Drummer Boy at Bull Run (14 page)

“We’d better pull off, or we’ll get trampled,” Leah’s father said. He drew the wagon to one side, and for some time they watched the troops running pell-mell.

“Look, Pa, there’s Ira!” Leah jumped out of the wagon before her father could stop her and ran over to where Ira Pickens was limping along.

He was using his musket for a crutch, and looking down she saw that his right leg was bloodied below the knee. His face was drained white, and his eyes were blank, but when he saw her he seemed to recover himself somewhat.

“Well, didn’t expect to see you here,” he gasped.

“Ira, you’ve been shot,” Leah cried. She saw that his hands were trembling. “Lean on me,” she said. “Our wagon’s right over here.”

“Reckon I’ll take you up on that,” he whispered.

She helped him over to the wagon, and her father said, “Lie down here, son, and let me look at that leg.”

Ira obediently slipped to the ground as if unable to stand, and Leah forced herself to watch as her father pulled up the trouser leg.

“It’s not bad,” Dan Carter said quickly. “The bullet went through without breaking a bone, it looks like. But the bleeding’s pretty bad. Leah, get one of my shirts, and we’ll make a bandage.”

Leah jumped into the wagon and frantically grabbed a shirt. Then she tore it into strips and helped as her father made a compress and tied it tightly with long strips of the cloth.

“Sure am thirsty,” Ira said. “Never knew a fellow could be so thirsty.”

At once Leah got a dipper and drew water out of the barrel fastened to the side of the wagon. “Drink this, Ira,” she said, holding it to his lips.

The soldier drank, gulping furiously, and then they helped him to the wagon.

“I guess we can get across now,” her father said. He looked back over the field. “It looks like we got whipped, Ira.”

Ira too looked back toward the battlefield, where guns were still firing and dust was still rising. Shaking his head, he said, “I thought we had ’em for a while but then they got lots of help from somewhere. They just plain run over us there at the last.” He gritted his teeth and said, “They whupped us this time, but there’ll be another day!”

Leah made a pallet for him in the wagon. “Lie down here, Ira,” she said. Then she poured a spoonful of liquid from a brown bottle. “Take some of this. It’ll help with the pain.”

She held his head up, and when he had taken the medicine he lay back again, smiled, and said, “I guess I might as well tell you the truth, Miss Leah.”

Leah stared at him. “What’s that, Ira?”

“You know that girl Rosie you’ve been writing all them letters to?”

“Yes, what about her?”

Ira made a face and said, “Well, there ain’t no Rosie. I just made her up.”

“Why in the world would you do that?”

Ira came up with a smile. The medicine had started to work. He muttered, “Well, I ain’t never been able to have a gal of my own, so I thought if I could get you to write letters for me … well … that’d be almost like having one.” He started to say something else, but sleep came upon him, and he fell into deep unconsciousness.

Leah sat beside him and smiled. “I’m glad you made it through all right, Ira,” she said. “You’ll have a girl of your own someday.”

* * *

Nelson Majors came out of warm darkness into a world of shouting and pain. He was aware that his side was one mass of agony, and then suddenly he was being picked up. He opened his eyes to see the two blue-clad soldiers who were placing him on a stretcher.

“Stop your yelling, Reb,” one of them said cheerfully “You’re not going to die at least not today, anyway.”

Nelson Majors gritted his teeth against the pain and looked around. All over the battlefield men were being gathered up and put into horse-drawn ambulances.

Looking down on him, the other soldier said, “Let me take a look at that side.”

The lieutenant could not protest, and the other drew the shirt back. He whistled slightly. “Well, you’ll have to see the surgeon for that. It’s a good thing it didn’t hit a little bit more in the front, or we’d be burying you instead of taking you to the hospital.”

He tried to nod but the slightest action sent pain racing along his side. He gasped, “What—what’s happening?”

The Union soldier frowned. “Well, it looks like you Rebs won this one. We got off the field, and they were still a-comin’ at us. I guess we ought to leave you for them but the lieutenant says take all the prisoners we can. There’ll be one less of you to fight the next battle.”

Lieutenant Majors felt unconsciousness coming back over him.

The soldiers carried him over to an ambulance wagon, where they placed him on the floor.

His last thought was,
I pray Tom and Jeff are all right …

* * *

Tom and Jeff were all right but were nearly frantic at losing their father.

“We’ve got to go after him, Tom!” Jeff cried. “We can’t let the Yankees have him!”

Tom shook his head. His face was black with powder, and he and Jeff were both trembling with fatigue. “We wouldn’t get a mile, Jeff,” he muttered. “The Yankees are retreating but they’ll get reinforcements right down the road.”

Jeff looked around. “If they’re retreating, why don’t we chase them?”

Tom frowned. “That’s just what Stonewall Jackson wanted to do but the other officers wouldn’t hear of it. They said we’re too wore out and there’s too many reinforcements in Washington.” He sighed deeply. “I reckon they’re right too. We’re in no shape to be doing much chasing.”

“Tom, I saw him go down, but I didn’t get to see what happened after. He might be shot dead.”

“Maybe not,” Tom said grimly. “If not, he’ll be exchanged.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means we’ll trade one of the captured Union officers we got to get him back.”

“Do they do that?”

“Well, that’s what I heard. Of course, there hasn’t been no prisoners up till now,” Tom said, “but now I know we got plenty of theirs.” He waved at the lines of captured Union soldiers that were being herded away from the battle. He put his arm suddenly around Jeff’s shoulders. “Come on, let’s get something to eat. It’s going to be a long march back to Richmond.”

Tom looked over at the retreating Union line. “I wish we were going in to take Washington. I’d like to finish this thing once and for all. But it’ll have to be another day.”

He turned wearily away, and the two went back to join the lines that were forming for the trip back to Richmond. General Jackson came by on his horse, looking over the men and calling out encouraging words. Stopping beside Jeff and Tom, he said, “Your father was captured, I understand.”

“Yes, sir. But we’re believing he’s all right—only wounded.”

Jackson’s eyes, which had been blazing with battle madness, were now calm. He stroked his beard and held up his bandaged hand. “I pray that you’re right. God will be with him and with all of you.” He rode away, going from man to man.

Jeff watched him go, thinking,
I sure hope he’ll help get my pa back!

T
he first spectators at the Battle of Bull Run returned to Washington about eight o’clock. Those who had left in mid-afternoon were convinced of a victory. However, by midnight the tumult and the dust and the terror of retreat had fallen upon the city. Rumors of defeat swept through the streets.

Finally President Abraham Lincoln received those who had watched the battle. He listened in silence as he heard of the rout. He did not go to bed all night.

Clouds whirled across the face of the moon as the Union army stumbled back across Long Bridge and Chain Bridge, scampering to Washington’s safe, familiar streets. All night long they came in, most of them beaten, footsore, totally whipped. Occasionally a regiment marched in order, the men still bearing their arms with the look of soldiers.

Among them were some slightly wounded men, but more were lying strewn along the road from Fairfax Courthouse. A hospital was set up quickly in Alexandria, and the wounded were taken there in a steady stream.

MacDowell’s army flooded into Washington. The troops stood in the wet streets around smoldering fires built from boards pulled from fences. Ladies stood in the rain handing out sandwiches and coffee.
Citizens sent their carriages across the river to carry injured and exhausted men into town. The newspapers began at once to criticize the army for suffering such a defeat. A mob gathered in the streets, and soldiers were sent to bring order.

Helplessly stretched in the mud, the capital awaited capture in the morning.

But no invasion came. Across Long Bridge came only the wagon trains, white-covered supply wagons, boxlike ambulances, country carts, and sutlers’ vans. By noon Tuesday, Long Bridge was solidly blocked from end to end, and the cries of the wounded could be heard above the shouts of the drivers.

The North had not been prepared for defeat, and the military hospitals, small and understaffed, were soon overflowing.

Nelson Majors was one of a small group of Confederate officers that had been brought, first, to Alexandria. Finding the hospital full of Union officers, their guards took them on into Washington. Finally a place was set aside for them by order of General Scott’s adjutant—an old warehouse, dark and dank.

There were no facilities and only a few beds. When Lieutenant Majors was brought in, he was placed on the rough blankets that had been wrapped around him on the battlefield. He lay on the hard floor, slowly becoming conscious of the sights and sounds around him.

“Where is this place?” he whispered to a Union soldier who had been set to guard the wounded prisoners.

“This is the old Capitol building, Reb,” the soldier said. “For a while it was the Capitol of the
whole United States, but it’s been about everything else since then, including a prison. How you feeling?”

“I could use some water,” Majors whispered.

“Well, it’s against regulations, but you lie steady there, and I’ll get you a drink.”

Majors smiled as he thought of how useless the sentry’s care was.
I couldn’t run five steps—or even one, for that matter
.

Gratefully, he took the water the soldier brought, drank it, then handed the dipper back. “Thanks a lot, soldier. That was about the best drink I ever had.”

He lay there quietly fighting against the pain, from time to time slipping into unconsciousness. Mostly he thought about Tom and Jeff. But he thought also of Royal and the other boys from Kentucky his son had grown up with who were now fighting on the Union side.

Finally a doctor came by, took one look at him, and said, “Get this man on a cot.”

Hurriedly, a bed was obtained, and the lieutenant was placed on it by rough hands.

“Let me have a look at you, Lieutenant,” the doctor said. He was an older man, fifty-five or sixty, with a shock of iron-gray hair and a pair of steady gray eyes. He was rough but efficient as he pulled back Nelson Majors’s uniform and washed the wound. “That’s a pretty bad wound you’ve got there. I’m going to have to probe for that ball, you understand?”

“Do what you need to, doctor. I appreciate the care.”

His courtesy brought a sudden stare from the doctor. “I’m Dr. Cain. I have to tell you that your
chances aren’t very good.” He pressed against the wound, bringing pain shooting through the lieutenant’s side. “That ball probably took some of your uniform in with it. It’s got a good chance of getting an infection, I’m afraid. But first I’ve got to get the ball out of there. Orderly …”

Jeff’s father never liked to think about the operation, for although he was partly sedated it was a painful process. He awoke some time later, confused, and stared around. He had been brought into a room where there were six other cots, all occupied.

One man looked over at him and said, “Well, Lieutenant, you’re still alive—and that’s good.”

He saw that the man wore the uniform of a captain and said, “I’m all right. How about you, Captain?”

“Oh, I’ll be fine, except for this,” he gestured down at his leg. His foot was missing.

“That’s too bad, Captain.”

“Aw, I’ll get me a cork foot and be dancing the reel before you know it. My name is Steers,” he said, “Burt Steers. Which outfit were you with?”

The two lay talking for a while. Finally, Jeff’s father felt sleepy.

“You better get all the sleep you can,” Steers said. “Anybody that goes through one of these operations needs lots of rest.” He glanced around. “No need to worry. We’re not going anywhere, and I’m not looking for any visitors. Are you?”

“No,” the lieutenant said as he dropped off into a deep sleep. “No visitors … not for me.”

* * *

“Well, you’re doing better, Ira,” Leah said with satisfaction. “As a matter of fact, it looks to me like you’re able to get out of here.”

It was two weeks after the Battle of Bull Run. Leah and her father had come regularly to visit Ira Pickens. His wound had given more trouble than he had expected, but now he looked fit. Leah sat beside him, asking how he had been.

He was sitting in a chair and had a cane that he used to walk with. She had brought him a cake that she had managed to bake, and he passed slices of it around to his companions, who devoured it eagerly.

One of them, a short, fat private from a New York regiment, grinned at Ira and gave him an obvious wink. “Wish I had a sweetheart to bring me cake like this. You got all the luck, Ira Pickens!”

Ira flushed. “Aw, it ain’t all luck. I had to work at this, didn’t I, Miss Leah?”

Leah was used to the men’s teasing Ira about her being his girlfriend, and she did nothing to dissuade them. She sat there talking, telling Ira what was going on in Washington.

When she got up to leave, he said, “You know, one of the soldiers said they’re keeping a bunch of Rebels next door. I reckon some of them are pretty bad off.”

Leah stopped at once. “Next door? You mean that big old factory of a building?”

“That’s it. The old Capitol. You can see it out the window here. Some of them get to walk around—with a guard, of course. Guess they’re wishing they were back in the South.”

“I hear they treated some of our fellows pretty rough, the Confederates did,” a soldier growled. “I’d just as soon they all die.”