American History Told by Contemporaries

the oarsmen, drop upon the bottom of the boat, and sleep sweetly and soundly. We have floated miles while I slept. We have descended nine miles by the river in just two hours. There is the sharp rattle of musketry as we turn toward the left bank. I fully awaken only after several shots are fired from the shore, to find the balls whizzing over and around, and striking the water close to our boat. "Push for the shore! Push for the shore!" The oarsmen pull heavily at the oars. Our boats have dropped a little below our intended landing, but we reach the bank and leap ashore as we may. The Company in our boat is formed instantly, and rushes up along the bank to reach our proper position. Day is just beginning to break, but objects are confused at a short distance.

We are at Brown's Ferry. A few feet above the water there is a narrow bench of level ground 100 to 150 feet wide, above which towers a hill ascending at an angle of forty-five degrees. . . . At this landing a ravine terminates, which cuts through the ridge I have described, and a road comes down along it to the water's edge. On each side of this road is the high hill. In going back along this road 500 yards you come out upon the broad valley beyond. Stopping to dress a wounded man I got behind the regiment. . . I had not gone up more than 200 yards when I came upon a squad of sixty men of the 23rd Kentucky holding the road, and although ten minutes had hardly elapsed since the landing, they were already cutting down trees to build a breastwork.. I had only ascended a little distance when a fierce fight began at the point I had just left. I could not see it in the gloom, but I could hear the sharp, shrill yells of the rebs, so different from the cheer which our men use. Crack upon crack came the musketry! I could hear our men falling rapidly back; the rebels had got upon the opposite hill, and as our men retreated, the rebel shots crossed the road and came thick and fast around us. . . . Our men threw out skirmishers to the right along the precipitous side of the hill to the right of the ravine, and the whole force pressed forward with furious cheers, and moved up over rocks, and up the almost perpendicular hill down which the rebels in the same order were advancing but a moment before. No man could guess what force the rebels had, or how soon we might run upon a line of battle which would sweep us down the hill like chaff. But the officers, who had been made fully aware of the ground to be gone over, pressed on at the best speed they could make, and in a few minutes more they reached the top of the ridge on this hill. Meanwhile our detachment

of 600 men with which I had landed had moved up the precipitous path and reached the top of the hill on the left. The perpendicular ascent was not less than 300 feet. Great boulders, rocks, rubbish, and underbrush were in their way. Along this ridge or razor-back, a few feet wide, our men were posted when I reached them. Of course, our regiment with Col. Wiley is in the advance; the 6th and 24th O. V. I. and 5th Kentucky follow. The top is scarcely two yards wide, and in front again descends rapidly, but is not so steep as on the river side. Our skirmishers form and push down the hill through trees and underbrush.... The rebels form rapidly, and probably imagining our force to be small, make a furious effort to take back from us the ground we have gained. Our skirmishers fall back for a moment, but soon drive back the enemy, who, as the daylight advances, are to be plainly seen in the broad valley below, and can be heard giving orders for a rapid retreat. The day is won! But to secure ourselves in our position our men throw up quickly a breastwork of small trees hastily cut down, loose stones, and earth scratched up with their tin plates. . . .

As soon as the position was secured another act began. As I sat fronting the ferry, a cloud of men appeared on the opposite shore. half-past eight A.M. a pontoon bridge, made with the boats which carried us down, started from the bank. As it was pushed into the river, straight as an arrow, I thought how savage Indians of the olden time, watching its progress from the shore, would have thought it some wondrous animal, pushing itself across the water, and bearing upon its broad back a thousand strange and unknown men, coming to drive them from their hunting grounds. At 4 P.M. I crossed the river upon this bridge, capable of ferrying over a great army. And over it, a day or two later, Hooker, coming up from Bridgeport with the Eleventh and Twelfth Army Corps, would reëstablish our "cracker line," and bring hope and relief to our starving army in Chattanooga.

From a MS. letter communicated for this volume to his son by Dr. Hart.

CHAPTER XVI-THE SOUTHERN ARMIES

91. War Songs (1861?)

BY SOUTHERN POETS

Pike, the author of "Dixie," was of New England birth and education, but he settled in the South, where he gained a reputation as a lawyer and author. During the Civil War he was Confederate Indian commissioner. Macarthy was a light comedian who appeared at most of the theatres in the South during the war, making a specialty of this and other patriotic ballads. Bibliography as in No. 80 above.

A. "DIXIE"

BY ALBERT PIKE

OUTHRONS, hear your Country call you!
Up! lest worse than death befall you!

To arms! To arms! To arms! in Dixie !
Lo! all the beacon-fires are lighted,

Let all hearts be now united !

To arms! To arms! To arms! in Dixie !
Advance the flag of Dixie !

Hurrah! hurrah!

For Dixie's land we take our stand,

And live or die for Dixie!

To arms! To arms!

And conquer peace for Dixie !

To arms! To arms!

And conquer peace for Dixie!

Hear the Northern thunders mutter !
Northern flags in South wind flutter;
[To arms, etc.

Send them back your fierce defiance !
Stamp upon the accursed alliance !]

To arms, etc.