Of this same day and evening, our own Colonel Peirson has also given a vivid picture; after quoting Grant's words to Colonel Theodore Wyman, sitting under a pine tree, May 7, '64 on the 7th, "To-night Lee will be retreating south" he says, in his Loyal Legion paper:—

General F. A. Walker, in his history of the Second Corps, accounts for the presence of the Confederates at Spottsylvania on the arrival of the Union army in a very interesting manner. He says that Lee, convinced of the intention on Grant's part of moving towards Fredericksburg, ordered Anderson, who had succeeded to Longstreet's position, to move in the morning of the 8th to Spottsylvania. We remember that the whole battle section had been overrun with fire and that it was still burning when the orders came. Anxious to escape its unpleasant nearness, he determined to set out in the evening of the 7th and so make a night-march of the fifteen miles intervening. By what Southern pietists might call this Providential procedure on the part of the Confederate leader, he got there ahead of Warren.

Resuming Colonel Peirson's excellent paper bearing on this campaign, we find him recording as follows:—

In the preceding pages General Peirson refers to the fact of the command of the Regiment devolving on himself; it might have been stated that Colonel Davis, a very large and stout man, though doing his best to lead his men whose pace was more than double-quick, was completely overcome by the heat and mounted upon one of the Rebel Battery horses, cut out by Milton F. Roberts of "C," was carried to the rear. Modesty no doubt influenced General Peirson not to state that he was, himself, hit by a portion of a buckshot-cartridge, three of the missiles lodging in his right arm or shoulder, his sword-cane giving place to the stalwart shoulders of Isaac H. Mitchell of "A." Two of the bits of lead were picked out by the surgeon, the other is there yet. The wound did not keep the resolute officer long from his post.

Here is the story as told by I. H. Mitchell, Company A, and transcribed by Channing Whittaker, Company B.:—

As the day advanced the other corps came into their respective positions, the Second being massed at Todd's Tavern, protecting the rear of the army and the Ninth was at the extreme Union left, and there was more or less fighting along the whole line at some time in the day. A melancholy train was that made up of ambulances and baggage wagons which on the 8th set out for Fredericksburg, bearing 12,000 wounded men, thence via Belle Plain Landing and the Potomac to be distributed to the great hospitals of Washington and points further North. Sheridan and his troopers also received orders to set out upon their famous raid which would flank Lee's army, reach the outer defenses of Richmond, slay J. E. B. Stuart, the most remarkable cavalryman of the Confederacy, and leave a gruesome token of its venturesome trip by a trail of decaying horseflesh and freshly made graves for considerably more than a hundred and fifty miles. The magnitude of this adventure, which began Monday morning, May 9th, may be seen when we know that it comprised 10,000 horsemen, riding in fours and well closed up, yet constituting a column thirteen miles long requiring, according to a rebel authority, four hours at a brisk pace to pass a given point; what an eye opener such a force must have been to the Confederates at home, who had little notion of the resources of the North. Rejoining the Federal army at Chesterfield Station, on the 25th, its results were summed up in having deprived Lee's forces of their "Eyes and Ears" (cavalry) since all of the mounted rebels started in pursuit, as soon as the move was understood; it had damaged Lee's communications, liberated nearly four hundred Union prisoners, destroyed an immense quantity of supplies, killed the leader of his cavalry, saved the Union Government the subsistence of ten thousand horses and men for more than two weeks, perfected the morale of the cavalry corps and produced a moral effect of incalculable good to the Union cause.

Returning to the incident of the artillery referred to by Colonel Peirson in his paper, it is interesting to find the same affair recounted by one of the leading Confederates, General Fitzhugh Lee, in one of his war sketches. After alluding to the ubiquity of the cavalry and the work it had done in preparing the way for the arrival of R. H. Anderson's (Longstreet's) Corps, he says:—

In confirmation of the foregoing, is the statement of Sergt. Wm. A. Mentzer, Company A, as follows: "After advancing about two and one-half miles we came to a piece of artillery on a knoll. While the Rebs fired at us, to our pleasure as well as surprise, they fired over our heads. We drove them from their position about half-a-mile, when they opened on us again. We in the front rank gave them a Yankee yell and charged for the gun. We shot one horse and drove away all the men but one, who dismounted, cut the traces of the dead horse, remounted in a hurry and got away with the gun just as we thought it was ours."

Battle scenes and incidents, we think, are indelibly impressed upon the memory. Sometimes they are; more often many of the prominent features disappear entirely, so that when the locality is revisited, difficulty is found in reconciling the past impressions with those of the present. Thus many of the Thirty-ninth who made that exhausting charge under fire, in the morning of the 8th of May, would find themselves at fault at many points, and would wonder at the changes in the face of nature, had they the opportunity to go over the route followed under such adverse circumstances. Channing Whittaker of "B," however, is sure he could recognize the spot where the Regiment reformed and momentarily rested; the place where Colonel Peirson and General Robinson were wounded; the road cut through the hill which Grant's army did not pass over on May 8th or 9th, the hillside on which he was wounded and where he spent the night after the fight; the point whence he saw three mounted Confederate Generals and where he saw Sergt. Major Conn, hacking away with his short Sergeant Major sword at a multitude of Confederates who had set upon him and finally carried him away captive and, above all, just where Breathed's rebel battery was dislodged.

Of the exactions of this day, M. H. Mentzer, "A," says, "Many were exhausted but an officer begged us to cross over one field more. We had been advancing and under fire from early morning, but we started again, a very thin blue line, through a valley, up a rise, when a terrible hail of bullets met us; we lay down and hugged the dirt; a lull, and then distinctly from the enemy came the order, "Now rally —— North Carolina and give them H—ll!" Over they came, taking many prisoners from our little line. I started to run as others did but tripped and fell headlong down the hill lying still until they had pushed our boys well back, when I crawled a short distance to cover, several shells bursting in my path as I got away. Out of the way, covered with sweat, dirt and ashes, for the cinders of the Wilderness were yet on us, I fell asleep, and remained here till about four o'clock in the afternoon. I fell in with a Natick boy, Company I, who had a bullet hole in his wrist; I washed out the wound, tore a piece from my shirt and bandaged it as well as I could, washed his face and hands, made some coffee to cheer him up and then took him to a hospital on the field. Then I set out to find my Brigade and Regiment and found them at twilight; my brother, Sergt. Mentzer, had reported me as dead with a bullet-hole through my forehead; those who saw me trip and plunge forward must have mixed me up with someone that looked like me. It was in the work of this May 8, '64 forenoon that General Robinson was wounded and Jeff. Cottrell, of "A," Color Sergeant, was wounded and was carried part way off the field by Charles Goodwin, only to die at last in a rebel prison. My brother, Sergt. W. A. Mentzer, then took the colors and carried them until Major Tremlett reorganized the color-guard."

J. H. Burnham also of "A," recalls, "The march down the Brock Road with the Fifth Corps from the Wilderness, the night of the 7th of May, and our running into Longstreet's corps, then under General Anderson. The rebels were behind, hastily erected breast works and were ready for us. We advanced across an open field and suffered much from the rifle fire. When near the works, I was hit in the abdomen. Throwing down my gun, I made my way back across the field, over the dead and dying, and lay down under a tree in front of a house. As this was early in the morning of the 8th, I don't think there were many other wounded men there then, but later others came. Sometime in the forenoon, a lady came out of the house and asked me if I was badly hurt. She also said that she was from New Jersey. It seems as though she said the place was the Laurel Hill farm, though I understand it is known in history as the Alsop farm. The next day came the ambulances, tents and other outfit of the Fifth Corps. I should like to go there some day and have a look at the place where I expected to give up my life. I carried the ball in my body for months and have it now. I never rejoined the Regiment."

We owe much to Colonel Peirson's recollections of the service of the Regiment, but in this affair at Alsop's he fails to recount a story remembered by McDonald of "B," who says that in the company was a tall Scotchman, Hunter by name, much inclined to stoop and, for this reason was frequently enjoined by the critical Lieut. Colonel to take "the position of a soldier." In the advance of this trying Sunday, Robert was stooping as usual when a bullet went through his cap. When the ball was over and the opportunity came, Hunter sought the officer and, holding up his headgear, remarked, "Now, look at that; if I had ta'en the position of a so'ger, be G-d, that ball wud a gone thru' my heed." R. W. Hall of "F" recites an interesting experience of this 8th of May, "I had penetrated the abatis in front of the Rebs and was unable to extricate myself in time, when our boys fell back, and with about one hundred and fifty others was taken prisoner, but I never saw the inside of a rebel prison, as Sheridan in his great raid overtook us toward evening of the following day at Beaver Dam Station on the Virginia Central Railroad, where we were waiting. How plainly I can see General Custer and another cavalryman in the lead, when they dashed down the road as we were about to take the train for Richmond. Of course we had to keep up with the cavalry during the raid and to dodge the Rebs who, in small squads, contested the way. Their General Stuart was killed or mortally wounded, May 11th, at the Yellow Tavern, in a very hot fight. After several days' rapid marching, we came out at Malvern Hill, on the James. The gunboats took us for Rebs and gave us several shots. City Point, on the other side of the river, was not so very far away and thence we ex-prisoners took a transport for Alexandria, where we were re-equipped and sent to the front as guard for a supply-train of the Ninth Corps. When Nelson and I reported for duty the surprise we gave our comrades may be imagined."

The 8th was a bloody day for the Thirty-ninth, the summary of losses revealing ninety-three killed, wounded and missing. Lieutenant Dusseault was wounded in the breast but an army button diverted the bullet. As he wrote in his diary, "I was within thirty feet of the enemy's works, and when I was hit, I was sure I was killed, as the force of the blow caused me to spin round and round like a top, and I fell to the ground. Finding I was not seriously hurt, I jumped up and joined in the retreat. When we May 8, '64 got back, we found Captain W. C. Kinsley of Company K in tears; 'Look at my company!' he cried, 'Only seven men left out of eighty-seven!' But he was assured that the woods were full of our men and that his would be in shortly. It proved to be so. We were not called on for the rest of the day, and that night we obtained some sleep."

During the closing hours of the 8th, there was digging for the Fifth Corps and the early hours of the 9th found the hard worked soldiers still using the shovel; the night and the following day showing no less than three distinct efforts in this direction for the Thirty-ninth, a record in which the stories of the Sixteenth Maine and Thirteenth Massachusetts accord. Of the day itself and the new positions of the several corps, Colonel Peirson remarks, "The 9th was another hot and dusty day, and the Fifth and Sixth Corps occupied it in pressing the enemy and developing his position, seeking points of assault. The enemy were still passing down during the morning the Parker's Store Road, in dangerous proximity to our right and rear, and Hancock's Second Corps was at 10 a. m. moved into position on Warren's right, making lines of battle along the crest commanding the valley of the Po, the artillery shelling the rebel trains which were in sight, causing them to take a more sheltered road." The new position of the opposing forces might be stated, briefly: from the northwest to the southeast, a distance of two miles, were Hancock and his Second Corps at the right, next to Warren and the Fifth; then Sedgwick with the Sixth; and at the extreme Union left, Burnside and the Ninth Corps. At the rebel right was Hill's Corps, now under Early; the extreme left was held by Longstreet's men, under Anderson; and the intermediate distance, including the famous Salient, was occupied by Ewell's Corps.

The event of the 9th which emphasized it in the annals of the campaign was the death of Sedgwick, Commander of the Sixth Corps. Since the fall of Reynolds at Gettysburg, no similar misfortune had befallen the army of equal importance; universally respected, all but idolized by his own men, his very presence at any time was worth whole brigades to the cause he loved. "While standing behind an outer line of works, personally superintending and directing, as was his custom, the posting of a battery of artillery at an angle which he regarded of great importance, he was shot through the head by a rebel sharpshooter, and died instantly. Never had such a gloom rested upon the whole army on account of the death of one man as came over it when the heavy tidings passed along the lines that General Sedgwick was killed." He was Connecticut born, West Point, 1837, having as classmates, Hooker, E. D. Townsend, and Wm. H. French, late Commander of the Third Corps, all of the Union Army; while his rebel fellows included Braxton Bragg, Pemberton of Vicksburg fame, and one might wonder whether Jubal Early, over at the rebel right, had a twinge of sadness over the summary taking off of the man who, in earlier times, had stood by his side on the West Point parade ground. Born in 1813, Sedgwick was not yet fifty-one years old when sought by the enemy's bullet.

Some of the besetments of army life and duty at this time are well set forth in the story that Lieutenant Dusseault, of Company H, tells of his efforts to replenish the supply of ammunition for the brigade: "That same night—and it was a dark one too—I was detailed to go back to the ordnance train for ammunition. I had sixty men from the five different regiments of our Brigade to help me. I was ordered to bring 25,000 rounds (twenty-five boxes). We had secured the requisite amount and were returning to the brigade in the thick darkness. As it took two men to carry a box, which was supported on a blanket between them, it was impossible to keep the men together, and as I did not know them, many of them dropped their burdens and ran away. When we got back to our camping place, we found that the brigade had moved on a mile and a half May 9, '64 further. When I came to my superior officer, I had but seven boxes to deliver to him. Rousing from his sleep, he ordered me to go back immediately and secure the rest, and then turned over and went to sleep again. It had to be done and at about two or three o'clock in the morning I reported the second time, not with the lost boxes, but with enough others that had been obtained in a way which I will not stop to explain."

May 10th adds another day to the long battle list of 1864; while a part of the Spottsylvania encounter, it bears to those who had a part, the sub-title of "Laurel Hill," the location being in the same vicinity as that of Sunday's fight at Alsop's Farm, possibly somewhat further towards the south. While there was fighting along the entire line, of that portion of the same in which we are directly interested, Swinton, in his history of the Army of the Potomac, says:—

This was the day, when at the left of the Fifth Corps a portion of the Sixth was more successful, yet even its fruits were not held. General Emory Upton of the First Division, Second Brigade, in a vigorous charge carried the enemy's first line of intrenchments, capturing nine hundred prisoners and several guns. This attack, however, was unsupported and the advantage could not be maintained, so that at nightfall Upton withdrew and the captured guns were left behind. General Meade ascribed the failure of the movement to the lack of expected support from Mott's Division of the Second Corps on his left. The reports of Generals Meade and Warren add nothing to the foregoing while Lieutenant Colonel Peirson particularizes as follows:—

While the Ninth Corps, General Burnside, did no severe fighting on the 10th, the day nevertheless was significant in Bay State records through the death of General Thomas G. Stevenson, commanding the First Division of that Corps. Born in Boston, February 3, 1836, he early displayed a bent for military matters and at the outbreak of the Rebellion commanded a battalion of militia in Boston harbor. At the head of the Twenty-fourth Massachusetts Infantry, he accompanied the Burnside Expedition to North Carolina, winning laurels everywhere. On the return of Burnside from the Southwest, Stevenson who already had won his star, was made commander as above and like Rice and Sedgwick is supposed to have been the victim of a sharpshooter.

While Colonel Peirson has given us a deal of information concerning the beginning of the Battle Summer, he says nothing of the fact that he had, himself, a narrow escape from death. Colonel Theodore Lyman, in his diary, writes of a visit made by himself and General Peirson to these scenes, and has this to offer on his observations:—

Concerning the injury to Colonel Peirson, Lieut. Dusseault of "H" has this version:—

Of this same event, one of the men of "A" writes, "One piece of shell wounded Colonel Peirson, ripping off a row of buttons from his coat. I picked them up and divided them with the boys. I have one left now. Salem Richardson got the bottom of the Colonel's brandy flask, which was shot away by the same bit of shell, and I wish you could have seen him empty it." The same incident is called up by S. H. Mitchell, also of Company A, whose members evidently were keeping their commander under observation. The flask was carried against an emergency, May 10, '64 when it might be of great utility. It offered no resistance whatever to the Confederate missile but Comrade Richardson always averred that the coming of the drink was most opportune. From the story of the Sixteenth Maine, it is learned that this day the brigade was temporarily assigned to the First Division, General Cutler commanding. The Second brigade was placed in the Third Division, under Crawford, and the Third was made independent to report directly to General Warren, these changes being induced, supposedly, on account of the heavy losses and the wounding of the commanding officer, General Robinson.

Possibly the doings of the 11th can be described no better than by copying the record as made at the time by John S. Beck, "Rested all day to-day, if you can call it rest, for we were in a mudhole, out of the range of Rebel shells. Our brigade looks small; drew rations; raining hard, everything wet through, no blankets or shelter tents. I should have been sick were it not for the excitement of battle. Our position here looks dubious, as we have to fight the enemy behind concealed breastworks and in dense woods. To-night we lay down on the wet ground with an old, wet, woolen blanket which I picked up." Considering that this rain was the first since crossing the Rapidan, it really was a comfort even if it did make some, for the time, unpleasantly wet. The 11th is noteworthy from another fact, viz., that it is on this day that Grant telegraphs to Washington the prominent features of the campaign thus far, that reinforcements would be encouraging, and that he purposes "to fight it out on this line, if it takes all summer."

Thursday, the 12th of May, is the day of the dread "Salient" or the "Bloody Angle" of Spottsylvania. Had our Regiment been with Barlow's men of the Second Corps, or with the Vermont Brigade of the Sixth, the mortality record of the Thirty-ninth might have been far different, though all participants in any portion of this bloody field have ever thought their losses severe enough. The vision of that First Division of the Second Corps, in the morning mists emerging from the woods at the Union left centre, and with determined rush, "a narrow front, but extending back as far as the eye could see," seeking the Confederate works, is one that memory needs no assistance in recalling. Through wonderful good fortune for us, the artillery of the enemy had been withdrawn and the guns which might have cut wide swaths through that disordered mass of blue, were hastening back, arriving just in time to be captured, the assault resulting in the capture of General Edward Johnson's Division of Ewell's Corps, including the commander, with twenty pieces of artillery and thirty stands of colors. But this did not end the day. So furious was the foe over the loss of men, munitions and position, that the struggle for reinstatement became possibly the fiercest and most deadly of the entire war. Once at least, the bayonet became a weapon of real contact. Here it was that the large oak tree was actually cut down by bullets from both sides. The ground, at the margin of the works, was covered with piles of the dead, and for twenty hours the battle raged, until the wearied rebels withdrew, unable to retake the lines lost in the morning.

In this rapid survey, no mention is made of the Sixth and Ninth Corps, but each one accomplished the task assigned, nor was the Fifth by any means idle. Inferring from the forces pressing upon Hancock in his endeavor to hold advantage of the early morning, that the enemy must be withdrawing his right and left to assist his centre, both Burnside and Warren were ordered forward. Warren obeying, advanced at something after nine o'clock, but was repulsed, "for Longstreet's corps was holding its intrenchments in force." Of this in his report, Warren says:

A graphic picture of the work of the Brigade is painted by Adjutant Small of the Sixteenth Maine in his history of the Regiment, and a portion of it is reproduced here:

It was in the trying scenes of this exacting effort that Major Leavitt, of the Sixteenth, so endeared by his manly character, received the wound from which he died on the 30th instant in Washington. His was a nature too broad and brave to be confined to the limits of his own Regiment. "None knew him but to love him."

How the day seemed to a Company C man appears in his diary entry for the day: "Still damp, wet and rainy; the day opened with an advance of the Second Corps under Hancock, who carried the enemy's front line of breastworks and captured a division of the rebels and their General, Johnson. We were soon on the move to support our First Division in a general charge and were soon into it, hot and heavy. The enemy soon had another enfilading fire of grape and canister on us, and we could do nothing. Edward Ireland was killed by a solid shot and Henry Ireland was wounded in the arm. Soon after being withdrawn to the rear, we were sent to the left to support the Sixth Corps, and lay in a line of rifle-pits about two hours, when again we advanced through the woods and joined the Sixth Corps on the right, where we lay all the afternoon. We heard our folks pouring shells into the enemy from mortars. We turned in for the night, resting on our arms, wet through to the skin."

The night was uncomfortable enough and during its hours there was an alarm that the enemy was advancing, while the truth was that Johnny Reb was quite as tired as the Yankees. Even soldiers must rest sometime, and early in the morning of the 13th the division was withdrawn to the rear, and for a short time laid aside responsibility, but it was not a long rest, since those rifle-pits must be filled with someone, and all too soon "we were moved up to the right, into works along with the One Hundred and Forty-sixth New York. Nothing here but water and mud. May 13, '64 Showery all day, though the men are in good spirits, notwithstanding. About 8 p. m. when we were beginning to arrange to stretch out for the night, orders came to move, and we fell in, following the rest of the corps to the left. The mud was dreadful, the night dark, we forded streams up to our knees, and the mud all the time was over shoes." Grant had not yet found the spot through which he could force his way, so the Fifth Corps once more essays the part of pioneers, and leads the move towards the inevitable left, seeking in vain for some point not bristling with rebel bayonets, or threatening with black throated cannon. Truly our Lieutenant General is finding out, not only how strenuous is the Eastern Union soldier, but his eyes are opening wide as to the resourcefulness of the Eastern Confederate and his eternal vigilance.

It is another flank movement, and the men of Warren's Corps are moving to Burnside's left with orders to assault with that Corps at four o'clock in the morning of the 14th. Very likely the difficulties of this night, with its more than Egyptian darkness, had not been reckoned upon by the Commander and the appointed hour found the would-be assailants a long way from the point of expected advance. The route was past the Landrum House to the Ny River, which had to be waded, and beyond the route did not follow any road, traversing the fields, and a track was cut through the woods. Then came a fog, so dense that not even the fires built to light the way could be seen. Men exhausted by the difficulties of the move and previous exactions fell asleep all along the way. The new locality was quite unknown and by daylight when the expected attack was to take place, only Griffin with his First Division, having only twelve hundred "fagged-out men" had arrived. It was seven o'clock before General Cutler got thirteen hundred of his men together. Naturally the four o'clock charge was not made.

Wright and the Sixth Corps moved still further to the left, but had to do some fighting to get just the position wanted. All observers, whether of Regiment or Brigade, agree that the day was wet and comparatively quiet, though the enemy's shells passed harmlessly over the heads of the tired men, many of whom slept the sleep of utter exhaustion, the waking ones thankful that the fuses in said shells were long enough to keep up their hissing until a considerable distance beyond us before bursting. In the mutations of fighting and moving about, all the regular contents of knapsacks had disappeared, the most of the men retaining, in addition to canteen and haversack, rubber blankets only; besides, rations were scarce, yet men were content to rest without food, so trying had been the ordeal of the preceding ten days. After all, the average Yankee is ever anxious to know just where he is, and several entries of the 14th are to the effect that the Regiment is near the Fredericksburg turnpike, about eight miles from the city itself and, from a mile and a half to two miles from Spottsylvania Court House. With only the canopy of the sky as a covering, a large part of the Thirty-ninth slept through the night of the 14th-15th.

The 15th is Sunday, and just a week away from the sad experience of Alsop's farm. These men of the First Brigade are fast becoming hardened veterans, and they have the privilege of greeting as such the comrades who had been home on re-enlistment furloughs and who, this day, got back again. There are many comparisons between the spic-and-span attire of the just-returned, and the "of-the-earth, earthy" apparel of men who, for ten long days and nights have fought and marched, at intervals hugging muddy mother-earth, till all semblance of cleanliness has disappeared, and dress parades have faded out of the recollections of all concerned. Then too the ravages of the hotly contested field have torn great gaps in the erstwhile well-filled ranks so that only squads of men constitute what have been long company lines. Some boys remark on the quiet of Sunday and think it properly kept; three days' rations are drawn, including fresh beef, and, May 15, '64 with returning vitality and spirits, learning that the Eleventh Massachusetts Battery, in the Ninth Corps, is hard by, men of the Thirty-ninth make friendly visits to their acquaintances therein. Colonel Davis comes back to the Regiment to-day, looking much better than when he dropped out. Towards night, six o'clock, the troops are formed in line with expectation of an attack; four lines deep, our right rests on the top of a hill whence, as far as the eye can reach, armed men are seen awaiting the attack which is not made. It is a sight to remember!

Monday, the 16th, is also a quiet day for this campaign. Beginning foggy and damp, with the rising sun the mists clear away and it is very warm. On some sort of an alarm we are deployed, in line with the One Hundred and Seventh Pennsylvania, Colonel McCoy, that has just got back from its home trip on account of re-enlistment. On being recalled to our former station, we are set to work entrenching, introducing heavy timbers into our lines of works, three deep. About 9 p. m., we have to stop work, because the tools are needed elsewhere. Though there are showers in the evening, the moon finally shines through and, under her benign light, the Regiment sleeps. Nor does the record of the 17th differ essentially from that of yesterday. Foggy in the morning, then clearing and warm; picket or skirmish line duty for some and, about 4 p. m., our lines are moved to the right, nearer those of the Ninth Corps where there is more digging to render safe our position in case of attack. It is about this time that General Grant finds the army encumbered with an excess of artillery and, accordingly, sends back to Washington over a hundred guns; how the Johnnies would like to have some of these same weapons! All of them will come back again before the Petersburg siege is over.

Those who remember clearly the events of the 18th will agree that the most important one was the arrival, at 5 p. m., of the first mail since leaving camp at Mitchell's Station. What joy its contents gave those loyal hearts! Yet there were missives, in that coming of the postman, for faithful lovers whose eyes, many hours before, had closed in dreamless sleep, and in this life could never know how fondly they were remembered. The enemy, as if to make amends for continued quiet, began to shell the Ninth Corps just after our early breakfast, which we had soon after four o'clock. For some reason, General Warren wanted our Brigade nearer him, so at seven o'clock we were moved over towards the left and, under a shelling fire, lay till well along in the afternoon. Though there were six regiments in the Brigade it numbered, all told, less than a thousand men. About two o'clock, we returned to the right and, at eleven o'clock, reoccupied the works on which we had labored the night before. General Warren in his report for this day states that General Richard Coulter, commanding our Brigade, is severely wounded. This, too, is the day of the arrival at the Front of the First Massachusetts Heavy Artillery from its long service in the defenses of Washington. It is assigned to the Second Brigade, Third Division, Second Corps, though at present it is with the Second Brigade of General Robert O. Tyler's Artillery Division.

For the greater part of the Potomac Army, the 19th is a quiet day, though the men in their breastworks notice some sort of change on their left. Of the day, General Warren says, "All our forces took up position on my left. This brought out General Ewell's Corps, who attempted to turn our right. He was repulsed, etc.... Rained in afternoon." Regimental note-takers remark on the drawing of rations, including fresh beef, and the fierce attack on their right, well along in the afternoon and of the fact that their friends in the First Massachusetts Heavy Artillery had a severe experience.

The hot reception accorded the First Heavies is worthy of more than passing mention. Recruited to the maximum of such organizations, the Regiment was a wonder to the May 18, '64 men who had been long in the field, for it numbered about 1800 men, as large as two brigades of those who had been in the thickest of the fray. The Confederates of Ewell's command, desirous of ascertaining whether the Union forces were moving and, incidentally, to capture if possible a tempting wagon train, in the afternoon of the 19th, undertook to steal around the Union right, bearing down thus about 5 p. m. along the Fredericksburg Pike on the line of Federal supplies. Whatever the expectations of the enemy, the point of attack was by no means unguarded, and in history, the engagement is known as that of the Heavies, since not only were our First men there, but the First Heavy of Maine was in line, and the Second, Seventh and Eighth of New York as well. Swinton says that the artillerists had not been in battle before, but under fire they displayed an audacity surpassing even that of the experienced troops. "In these murderous wood-fights, the veterans had learned to employ all of the Indian devices that afford shelter to the person; but these green battalions, unused to this kind of shelter-craft, pushed boldly on, firing furiously. Their loss was heavy, but the honor of the enemy's repulse belongs to them." Excellent evidence of the sturdiness and steadiness of the men, with crossed cannon on their caps, is found in the words of an old Confederate, spoken in 1901 at the dedication of the regimental monument on the scene of the fight, known in the annals of the First as Harris Farm:

"I saw your men march on this field, not deployed, but like soldiers on parade, take aim and fire a volley straight from the shoulder. You seemed to me the biggest men I had ever seen. You were so near that I noticed that all wore clean shirts. There was the most perfect discipline and indifference to danger I ever saw. It was the talk of our men."