Attacks on the Confederate centre and right followed that upon the left.  In the centre a great disaster was at one time imminent.  Owing to a mistake of orders, the brave General Rhodes had drawn back his brigade posted there—­this was seen by the enemy—­and a sudden rush was made by them with the view of piercing Lee’s centre.  The promptness and courage of a few officers and a small body of troops defeated this attempt.  General D.H.  Hill rallied a few hundred men, and opened fire with a single gun, and Colonel Cooke faced the enemy with his regiment, “standing boldly in line,” says General Lee, “without a cartridge.”  The stand made by this small force saved the army from serious disaster; the Federal line retired, but a last assault was soon begun, this time against the Confederate right.  It continued in a somewhat desultory manner until four in the evening, when, having massed a heavy column under General Burnside, opposite the bridge in front of Lee’s right wing, General McClellan forced the bridge and carried the crest beyond.

The moment was critical, as the Confederate force at this point was less than three thousand men.  But, fortunately, reenforcements arrived, consisting of A.P.  Hill’s forces from Harper’s Ferry.  These attacked the enemy, drove him from the hill across the Antietam again; and so threatening did the situation at that moment appear to General McClellan, that he is said to have sent General Burnside the message:  “Hold your ground!  If you cannot, then the bridge, to the last man.  Always the bridge!  If the bridge is lost, all is lost!”

The urgency of this order sufficiently indicates that the Federal commander was not without solicitude for the safety of his own left wing.  Ignorant, doubtless, of the extremely small force which had thus repulsed General Burnside, in all four thousand five hundred men, he feared that General Lee would cross the bridge, assail his left, and that the hard-fought day might end in disaster to his own army.  That General Lee contemplated this movement, in spite of the disproportion of numbers, is intimated in his official report.  “It was nearly dark,” he says, “and the Federal artillery was massed to defend the bridge, with General Porter’s corps, consisting of fresh troops, behind it.  Under these circumstances,” he adds, “it was deemed injudicious to push our advantage further in the face of fresh troops of the enemy much exceeding our own.”

The idea of an advance against the Federal left was accordingly abandoned, and a movement of Jackson’s command, which Lee directed, with the view of turning the Federal right, was discontinued from the same considerations.  Night had come, both sides were worn out, neither of the two great adversaries cared to risk another struggle, and the bitterly-contested battle of Sharpsburg was over.

The two armies remained facing each other throughout the following day.  During the night of this day, Lee crossed with his army back into Virginia.  He states his reasons for this:  “As we could not look for a material increase of strength,” he says, “and the enemy’s force could be largely and rapidly augmented, it was not thought prudent to wait until he should be ready again to offer battle.”