A graphic description of the Yankee rout at Murfreesborough.
the final repulse of the rebels!
A Yankee correspondent writing from the battle field of Murfreesboro, gives a most graphic description of the slaughter of the Federal soldiers there, and the irresistible charge of the Confederates.
We give it in full: The sun had not yet risen on Wednesday morning when the firing commenced upon the right. The First Missouri Battery, Captain Eessock, and the First Illinois, Capt. Houghtain, shelled the rebels out of a point of woods in front of Sheridan's division, which now slightly advanced the enemy threw himself upon Sheridan with terrible energy, but was thrice repulsed.
Again he advanced, with larger numbers and greater desperation than before, and Sheridan's men were compelled to give ground.--It was only for a moment, however. The brave and noble Sill, assisted by other daring officers, soon rallied the retiring troops. The flashing banner of the Stars once more advanced, and although Sill purchased the victory with his life, the rebels were repulsed, and driven from this quarter of the field.
It was a few minutes after eight when this occurred, and at the same time the sun broke forth through some cold-looking clouds, and flashed a clear, bright light over the field. --There had not elapsed even time to remove the body of the dead General Sill, when all attention was directed to the extreme right.
Three divisions of the enemy — McCown's, Claiborne's and Cheatham's — had advanced in massive columns, and charged impetuously upon Johnson and Davis. A portion of the infantry in Johnson's division immediately broke, almost indeed before they had taken their arms from the stack, and one of the batteries (Edgerton's) was taken before it fired the third round.
Poor Edgerton! It was not his fault. A ters better, braver young man, is seldom found than lie. It was his greatest ambition to take part in a battle; and I remember well how often and how earnestly he deplored that separation from the old 3d division, which prevented him from taking part in the battle of Perrysville.
His hour came at last. It found him ready; but those upon whom he had a right to rely to give him timely notice of the enemy's arrival, failed to do so, and ere his guns could be loaded and discharged three times, the rebel bayonets had swept away his men, and he himself fell wounded and bleeding into the hands of the foe.
The gallant and earnest Captain Simonson fought like a hero as he is, and brought off all but two of his guns. Capt. Goodspeed strenuously endeavored, after firing several rounds, to save his cannon, but could only succeed in getting away with two of them. Gen. Kirk, of Illinois, commanding one of the brigades in Johnson's division, was severely wounded while endeavoring to rally his regiment.
The enemy succeeded in getting the right flank completely hemmed in. A large number of officers of every grade were shot down while standing almost at the muzzles of the rebel muskets. The brigades and regiments rushed upon one another in disgraceful disorder, and the rout of the division became irretrievable.
I suppose I shall raise a storm about my head for saying so, but I can't, from all that I have heard, come to any other conclusion than that the right wing of the army was completely surprised, and that, too, under circumstances which should have rendered it particularly careful and vigilant.
Whether General McCook or General Johnson is to blame, this impartial investigation will hereafter determine. At present the sentiment of the entire army is extremely hostile to both, and I imagine it will not be many days before there are important changes in leadership of the fourteenth army corps.
Brigade after brigade, battery after battery, from Palmer's, Negley's, and Roussean's divisions were sent into the midst of the thickets to cheek the progress of the foe and rally the fugitives, but all in turn were either crushed by the flying crowds, broken by the impetuosity of the foe, and put to confused flight, or compelled to retire and extricate themselves in the best manner that seemed to offer.
The history of the combat in those dark cedar thickets will never be known. No man could see even the whole of his regiment, and no one will ever be able to tell who they were that fought bravest, and they who proved recreant to their trust.
I know there was some cowardice displayed, but I know, too, that there was shown by many officers and regiments as lofty a heroism as that which distinguished and immortalized the followers of Godfrey or the Cid; but, in spite of heroism and devotion, in spite of desperate struggles which marked every fresh advance of the foe, in spite of awful sacrifice of life on the part of the officers and soldiers of the Union army, the rebels still steadily pushed forward and came nearer to the turnpike.
Nearly two miles and a half the right wing of our army had been driven, and faintness of heart came over me as the destruction of our whole army seemed to stare us in the face.
The right of Davis's division, assailed at the same time as Johnson's, gave way simultaneously, and the rout of the remainder seemed to follow as a matter of course. This left to General Sheridan the task of repelling the hitherto successful onset of the foe. Never did man labor more faithfully than he to perform his task, and never was a leader seconded by more gallant soldiers.
His division formed a kind of pivot upon which the broken right wing turned in its flight, and its perilous condition can be easily imagined when the flight of Davis's division left it without any protection from the triumphant enemy, who now swarmed upon its front and right flank; but it fought until a fourth of its number lay bleeding and dying upon the field, and till both remaining brigade commanders, Colonels Roberts and Schaeffer, had men with the same fate of General Sill. Then it gave way, and, as in almost every instance of the kind, retreat was changed to rout, only less complete than that of the troops of Johnson and Davis.
All these divisions were now hurled back together into the immense cedar thickets which skirt the turnpike, and were hurried over toward the right, and massed rank behind rank in an array of imposing grandeur along the turnpike and facing to the woods through which the rebels were advancing. The scene at this time was grand and awful as anything I ever expect to witness until the day of judgment.
I stood in the midst and upon the highest point of the somewhat elevated space, being between the turnpike and the railroad, and forming the key to our entire position. Let the rebels once obtain possession of it, and the immense mains of wagons parked along the turnpike, and the Union army was irretrievably ruined. Even its line of retreat would be cut off, and nothing could save it from utter rout, slaughter, and capture — and yet each minute it became more and more painfully evident that all the reinforcements which had been hurried into the woods to sustain and rally the broken wing and cheek the progress of the enemy in that direction, had proved inadequate to the task, and had in turn been overthrown by the great mass which was straggling in extricable disorder through the woods.
Such sounds as proceeded from that gloomy forest of pines and cedars were enough to appal with terror the stoutest hearts. The roar of cannon, the crashing of shot through the trees, the whizzing and bursting of the shells, the uninterrupted rattle of thirty thousand muskets — all mingled in one prolonged and tremendous volume of sound, as though all the thunders of Heaven had been rolled together, and each individual burst of celestial artillery had been rendered perpetual. Above it all could be heard the wild cheer of the traitorous host, as body after body of our troops gave way, and were pushed toward the turnpike.
Nearer and nearer came the storm, louder and louder responded the tumult of battle — The immense train of wagons parked along the road suddenly seemed instinct with struggling life, and every species of army vehicle, preceded by frightened mules and horses, rolled and rattled away pell-mell in an opposite direction, pressing onward. The shouts and cries of the terrified teamsters, urging their teams to the top of their speed, were now mingled with the billows of sound which swayed and surged over the field.
Everything now depended upon the regiments and batteries which the genius of Rosecrans had massed along the turnpike to receive the enemy when he should emerge from the woods in pursuit of our broken and flying battalions. Suddenly the rout became visible, and a crowd of ten thousand fugitives, presenting every possible phase of wild and uncontrollable disorder, burst from the cedar thickets, and rushed into the open space between them and the turnpike. Among them all, perhaps, no half dozen members of the same regiment could have been found together.
Thick and fast the bullets of the enemy fell among them, and scores were shot down; but still the number constantly increased by reason of the fresh crowd which burst every moment from the thickets. It was with the greatest difficulty that some of the regiments which had been massed together, as a sort of forlorn hope, to withstand, and if possible, drive back the victorious cohorts of treason, could prevent their ranks from being crushed or broken by the mass of fugitives.
From my position upon the elevated ground between the railroad and turnpike, I could view the whole scene, and with an intensity of interest and tumultuous emotion which I can find no language to express. The flower of our troops were ranged in order here, and I had no fears for the result, unless one of those unaccountable panics, which sometimes rain, even in an army of veterans, should seize upon our yet unbroken battalions. Yet there were men not liable to panic, men whose lofty courage and devotion to their country's cause overcame and extinguished fear.
Colonel Loomis was there with his immortal First Michigan Battery, and there was stokes with the guns and equipments furnished by the Chicago Board of Trade, and Mendenhall and Gunther, with their regular artillery, and the troops led by General Wood, comprising some of the finest in the service, and the three famous brigades belonging to the old Third division.
The Ninth, the Seventeenth and the Regulars, which the daring valor of Rosecrans, assisted by the unflinching courage of Colonel Scribner, of the Thirty-eighth Indians, commanding the Ninth Brigade, and by the splendid abilities of Colonel John Beatty; of the Third Ohio, commanding the Seventeenth, had extricated from the woods, into which they had been sent to check the progress of the enemy, in a comparatively unbroken and undemoralized condition, a result which to one who knows something of the nature of that fearful combat in the woods seems little short of miraculous.
Other illustrious corps were there also, whose patriotism and courage I should be glad, even at this early day to celebrate, if one individual could have known and observed them all. Their zeal and sacrifices will yet be known and appreciated by a grateful nation.
With cool, calm courage, Gen. Crittenden awaited the coming storm, and conspicuous among the rest was the well built form of the commanding General, his countenance unmoved by the tumult around him, and his thoughtful and animated features expressing a high and patriotic hope, which acted like an inspiration upon every one that beheld him as he cast his eyes over the grand array which he had mustered to repel the foe. He already felt himself master of the situation.
At last the long lines of the enemy emerged from the woods, rank behind rank, and, with a demoniac yell, intended to strike terror into the "Yankees" who stood before them, charged with fearful energy almost to the very muzzles of the cannon, whose dark mouths yawned upon them. A dazzling sheet of flame burst from the ranks of the Union forces, an awful roar shook the earth, a crash rent the air, the foremost lines of the rebel host were literally swept from the field, and seemed to melt away like snow flakes before the flame, and then both armies were enveloped in a cloud of smoke which hid everything from the eye.
In the still visible ground between the pike and the railroad the tumult redoubled. Not knowing what would be the result of the strife which was raging under the great canopy of smoke that concealed the combatants, the flight of those in charge of wagons and ambulances became still more rapid and disordered. Thousands of fugitives from the right wing mingled with the teams, and frequently a mass of men, horses, and wagons, would be crushed and ground together. Every conceivable form of deadly missile whizzed and whirled and burst amid the crowd, and terror and dismay ruled uncontrollably.
The whole disordered mass rushed down as fast as possible towards the river, into which it plunged, pushing and struggling to the other side. The combat under the great cloud of smoke was somewhat similar to that in the woods. No one knows exactly what command there was. A shout, a charge, a rush of fire, a recoil, and then all for a time disappeared.
For ten minutes the thunder of the battle burst forth from the cloud. When our battalions advanced they found no rebels between the woods and turnpike, except the dead, the dying, and the disabled. There were hundreds of these, and their blood soaked into and reddened the ground.
Since the annihilation of the Old Guard in their charge at Waterloo, there has probably not been an instance of so great a slaughter in so short a time as during the repulse of the rebel left at Murfreesboro', and it will hereafter be celebrated in history as much as is the fierce combat which crushed forever the power and prospects of Napoleon.
The rebel left was now thoroughly repulsed, and our troops, emboldened by their success, pushed after them into the woods, driving them back in turn over a considerable portion of the ground which we at first occupied. The roar of our artillery sounded further and further off, as the different batteries moved on slowly after the retreating foe, and hostile cannon balls no longer plowed up the earth around me.
