Just before the charge, Zagonyi directed one of his buglers, a Frenchman, to sound a signal.  The bugler did not seem to pay any attention to the order, but darted off with Lieutenant Maythenyi.  A few moments afterwards he was observed in another part of the field vigorously pursuing the flying infantry.  His active form was always seen in the thickest of the fight.  When the line was formed in the Plaza, Zagonyi noticed the bugler, and approaching him said, “In the midst of the battle you disobeyed my order.  You are unworthy to be a member of the Guard.  I dismiss you.”  The bugler showed his bugle to his indignant commander;—­the mouth-piece of the instrument was shot away.  He said, “The mouth was shoot off.  I could not bugle viz mon bugle, and so I bugle viz mon pistol and sabre.”  It is unnecessary to add, the brave Frenchman was not dismissed.

I must not forget to mention Sergeant Hunter, of the Kentucky company.  His soldierly figure never failed to attract the eye in the ranks of the Guard.  He had served in the regular cavalry, and the Body-Guard had profited greatly from his skill as a drill-master.  He lost three horses in the fight.  As soon as one was killed, he caught another from the Rebels:  the third horse taken by him in this way he rode into St. Louis.

The Sergeant slew five men.  “I won’t speak of those I shot,” said he,—­“another may have hit them; but those I touched with my sabre I am sure of, because I felt them.”

At the beginning of the charge, he came to the extreme right and took position next to Zagonyi, whom he followed closely through the battle.  The Major, seeing him, said,—­

“Why are you here, Sergeant Hunter?  Your place is with your company on the left.”

“I kind o’ wanted to be in the front,” was the answer.

“What could I say to such a man?” exclaimed Zagonyi, speaking of the matter afterwards.

There was hardly a horse or rider among the survivors that did not bring away some mark of the fray.  I saw one animal with no less than seven wounds,—­none of them serious.  Scabbards were bent, clothes and caps pierced, pistols injured.  I saw one pistol from which the sight had been cut as neatly as it could have been done by machinery.  A piece of board a few inches long was cut from a fence on the field, in which there were thirty-one shot-holes.

It was now nine o’clock.  The wounded had been carried to the hospital.  The dismounted troopers were placed in charge of them,—­in the double capacity of nurses and guards.  Zagonyi expected the foe to return every minute.  It seemed like madness to try and hold the town with his small force, exhausted by the long march and desperate fight.  He therefore left Springfield, and retired before morning twenty-five miles on the Bolivar road.

Captain Fairbanks did not see his commander after leaving the column in the lane, at the commencement of the engagement.  About dusk he repaired to the prairie, and remained there within a mile of the village until midnight, when he followed Zagonyi, rejoining him in the morning.