progress was slow. About 7 o'clock he opened a battery on my left, about eight hundred yards distant, which swept my line from left to right, committing dreadful havoc in the ranks. I have never before witnessed such accurate and destructive cannonading. In a few minutes forty (40) men were killed and over a hundred wounded by this battery alone. In the Eighteenth Texas cavalry (dismounted) regiment, seventeen (17) of the eighteen (18) men, composing one company, were placed hors de combat by one shot alone. When the cannonading ceased, the enemy's infantry moved on our front in heavy force, and succeeded in driving the cavalry on my right in confusion from its position, thereby causing the right regiment of my brigade to give way. This regiment, the Twenty-fourth and and Twenty-fifth Texas cavalry (dismounted) was soon rallied, and, in turn, drove back the enemy with heavy loss, regaining its position in the line. During the fearful cannonading on our flank and rear, both officers and men demeaned themselves with marked coolness and courage; not a man left his post, but quietly awaited the coming charge, which was repulsed with heavy loss—the enemy leaving a number of his killed and wounded in our hands.
The reports of other officers are to the same effect; and Cleburne's views of the opportuneness of his arrival on the right, and the character of the work next day, are quoted by General Hardee above.
Lieutenant-General Wheeler, holding the extreme right with cavalry, under date of 29th February, 1880, thus refers to the situation on the 20th, after McPherson had pressed him back to a point near Atlanta:
I finally reached a strong position, which I had fortified with some care, and held it against a spirited assault of two lines of battle. It was during these operations that Generals Hardee and Stewart were attacking General Thomas, some four or five miles northwest of my position. From the line of works occupied by my troops, they could see masses of the enemy, fully twenty thousand strong, all aligned and ready to attack. I felt that any respectable effort upon their part could easily dislodge my force, and leave nothing between McPherson and the interior works which had been erected for the final defence of Atlanta.
And he furnished me the following copies of dispatches received by him that day, which illustrate the state of affairs which required the shiftings of Cheatham's corps and the call for Cleburne's division:
