rice, sugar, molasses, salt, and bread were piled Sumner was stationed with 20,000 men, who up in immense pyramids and consigned to the were to hold in check the enemy until our flames. It was not easy to dispose suddenly of troops had escaped beyond White Oak Swamp. the ammunition, consisting of hundreds of bar- Here this heroic band for hours awaited the aprels of powder and tons of shells. The follow-proach of the trebly outnumbering foe, while ing expedient was adopted. The whole mass regiments and divisions and trains of wagons of powder and shells was piled up in a long filed by them. The fate of the army was in train of cars. The engine, under full pressure their hands, and they proved worthy of the of steam, was attached. There was a descend- trust. ing grade of about two and a half miles from the station to the Chickahominy, where the railroad bridge had been destroyed. The torch was applied to the combustibles placed in the cars and the train put in motion. The currents of air fanned the flames, and in billows of fire they wreathed around the long serpentine train, whose wheels revolved every moment with more frightful velocity. As multitudes stood upon The Peninsula Campaign in Virginia, by J. J. Marks, D.D., p. 243.

About five o'clock in the afternoon an immense cloud of dust announced the approach of the enemy. As they drew nearer, from their whole mass of artillery in front they opened a terrific fire. The national guns responded. For an hour not a musket was discharged, but the reverberating thunder of the cannon shook the hills. Then the whole majestic mass of the rebels, with their peculiar yell, not cheer, which their savage allies had apparently taught them, sprang forward upon the open plain, presenting

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a crested billow of glittering bayonets which it would seem that no mortal power could stem. Every musket in the Union line was brought into deliberate aim. Not a man wavered. For a moment there was a pause until it was certain that every bullet would fulfill its mission, and then there was a flash, followed by a storm of lead, which covered the ground with the dead and the dying. At the same moment, the cheer of the patriot responded to the yell of the rebel. I can not refrain from again quoting from the graphic pen of an eye-witness: "Beaten back by this leaden storm the ene

my wavered and retreated a few steps to the railroad. But soon after troops coming up behind them pressed the front line once more into the field. Again there leaped from ten thousand guns the fiery blast, and yell answered yell. For a moment there would be a pause, a lull in the battle, to be succeeded by the instantaneous discharge of five thousand guns; and then, as if the contending hosts had been stung to frenzy, the rage of the contest was redoubled. The clash of arms was occasionally interrupted by the coming into the field of fresh regiments, cheering their companions with loud shouts.

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