Shiloh, 1862 by Winston Groom Read Free Book Online Page B

looked back were stunned to behold an entire Rebel line of battle emerge from the woods and fields—21 regiments—nearly 10,000 men, many flags flying, officers on horseback, swords drawn, gun barrels glinting, sergeants shouting orders. Their breaths caught tight as they watched this Rebel line come crashing toward them.
    At just this juncture Colonel Moore’s relief column collided with the head of Powell’s withdrawal. Before noticing the Rebel battle line, Moore began to rebuke Powell’s men for running away. “He rated us cowards for retreating,” said Private Ruff. “We warned him not to be too bold or he would get into trouble.” Moore rejected this perfectly sound advice, and pressed on—dragooning Powell’s unwounded men to accompany him until he, too, encountered the Confederate attack in motion.
    Moore quickly sized up the situation and became intent on buying time for the unsuspecting Union ranks back in the camps. After sending for reinforcements, he and the remnants of Major Powell’s command fought a tooth-and-nail delaying action that cost Moore his leg and Major Powell his life and saw most of their force “nearlyannihilated or put to rout.” But the 25 minutes that their lopsided little battle lasted was worth a thousand times the effort in blood and tears, because Moore and Powell had bought enough time to prevent the Rebel attack from falling on Prentiss’s division completely unexpected.

    Over in his own camp Sherman had heard the commotion and decided to investigate. A few minutes earlier, a messenger sent by Moore had warned Sherman that Rebel units were marching toward his front. Barely an hour earlier he had discounted a similar alarm sent by the ever anxious Colonel Appler, but all these reports had finally spurred the nervous-natured Sherman to action despite his best efforts to remain calm in the face of whatever was causing everybody else to be so jumpy.
    In most of his sector it had been, thus far, a typical Sunday morning on the “plain of Pittsburg Landing,” as Sherman had dubbed it. Soldiers had finished their breakfast and were attending to routine tasks such as washing clothes or writing letters or simply lounging around; some were engaged in playing cards or other games of chance, while still others attended services conducted by brigade chaplains on the lovely Sabbath day. It was cool, bright, clear, and too early in the year for bugs. The orchards were in full blossom, oaks were tasseling, dogwoods and redbuds were blooming, and an inordinate number of those on hand recorded in diaries and memoirs how many birds were singing in the trees; some singled out robins, some bluebirds or mourning doves. Others noted the disharmony of the sounds of the birds and the distant spatter of gunfire.
    Accompanied by his staff, Sherman shortly after 7 a.m. rode out into farmer Rhea’s open field in front of the 53rd Ohio, Colonel Appler’s bothersome regiment. Appler himself had been fretting half the night as he listened to the sporadic firing somewhere out in the darkness. About six, one of Major Powell’s men came staggering wild-eyed and bloody into his camp shouting, “Get into line, the Rebels are coming!” Appler once more ordered the long roll drumbeat and sent his quartermaster to alert Sherman. As the 53rd Ohio’s bedraggled officers and men began falling into line, the quartermaster returned with a sarcastic message that he delivered to Appler confidentially: “General Sherman says you must be badly scared over there.”
    There was barely time to process this deflating reply when one of two companies Appler had sent out earlier to check on the picket line returned with a report that “the Rebels out there are thicker than fleas on a dog’s back.” Appler ordered his men to load up and form in a line of battle. It was about this time that Sherman’s party appeared in Rhea’s field in front of Appler’s position and the general halted to take out his spyglass and