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Plank road. General Longstreet rode forward with that imperturable coolness which always characterized him in times of perilous action, and began to put them in position on the right and left of the road.
His men came to the front of disordered battle with a steadiness unexampled even among veterans, and with an elan which presaged restoration of our battle and certain victory.
When they arrived, the bullets of the enemy on our right flank had begun to sweep the field in the rear of the artillery pits on the left of the road, where General Lee was giving directions and assisting General Hill in rallying and reforming his troops.
It was here that the incident of Lee's charge with Gregg's Texas brigade occurred.
The Texans cheered lustily as their line of battle, coming up in splendid style, passed by Wilcox's disordered columns, and swept across our artillery pit and its adjacent breast-work.
Much moved by the greeting of these brave men and their magnificent behavior, General Lee spurred his horse through an opening in the trenches and followed close on their line as it moved rapidly forward.
The men did not perceive that he was going with them until they had advanced some distance in the charge; when they did, there came from the entire line, as it rushed on, the cry, “Go back, General Lee I go back!”
Some historians like to put this in less homely words; but the brave Texans did not pick their phrases.
“We won't go on unless you go back!”
A sergeant seized his bridle rein.
The gallant General Gregg (who laid down his life on the 9th October, almost in General Lee's presence, in a desperate charge of his brigade on the enemy's lines in the rear of Fort Harrison), turning his horse towards General Lee, remonstrated with him. Just then I called his attention to General Longstreet, whom he had been seeking, and who sat on his horse on a knoll to the right of the Texans, directing the attack of his divisions.
He yielded with evident reluctance to the entreaties of his men, and rode up to Longstreet's position.
With the first opportunity I informed General Longstreet of what had just happened, and he, with affectionate bluntness, urged General Lee to go farther back.
I need not say the Texans went forward in their charge and did well their duty.
They were eight hundred strong, and lost half their number killed and wounded on that bloody day. The battle was soon restored, and the enemy driven back to their position of the night before.
