Oliver Otis Howard, Autobiography of Oliver Otis Howard, major general , United States army : volume 1

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[371] points at once; the roar, redoubled by echoes through the forest; the panic, the dead and dying in sight and the wounded straggling along; the frantic efforts of the brave and patriotic to stay the angry storm I One may live through and remember impressions of those fatal moments, but no pen or picture can catch and give the whole.

A few words of detail will make clearer to the reader the situation. General Dole said that at 5 P. M. the order was given the Confederates to advance. If his time was right it must have taken him an hour to work forward “through the very thick woods.” He first encountered our skirmishers who were so obstinate that it required his main line to drive them back; then his men were “subjected to a very heavy musket fire, with grape, canister, and shell.” Immediately his line assailed our barricades and intrenchments, drove our defenders off, and seized our batteries. Von Gilsa's Union brigade was supporting two guns; Dole's left regiment broke through the interval between Von Gilsa and the remainder of Devens's division, while Rodes's brigade faced Von Gilsa in front and so the greater part of Iverson's long line reached beyond Von Gilsa's position. Von Gilsa and the troops to his immediate left were quickly driven from their intrenchments, and they rolled along down Devens's line and created a panic in all that front. But there was another line to encounter after the first real resistance made by Devens's reserve regiments and part of Schurz's division, which was on a side hill in an open field east of Hawkins's house. Against this line the Confederates had come and succeeded in dislodging it, capturing one rifle gun; then they pushed on rapidly 300 yards more over an open field. During this movement