The battle was poised on the most delicate of balances. An officer panicking, a flag bearer falling, perhaps even one man turning, screaming that all was lost, could set off a stampede on either side. In turn, a few men were determined to hang on. An officer oblivious of risk and riding forward, a man who could inspire and lead, could make the decisive difference.
For the Confederates, at that moment, there were four profound advantages, which were at that same instant distinct and terrible disadvantages for the Union. The Confederates had not been forced to advance, all they had had to do was wait, saving their already half-depleted strength for the supreme moment. They were on the high ground, with all the natural advantages that implied, and along most of the front Except where several small breaches had been cut into their line, they were still in the trench or the battery bastions, while their foes were downslope and in the open… and finally, they had a commander who at that moment was inspired to lead, to make the decisions that had to be made second by second. The psychological advantage thus gained was tremendous.
The supreme moment was at hand before Union Mills.
Even as the two breakthroughs cracked into the Confederate line, Lee was galloping back to the rear, not in retreat but with orders, his staff at least grateful that for a few minutes he was relatively out of harm's way except for the continual rain of shot arcing down from the Union batteries.
Rodes's heavy division, minus one brigade under O'Neal, which was up on the forward line, had sat out the bombardment and first assault, lying down in a field of waist-high com, four hundred yards away.
The first ranks could see Lee riding up, waving his straw hat, and the men were instantly up.
"Lee! Lee! Lee!"
Rodes, mounted and at the front of his division, snapped off a salute.
"General, send your men in now!" Lee shouted. "Reclose the line and then push those people back!"
Rodes needed no further orders. He could see where the battered brigades of McLaws and Anderson were beginning to bend under the strain.
Rodes's First Brigade, Daniel's North Carolinians, already deployed in regimental front, leapt forward on the double, while behind them, the brigades of Dole and Ram-seur shook out from column to line by regiment and began to move toward their left Iverson's brigade, so badly shattered in the fight before Gettysburg, was held back for the moment, Rodes having decided to personally lead the unit after Iverson's ghastly, drunken display three days earlier, which had nearly annihilated the entire unit when he let them advance into a trap, while he hid in the rear, bottle in hand.
Lee started to turn, to go in with them, but this time his staff did revolt, pushing their mounts in front of Traveler, shouting for him to stay back. Again the realization hit him, and slightly embarrassed he nodded an assent
Meade, pacing back and forth nervously, turned yet again, raising his field glasses. It was impossible to tell. The smoke was thickening again, the rain increasing, the effect now being to mingle cloud and smoke into one impenetrable haze, all but obscuring the view.
Sedgwick was by his side. "Should I go in?" he asked.
And within Meade, at that moment, there was a terrible indecision. To speak an hour ago of forty thousand men at once sweeping forward was one thing; now he was seeing the result Thousands of men were emerging out of the gloom, streaming back, individually, in groups of two or three, helping a wounded comrade, in several cases entire regiments, or what was left of them, moving slowly, sometimes pausing as if debating their course.
The front of the first trench was still visible in places, easy enough to pick out by the carpet of bodies spread before it
Two entire corps were fought out and now word had just come that Sickles, without orders, had thrown at least another division into the fight advancing onto the open.
If that was true, then Sedgwick was now the only true reserve left that and the small remnant of the devastated First Corps, which had marched up during the night
"Do I go in?" Sedgwick asked yet again.
Meade was silent gazing at the heavy columns of Sedgwick, and the ever-increasing flood of beaten men emerging out of the gloom encasing the opposite ridge.
"Sir, what do you want me to do? Should I go in now or wait?"
"Only if Hancock and Slocum break through," Meade replied.
Meade turned, galloping down the line to see what Sickles was doing, leaving Sedgwick alone.
Longstreet stood with Porter in the shattered bastion built by Cabell and now occupied by Mcintosh's valiant gunners, the Second Rockbridge Artillery posted at the right corner, pouring blast after blast of canister into the smoke, confident that canister would do its work at this distance almost without aiming.
Another of Longstreet's old West Point comrades suddenly went down less than a hundred paces away, John Gibbon struck in the stomach by a canister ball from a Rockbridge gun. John struggled back to his feet clutching the agonizing wound, and continued to scream for his men to press forward.
Another seam in the Confederate line ruptured, as men from half a dozen regiments, all mingled together, pushed up across the road and the ruins of the Shriver house, led by the men of the old Philadelphia Brigade, yet again Irishmen under green flags. The hard-fighting Sixty-ninth Pennsylvania led the way, breaking over the trench, gaining a small inverted V lodgment, bending several companies back to hold either flank. It might have gained momentum, but the Seventy-first, on their right, broke apart only feet away from widening the breech, and began to fall back, their comrades of the Sixty-ninth jeering them before turning back to the fight
Henry, shaking with exhaustion, was at a near hysterical pitch, shouting for his gunners to aim high, to keep pouring it in. He could no longer see what they were shooting at but from the flashes of light through the gloom, and the continual roar of musketry along the crest he knew that the top was almost gained but not yet taken.
Winfield Scott Hancock, hat off, eyes blazing, galloped at full speed down the Baltimore Road, oblivious to Meade's orders to stay back from the fight Those were his boys up there, but that was not where he was heading first
On his right arrayed across the open slope that his divisions had marched down less than an hour before, were the three heavy divisions of Sedgwick, eighteen thousand men… and they were not moving!
Reaching the front of the Sixth Corps, which was deployed at the edge of the flat bottomland, he leapt a ditch, nearly losing his saddle, and then streaked across the field, his mount nervous, shifting and weaving to avoid trampling the dead and wounded.
At last he spotted Horatio Wright commander of the First Division of the Sixth.
"In the name of God, why are you not advancing?" Hancock roared.
"Sir, we've yet to receive orders to go in," Wright replied, stunned by the near hysteria of Hancock. "I was ordered to stay in reserve until a breakthrough had been achieved by your men."
"Goddamn you, sir. Go in! Go in! My boys are dying up there."
"Sir, I was ordered to wait for General Sedgwick to give the final order to advance."
Hancock threw back his head and screamed the foulest of oaths against Sedgwick. Standing in his stirrups, he fixed Wright with a malignant gaze. "Look over there, man!" and he pointed toward the opposite crest "You can see we're almost in. My men are dying up there by the thousands. All that is needed is one more push. Now give your men the order to charge, and I will go with you!"
Wright hesitated, looking to his staff, who were gazing at Hancock as if he were a madman. The seconds dragged out and finally Wright nodded. 'I will follow you, sir."
Hancock swung about drawing sword and holding it high. "On the double, men, on the double!"
Wright's division lurched forward. At the sight of them advancing, the second division in line behind them, Russell's, believing that the order had been given, stepped forward as well, followed a minute later by the third and final division.
Wright's men still had over eight hundred yards to go before coming into effective range; at double time it would take five to seven minutes. If deployed forward, on the opposite side of the valley, it would have only taken one minute.
"Here comes Rodes!" Longstreet cried hoarsely, thrilling at the sight of the brigade-wide front charging the last hundred yards, the Second and Third brigades advancing at the oblique to their own left followed in the rear by the decimated remnants of Iverson's brigade, those men now eager for pay back for the slaughter endured in front of Seminary and Oak Ridges three days before.
The countercharge swept into the thinning volley line of McLaws's two brigades, hitting it like a tidal surge. The units instantly mingled together and now flooded back into their trench, in places continuing straight forward, down the slope, covering the last few paces into the men under Gibbon and Hays.
The charge hit with a vicious momentum, in many places propelling men forward who normally would have hesitated to cross those last ten to twenty feet into actual hand-to-hand combat.
An audible impact of men slamming into men, rifles against rifles, and steel into flesh was heard, the Union line staggering backward like a wall about to burst when hit by a battering ram.
Hundreds fell within seconds, many just tripping, going down in the confusion, men then backing up or pushing forward, stumbling over the fallen and going down as well.
For a moment the battle degenerated into a brawl in which all lashed out, some in rage, others in terror, kicking, stabbing, clubbing, and gouging anyone within reach. More than one man, in his terror, was slammed into by another, and whirling about stabbed a comrade by mistake, sometimes not even realizing what he had done.
And yet again, all of what was said about the "good ground" came to pass here. If the rebel charge had been met on level ground and by men not already exhausted, the line just might have held, but their backs were to a downward slope now churned up into slippery mud, all was confusion in the smoke, none could see more than ten, maybe twenty feet, and what little could be seen was a glimpse of hell.
Men began to stagger backward; some in their terror simply threw aside their rifles and ran; others, as always those around a sacred flag or trusted officer or sergeant, backed out, slashing and stabbing at those who pressed too close.
The entire Union line disintegrated as Rodes's Second Brigade slammed in and the Third Brigade, a few minutes later, obliquely hit Lockwood's lone brigade on the Union right
John Gibbon, defiant to the end, stood clutching his ghastly wound. Mercifully, a North Carolina boy stopped short of him, grounded his musket, and then just simply offered a hand, not saying a word. Gibbon, nodding, slowly sank to his knees.
Those still standing from the second and third waves of Hancock's and Slocum's corps poured down off the slopes above Union Mills.
"Keep moving; don't stop!"
Hancock was still out in front, weaving back and forth in front of Wright's brigades, sword held high.
Already across the stream, they had taken almost no casualties, all the Confederate fire concentrated on the annihilation of those on the slope.
Though he could not see it, so thick were the smoke and the steadily increasing curtains of rain, Sickles, a mile and a half to the west, was going in with two divisions. Sickles's charge was just now slamming into the flank of Early's brigade, which itself was on the flank of the retreating Twelfth Corps.
Hancock caught a glimpse of a courier riding straight down the middle of the Baltimore Road, swerving off, going down into the streambed, and then just disappearing. He suspected it was from Meade or Sedgwick.
To hell with them now.
From out of the maelstrom cloaking the ridge ahead, he saw a wave of men emerging, falling back, some running like madmen. Spurring forward, he waded straight into their ranks, standing high in the stirrups.
"My men. Rally to the old Sixth! Fall back in. Rally!"
At the sight of their corps commander, many of the men actually did turn about, though there was little fight in them now, exhausted as they were.
The blue wave of the Sixth Corps hit the bottom of the slope and started the final climb up toward the blood-soaked ridge.
"My God, another one," Porter gasped. "When will they stop this!'
Rodes had somehow managed to rein in his men charging down the slope, and they were now falling back up the slope in fairly good order, firing a volley, withdrawing a couple of dozen yards, then firing again before sliding into the trench.
Porter's guns had switched back to solid shot and case shot with fuses cut to two seconds, firing downslope into the mist, the passage of the shot visible by the twisting swirls lashed through the smoke.
"One more time!" Longstreet shouted, stepping back from the walls of the bastion, looking at the gunners. "They can't have anything behind this."
Venable and Moxley were waiting outside the bastion, holding Longstreet's horse. He left the position, pausing for a second to look back. The battlefront was emerging out of the smoke, a powerful block. He caught a glimpse of a divisional standard, the new ones that the Army of the Potomac had just instituted. He wasn't sure which division it signified, but it was obviously Sixth Corps. So, after all these days, he knew exactly where they were at last, the heaviest corps of their army, coming straight at them.
He judged the width of the line, a half mile or more across. Most likely a second division behind it..Thank God, they had not come up ten minutes earlier.
He turned to Moxley. "Ride like hell. This will hit here," and both ducked as a shell screamed in close, but failed to burst
"Pender and Pettigrew are to leave a light screen, one brigade each to cover their lines, but then start moving everything else down here."
"Sir?" Moxley looked at him, a bit confused.
"Every regiment, every battalion, I want them here! Get a message back to General Lee as well. Tell him we've pinpointed the location of Sixth Corps. They are directly in front of us. They are not before Taneytown; they are here!"
Moxley saluted and galloped off, his horse kicking up sprays of mud
Longstreet swung up into the saddle. The rain had closed in hard, dropping visibility to less than a hundred yards, so that for a moment the advancing lines were lost to view. There was no need to see them; one could hear them, the ground, the air vibrating from the steady trample of eighteen thousand men, coming straight at him.
Henry watched the advance, tears in his eyes, knowing that the timing was off, that they should have gone in ten minutes earlier.
Barely able to speak, he grabbed the nearest battery commander. "Pour it in. Sweep that crest Don't stop!"
The major shook his head. "Sir, we're out. Just canister and half a dozen rounds of case shot as reserve."
"Then fire the case shot!"
Even as he spoke, Meade, who had swept past Henry twenty minutes earlier, in response to the word that Sickles was advancing, reined in.
Sedgwick, hat off, came racing up to join Meade.
"Did you order your men in?" Meade shouted.
"No."
"Then why are they going in? Did we break through?"
Sedgwick hesitated. "I'm not sure. I sent a courier down to order them to stop, but they are still going forward."
"They're going in without orders?" Meade cried.
Henry looked at the two, at first mystified, and then overwhelmed with despair.
"I did not yet order the final advance," Meade gasped.
Henry, all thought of propriety gone, stepped forward between the two. "Let them go!" Henry shouted, his voice breaking. "They still might carry it."
"It's out of control, Hunt," Meade said, his voice cold and distant. "Sickles went in without orders; it's too late to stop him; now this, my last reserve other than First Corps."
Henry wanted to ask him why, if that was the case, had he had Sedgwick move up halfway in support to start with. He sensed that at this moment Meade was losing his nerve, thinking more of a battle lost than a battle that could still be won.
"They can still carry it" Henry offered.
"Those are my men going in without my orders," Sedgwick announced stiffly.
"Then go in with them now, sir," Henry replied, his voice filled with rebuke. "Show them that you can still lead."
Sedgwick glared at him coldly. "Goddamn you, sir. I'll have you court-martialed for that"
"Go ahead," Henry said wearily, shaking his head.
The nearest battery fired, and Meade, startled, looked up.
"I thought you said we were nearly out of ammunition."
"I'm putting in what we have left" Henry replied, turning away from Sedgwick. "My God, those men need my support Sir, they are our last hope. Let them go in."
Meade was silent watching as the Sixth Corps started up the slope, disappearing into the smoke and mist
"Go, John, see what you can still do." Meade sighed.
Sedgwick glared angrily at Henry for a moment and then, with a vicious jerk of the reins, turned his mount around and raced down the hill.
Henry said nothing, looking up at Meade, who sat astride his horse as if transfixed, not moving, almost like a statue, rain dripping from the brim of his hat
Flashes of light danced along the ridge crest; long seconds later the rumble of a volley rolled across the valley.
"I've lost control of the battle," Meade whispered, speaking to himself.
Even as he spoke, Henry saw a rider emerging through the drifting clouds of smoke, standing tall in his stirrups, shouting for General Meade. A gunner pointed and the courier turned, seeing the flag of the commander of the army, and raced up, then reined in hard, mud splattering up from his horse.
"Sir, I've come down from Hanover, sir," the courier gasped. "Hell of a ride. Damn near got caught twice by Reb cavalry."
As he spoke the courier fumbled with his breast pocket and finally pulled out a packet It was sealed with wax, several large matches tucked into the edge of the envelope, so that if the courier felt he would be captured he could quickly burn it
"Has anyone else brought this in?" the courier asked.
Meade grabbed the envelope and shook his head.
"I was told three other riders were carrying the same message, sir."
"Well, Lee is most likely reading those by now."
Meade tore the envelope open; inside were two memos. Henry, standing by his side, caught a glimpse of one, the letterhead standing out boldly