Coming to the edge of the woodlot, Longstreet reined in. Bullets were snicking through the trees, leaves fluttering down around him. "Right down there," Hood announced, pointing. He was right A ford, the river shallow to the right of the crossing for a good hundred yards. The banks were a bit steep. It'd be tough getting up on the far side, but it was better than trying to force the bridge with a frontal charge against men armed with breechloaders.
Two batteries were already in place, shelling the crest behind the bridge. He raised his field glasses and focused on a plume of smoke. It looked like a farmhouse at the crest was on Are. Now that would be a signal that could be seen for miles.
The entire river valley for nearly half a mile was an inferno, stabs of light flickering in the smoke, the high crack of Sharps rifles, the tearing roar of volleys from his side. Behind him, weaving down a farm lane, a column approached, George Anderson's brigade, running at the double, men staggering with exhaustion in the ninety-degree heat, having marched nearly twenty miles and now going into this.
From the opposite side of the creek, he saw an open line of Union cavalry coming down the hill, cutting across the field, stopping a hundred yards from the riverbank, troopers dismounting, pulling carbines from saddle holsters, units of five men, four dismounting, the fifth staying mounted and grabbing the reins of the other horses.
The troopers raced down to the banks of the narrow stream, sliding down into the high grass, nestling in behind trees. No artillery though, not a single gun, thank God. One field piece, loaded with canister, would murder the men about to sprint to the ford.
Hood came up by his side.
"Almost in place."
Pete took out his pocket watch and shook his head. This had been going on for well over an hour and a half. If the signal station back in Emmitsburg had indeed warned Meade, reinforcements could already be approaching Taneytown.
"Send them in now."
'Twenty more minutes, and I'll have the entire brigade up." "Now!"
Hood looked over at him, saluted.
"And John."
"Sir!'
"You stay here with me." "General?"
"I need you for a lot more… John, after this. I don't want you getting hurt now. Give the order, then come back here."
"Sir."
John galloped off. Pete continued to scan the approach to the ford. It was a steep bank down for the last fifty yards. He could see the Yankee cavalry deploying along the stream, crouching down low, getting ready. His artillery, halfway back toward the main bridge, was now up to three batteries, all of them pounding the slopes on die other side with case shot. The third battery, as ordered, was deploying out to enfilade this ford, the first shot already winging in, kicking up a geyser of water twenty feet high.
The long roll of a drum stuttered behind him, a bugle picking up the call. The first two regiments of Anderson's brigade started down the road, on the double, racing around a bend in the road. In another minute they'd be in sight of the troopers defending the ford.
Hood, his horse lathered and panting, came up to Longstreet's side, reining in.
"It's going to get tough. I've ordered the next regiment to fall in on the right They will be going straight down to the stream in open order."
Pete nodded, saying nothing, lowering his glasses to watch the battle unfold.
The charge, advancing in columns of four, came around the final bend in the road. They were now in view. He could see Yankee troopers standing up, raising carbines, beginning to fire.
The charge pressed in, men dropping, sprawling in the roadway, staggering to either side. The head of the column hit the stream, men losing their footing on the large slippery rock that some farmer had laboriously put into place at the bank of the river.
Men jumped into the stream, rifles held high, bullets smacking the water around them. They were in thigh deep, desperately struggling to get across, churning the water into a muddy foam. The column stalled at the middle, breaking apart men going down, bodies floating, wounded fleeing back to the shore.
The road was packed with men who started to spread out, falling in to either side of the ford, dodging into the high grass and trees, opening fire. The attack stalled.
He waited, Hood softly cursing by his side. A hundred men or more were down, littering the road, the riverbank, floating in the slow-moving current Shells arced in, detonating along the far bank and in the field beyond, where mounted troopers struggled to control the horses of those who were fighting on foot
Anderson's third regiment came out of the woodlot to Pete's right deployed in heavy skirmish order, moving fast rifles poised as they went down into the narrow valley. Long minutes passed as they pushed to the edge of the stream, adding their weight of fire to the two regiments that had gone to ground at the ford.
"Now, damn it now!" Hood shouted, and he started to go forward, Pete reaching out to grab his reins.
Only thirty yards of thigh-deep water separated the two sides. Hood would be dead in minutes if he went down there.
A surge finally built up. A couple of dozen men leapt into the stream, fifty yards below the ford, and tried to storm across. Only three or four made it, slamming in against the muddy slope and then pushing up, going hand to hand with the troopers who had drawn revolvers to face them.
That small charge seemed to set off a fuse. A wolflike shriek began to echo, build, sending corkscrews down Pete's
"That's it!" Hood roared. "Go! Go!"
Anderson's men stood up, swarming by the hundreds into the stream, running with high, exaggerated steps as they splashed through the water.
The charge stormed across the stream, scores of men falling, but more and more gaining the opposite shore. From out of the thin band of trees, a scattering of Yankees emerged, running back to their mounts, followed seconds later by a gray-and-butternut swarm. Most of the troopers gained their mounts, leaping into saddles, spurring horses, but more than one fell in the excitement, or jumped astride a horse that was so worn it could barely get up to a canter before its rider was dropped.
"Let's go," Pete announced and he came out of the wood-lot, Hood by his side, and raced down the slope, avoiding the road, which was littered with the wounded, dead, and dying.
Reaching the stream, he let his horse drink for a moment. It was a grim landscape. A couple of hundred casualties at the very least Bodies floated in the stream, plumes of pink spreading from them. Exhausted men lay on both shores, pushed to the limit by the long march, the heat and this short but deadly fight He crossed the stream, his mount slipping as it struggled to get up the muddy bank.
The battle was sweeping up the gentle slope ahead, a strange sight exhausted infantry pursuing equally exhausted cavalry. If he had but one regiment of fresh mounted troopers, he could bag the whole lot in front of him.
He pushed on, following the skirmishers advancing up the slope and onto the high footing beyond Atop the crest the ragged line had halted and were blazing away, men shouting, loading frantically. Gaining the line, he saw their target. Hundreds of Yankee troopers were falling back, crowding the pike, all semblance of order gone, streaming toward the rear now that they were outflanked.
The volume of fighting down at the main bridge was beginning to drop off. They were giving up, pulling back. The sight filled him with frustration. They were getting away, damn it. But he could sense that this unit was beaten.
Long minutes passed, his skirmishers engaging at a range of several hundred yards, not feeling strong enough to try and push forward and close. Finally another regiment came up, men staggering as they deployed into a heavy battle line and at last began to squeeze in on the pike.
A final determined band came up the road when they were less than a hundred yards away from the burning farmhouse. A volley dropped several men as the last of the troopers veered off, cutting out into the open fields beyond.
His skirmishers finally closed on the main road, and a hoarse cheer rose up as they greeted troops from Law's brigade coming up from the main bridge.
Anderson, who had been on the skirmish line, came back, features pale, obviously on the edge of dropping from heat exhaustion. "Sir, you'd better come over here."
Pete followed the brigade commander over to the burning farmhouse. Half a hundred wounded and dead troopers were on the front lawn. A surgeon, aided by a lone woman, with two small children clinging to her side, stood at the busted gate.
The surgeon looked up coldly at Pete, who stiffened and saluted.
"My surgeons will be up shortly. We'll establish our hospital here, and your men will be tended to also, Doctor." The surgeon said nothing.
Anderson motioned to one of the bodies. "Sir, that's Buford," Anderson announced.
Pete sighed, dismounted, went up to his old comrade, and knelt down. He wasn't sure if John was alive or not The wound was ghastly, through the lungs.
He wasn't good at moments like this. Bad enough when it was your own men. Harder though when it was someone from long ago, now on the other side, and it was you who'd done it to him.
John opened his eyes. "We have to hold," John whispered.
"You did, John. You did just fine." "Pete? Is that you?" "Yes, John, it's Pete." Buford sighed, closed his eyes. "I'm sorry, John; it had to be done." But Buford was gone.
General Longstreet stood up, catching the cold gaze of the woman standing protectively over the body. "Your house, ma'am?" "Yes."
"My apologies, ma'am. My quartermaster will give you a voucher for payment I pray that you and your family are safe."
"My husband isn't. He died at Gaines Mills," she paused, "fighting on your side."
There was nothing he could say.
He turned away, walking back out to the road. Men from Law's and Anderson's brigades were forming up, gathering beneath their standards on the far side of the road. They were finished for now, played out and needed several hours' rest before he could push them again.
He saw Anderson, leaning against the fence, doubled over. The man vomited. It wasn't fear, it was just the exhaustion after a tough fight Pete waited until the brigade commander, spitting and coughing, stood back up, features pale.
"You had two regiments that didn't engage?"
"Yes, sir."
"I want them on the road in fifteen minutes." Anderson hesitated, then saluted and walked off, his legs rubbery.
Pete drew out his pocket watch. It was nearly four in the afternoon. Too long. Too damn long.
He looked back at John Buford's body.
Maybe you did buy enough time, Pete thought but God I hope not
Remounting, he turned east and continued on toward Taneytown as the roof of the burning farmhouse collapsed, sending up a pillar of flame and smoke.