Van Dorn's movements were delayed by the obstructions on the roads by which he moved. As soon as General Curtis became satisfied that the rebels were trying to get around to his rear, he ordered General Dodge, who commanded the fourth division of the army, to cut down trees along the road leading north from Bentonville, and the order was instantly carried out. General Dodge had been ill in his tent for three days, but when the news of the approaching enemy reached him he was cured as if by magic. Remarking that it was no time to be sick, he got out of bed, assumed the active command of his division, and during the afternoon of the sixth supervised the work of a large detail of men, who felled trees across the road and otherwise blocked it to delay the rebel advance. He kept at it until the rebel skirmishers began to fire upon his men, and as he had orders not to bring on an engagement he prudently withdrew.

“General Dodge was a trump,” said Harry afterwards, when telling the story of the battle; “sick in his tent and in the doctor's hands before the battle began, he was almost constantly in the saddle for three days. When the battle was over and the enemy had retreated, he dropped to the ground and went back to his sick-bed. It's a good example of what a man can do under excitement.”

“And there was another example of the same sort,” said Jack. “There was Major Post, of the Thirty-seventh Illinois who became General Philip Sidney Post, and served gallantly in a good many battles. Early on the second day at Pea Ridge he was wounded in the arm, but he kept his place with his regiment and would not stop to have his wound dressed. The surgeon insisted, but he would n't go. 'I can walk and give orders,' he said, 'even if I can't use my arm, and I'm going to stay here.' The colonel of his regiment had to order him to go to the field hospital. He went very reluctantly, as he wanted to see the battle fought out to the end, and was determined to do all he could toward winning it.”

The same spirit prevailed among officers and men throughout the whole army. Of course there were instances of shirking, as will always be the case in any battle, but they were not numerous. Perhaps the knowledge that the enemy was right on the line of communications, so as to cut off retreat and render surrender necessary in case of a defeat, had something to do with the good conduct of a few, but it could not be the case throughout the whole army. And to do the rebels justice, they displayed similar courage, but they had the advantage of being the attacking party and knowing that they were superior in numbers to the union forces.

“On the morning of the seventh,” said Harry, in his story of the battle, “there was great activity all through the union camp. Every drum and fife in the army was called into use, and never before had the woods of Pea Ridge resounded to so much martial music. Rations for two days had been prepared, the soldier's cartridge-boxes were filled to their fullest capacity, every man made a careful inspection of the lock of his rifle to make sure that it was in perfect order, and then the order was given to load with ball cartridge and be in readiness to advance when the word was given.

“We were kept waiting while General Sigel had his fight with the enemy on the left of our line that I've already told about. While we were getting ready for work Jack and I went to General Vandever and asked what we should do.

“'What do you want to do?' said he.

“'We want to do the best we can,' I answered, 'and help all we can. We'll do anything you tell us to do.'

“'Well, then,' the general said, very quickly, 'stay near me and act as my volunteer aide till I tell you to do something else.' Then he turned away to attend to getting his brigade in order, and we stood still and waited till he came back.

“He was gone only a minute or two, and then told Jack to ride over to General Carr and say the second brigade was waiting for orders. He told me to go to General Dodge and ask if he had received orders to move yet, and to let him know whenever orders came.

“Jack came back with the order for the brigade to follow that of General Dodge, which had received its orders just before I got to it. One of General Carr's aids had brought the order to General Dodge, and he rode with me to General Vandever to repeat the order which Jack had already brought.

“The order to advance was loudly cheered, and the men stepped off as gayly as though they were going to dress-parade, and most of them a great deal more so. I couldn't help thinking how many of these gallant fellows would be stark and stiff on the ground or suffering with wounds before another morning sun would rise on them. We could hear the roll of musketry and the booming of cannon where General Sigel was engaged on the left, and before long our advance was engaged with that of the rebels, and the shot and shell were crashing among the trees as their artillery opened upon us.

“General Dodge's brigade marched up the main road toward the Missouri state line, and filed off to the east near Elkhorn Tavern. As soon as it got into position it opened with a battery upon the rebels, who were posted in a wood on a slope in front. The battery was promptly replied to, and then the shots were exchanged with great rapidity. There were six guns on each side, though some of our men thought the rebels had eight or ten guns, but we afterward learned they had only six; but it was the best battery in their whole army. Our battery was the First Iowa, and its captain prided himself on having brought it to a state of great efficiency, but he wasn't quite equal to his antagonist.

“General Vandever's brigade went a little beyond Elkhorn Tavern and took position on the left of the road nearly opposite to where General Dodge had stretched out to the right. As I sat on my horse close behind the general I could see that we had a dry ravine in front of us and a wooded slope farther on, and it did not need sharp eyes to discover that this slope was well occupied by rebels. The general ordered the Dubuque battery (Captain Hayden) to open fire on these gray and butternut coats, and as he did so there was a lively running of the fellows to cover. They showed by their actions that Captain Hayden's shots were well aimed; but we had not given them more than two or three rounds before a battery on the other side replied to us.

“That battery was evidently in the hands of a good officer, as he got our range at the very first fire. A shot came whistling close to the general, and I thought it passed between him and me, but an officer who was there said it went over our heads. You have no, idea if you've never heard it, what a spiteful screeching a cannon-shot makes when it goes by you. Involuntarily you dodge, but really dodging is of no use, as the ball has gone past you before you hear it. A cannon-ball moves a great deal faster than sound. According to our school-books sound moves one thousand one hundred and forty-two feet a second, and the scientific gunners say the velocity of a cannon-ball is from one thousand four hundred to one thousand, eight hundred feet a second. That of a rifle-ball is greater, and so by the time you can hear the sound made by a missile, whether large or small, it has gone way past you.

“At the third fire the rebels blew up one of our limber-chests, which was standing close behind the gun to which it belonged. The great puff of smoke that rose from it showed the rebels that they were taking good aim, and they poured in their shot very rapidly after that. In ten minutes more they blew up another limber-chest, and then the general ordered the battery to change its position, and sent me to carry the order to Captain Hayden.

“It was about nine o'clock in the morning when the first shots were exchanged on this part of the field, and in fifteen minutes the whole of General Carr's division was engaged. Before I could get to Captain Hayden to give him General Vandever's order the rebels made a rush upon the battery and captured one of the guns; the rest were hauled back a short distance, and at the same time the Ninth Iowa, which was supporting the battery, poured in a heavy fire and covered the ground with the enemy's dead and wounded. The rebels were driven back to their cover in the woods, and the gun that had been captured was retaken, as they did not have time to drag it from the field.

“'They stand like veterans,' said General Vandever, referring to the soldiers of the Ninth Iowa. 'Their long march yesterday has n't affected their courage. There were never better men on a battlefield.'

“Just as he said this Colonel Herron, of the Ninth came up, and the general congratulated him; and then the general rode along the line and said to the soldiers the same that he had to their commander. The men cheered him and were evidently determined to do their part toward winning the battle for the union side. But would they succeed against all those masses of men that could be seen on the hill-slope to the east and west, and crowded in the brushwood and among the trees that stretched away to the north?

“After this for a while there was a lull in the fighting, and meantime we could hear the artillery and small arms to the left, where General Sigel and General Davis, with their divisions, were sustaining the shock of the enemy. They were overmatched in numbers, but their weapons were more effective, and they had a better supply of ammunition. Many of the enemy were armed only with squirrel-rifles and shot-guns, and, of course, they could not load and fire with the rapidity of our men. Had they been able to do so, and had their weapons been equally effective with ours, the battle would have been hopelessly lost to us by reason of the great superiority of the rebels in numbers alone and their better knowledge of the ground.

“By and by we heard that Sigel and Davis had driven away the enemy and were slowly drawing in their lines, as only a small force were in front of them. The attack on General Carr's division was renewed by the rebel artillery, and we could see that they had a great number of men gathered behind their battery to charge upon our lines at the proper moment. So General Carr sent an order for General Vandever to fall back, and at the same time he gave a similar order to General Dodge.

“We fell back perhaps a hundred and fifty yards, close to Elkhorn Tavern and a little to the north of it. There our battery opened fire again, still supported by the Ninth Iowa, and there the rebel battery again poured its fire upon us.

“Near the house were two companies of infantry drawn up in line and waiting orders to move. I had just gone to carry an order for them to come up to the support of the Ninth, when a shell passed close to me and struck in their ranks, where it burst. Two of the men were killed and five were wounded by this shell. Almost at the same time another shell exploded on the ground in front of the house and shattered the leg of a soldier who stood there. Another fell among some horse-teams, frightening the animals into running away. They dashed up the road in the direction of the enemy, and were lost in a cloud of dust. In its runaway career one of the wagons knocked down some of our soldiers, wounding one seriously and two or three slightly. A solid shot struck the house and went completely through it, but did no damage to any one, as the family had taken refuge in the cellar.”