Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 07.djvu/377

beyond this redoubt; but it did not push the advantage, because the force in its front was too heavy, and its loss was already severe—General Early being among the first wounded, as also Colonel Terry and Lieutenant-Colonel Hairston. The regiment next to it, the Thirty-eighth Virginia, and that next to it, the Twenty-third North Carolina, were for some reason—which has never been given satisfactorily by General Hill or anyone—halted in the woods, quite near to the field, and were never brought upon the field. Colonel Whittle—who afterwards, I believe, perished in battle, and of whom I have no reproach to utter—did once make some explanation as to his regiment, but I confess I did not think it satisfactory. Why the Twenty-third was not advanced, no reason has ever been given to the public that I have ever heard. The Fifth North Carolina, being on the right, pushed forward to the field and found no battery or enemy in front; but immediately on emerging from the woods a shot from a battery on the left passed over it, and the fire of musketry showed a fight to be going on about where our left should come out of the woods, nearer to us than the battery from which the shot came, and near to a redoubt on the edge of a field. The regiment was immediately, by change of front, faced towards the battery and towards the musketry, and was put rapidly in motion; but finding that the regiment had been separated from the Twenty-third North Carolina, and that it had not come out, I dispached Major Sinclair to tell General Hill—who I supposed would be in the woods where the centre of the line might be—of this battery on our left and of the fight going on, and to inquire of him if that was the battery he desired us to assail. I also requested Major Sinclair to say to General Hill that we were in open ground and the work would be stiff, and to urge him to expedite the advance of the two regiments, for I had the idea, from reading Jomini and such like, that the more force we had in a fight the better chance we would have of success. Major Sinclair found General Hill, with the two regiments—the Twenty-third North Carolina and Thirty-eighth Virginia—in the woods on my left-front, not far from the field, and they remained there facing my flank as I advanced beyond them. General Hill sent me an order by Major Sinclair "to move on the battery rapidly and use only the bayonet." The regiment was advancing at double-quick, and I soon met Captain Sam. Early, of General Early's staff, with orders to me from General Early to in-