532 Southern Historical Society Papers.
litz, in which he said: "Soldiers, I will keep myself at a distance from the fire, if with your accustomed valor you carry disorder and confusion into the enemy's ranks; but if victory appear uncertain, you will see your Emperor expose himself in the front of battle." It is the contrast of the simple devotion to duty of the Christian patriot, thoughtless of self, fighting for all that men held dear, with the selfish spirit of the soldier of fortune, " himself the only god of his idolatry."
I have been thus particular in giving this incident, because it has been by various writers of the life of Lee confounded with the other two incidents of a like character which I have before given. In fact, to our great Commander, " so low in his opinion of himself and so sublime in all his actions," these were matters of small moment ; and when written to by a friend in Maryland (Judge Mason), after the war, as to whether such an incident ever occurred, replied briefly, " Yes ; General Gordon was the General " — alluding thus concisely to the incident of the early morning of the 12th, when General Gor- don led the charge, passing over the similar occurrences entirely, in his characteristic manner of never speaking of himself when he could help it. But that which was a small matter to him was a great one to the men whom he thus led
At nightfall our line of battle still covered four of the eighteen contested guns. The interior line was finished later, and our wearied heroes were withdrawn to it about midnight. Unfortunately, the four recaptured pieces, through the darkness of the night and diffi- culty of the ground, became bogged in a swamp while being brought off, and so were left outside of the new lines and fell again into the hands of the enemy.
During the day, the enemy, under the impression that General Lee had weakened his lines to reinforce our troops in Hancock's front, made an attack, which was repulsed with heavy loss to the at- tacking column. The repulse of this attack of Burnside on Wil- cox's front, the splendid execution done by the artillery of Heth's line on the flank of the attacking party, and the counter attacks by brigades of Hill's corps, sent out in front of our lines during the day, have been recorded by the graphic pen of General Early, who had been assigned to the command on account of General Hill's sickness on the 7th of May.* The restoration of the battle on the
- General Hill, thouj^li unable to sit up, in these days of Spotsylvania
would have himself drawn up in his ambulance immediately in rear of the lines. Such was his anxiety to be near his troops.
