[652] contest and check the Federal advance. The retreat was by alternate lines, and was skillfully conducted by General Beauregard. The pressure on that wing, moreover, was relieved by the direction given to Nelson's column, which was moved toward Hamburg. General Beauregard says:
About 2 P. M. the lines in advance, which had repulsed the enemy in their last fierce assault on our left and centre, received the orders to retire. This was done with uncommon steadiness, and the enemy made no attempt to follow.Before they fell back, the Kentucky Brigade, with Marmaduke's Arkansas Regiment, and Tappan's Arkansas Regiment, had a final combat with the enemy, in which Colonel Hunt led the Ninth Kentucky in a gallant but unavailing charge. Trabue, in his report, puts the fact very well when he says:
The fragmentary forces of both armies had concentrated at this time around Shiloh Church, and, worn out as were our troops, the field was here successfully contested for two hours (i. e., from one until three o'clock); when, as if by mutual consent, both sides desisted from the struggle.Just as the fighting ceased, the Federals were reinforced by two fresh brigades of Wood's division which came up. In the mean time, under Beauregard's direction, Breckinridge had formed Statham's brigade at the junction of the roads to Monterey from Hamburg and from Pittsburg, about a mile and a half in the rear of Shiloh Church, and this brigade, with the Kentucky Brigade and the cavalry, formed the rear-guard of the retiring army. The movement backward had been slow and well guarded. Some of the Federal accounts describe desperate charges, routing the Southerners, about this time; but they are the vainglorious boasts of those who had done the least real hard fighting that day. The Confederate army retired like a lion, wounded but dauntless, that turns and checks pursuit by the grim defiance in his face. The Federal army was well content to recover its lost ground, and win back that field from which it had shrunk cowering and beaten the day before. General Beauregard says:
Our artillery played upon the woods beyond for a while, but upon no visible enemy, and without a reply. Soon satisfied that no serious pursuit was, or would be, attempted, this last line was withdrawn, and never did troops leave battle-field in better order.About an hour after the Confederate troops retired, the Federal army reoccupied its front line of April 5th. In this day's contest the troops of McCook's division had especially signalized themselves. They had entered the field, last of all, at a reentrant angle, and closed the
