the Second Army Corps, threw three divisions against the West Wood and the Roulette House.  In three lines, up the slope from the Antietam, at sixty yards distance and covering a wide front, came Sedgwick on the right, French on the left, and Richardson to the left rear.  So orderly was the advance of those 18,000 Northerners, and so imposing their array, that even the Confederate officers watched their march with admiration, and terrible was the shock with which they renewed the conflict.

Sedgwick, emerging from the East Wood, moved directly over the corn-field, crossed the turnpike, and entering the West Wood to northward of the point still held by Greene, swept through the timber, and with a portion of his advanced brigade reached the further edge.  Greene, at the same moment, moved upon the Dunkard Church, and Early, who with the fragments of Jones’ division was alone within the wood, marched rapidly in the same direction.  Attacked suddenly in flank from behind a ridge of rock Greene’s regiments were driven back; and then Early, observing Sedgwick’s third line pushing across the turnpike, reformed his troops for further action.  Greene, for the moment, had been disposed of, but a more formidable attack was threatening.  Sedgwick’s 6000 muskets, confronted only by some 600* (* Letter of Jackson’s Adjutant-General.  Memoirs of W.N.  Pendleton D.D. page 216.) of the Valley soldiers under Grigsby, were thronging through the wood, and a change of front southward would have sent them sweeping down the Confederate line.  Early could hardly have withstood their onset; Hood was incapable of further effort, and D.H.  Hill was heavily pressed by French.  But Jackson’s hand still held the reins of battle.  During the fierce struggle of the morning he had remained on the edge of the West Wood, leaving, as was his wont, the conduct of the divisions to his subordinates, but watching his enemy with a glance that saw beyond the numbers arrayed against him.  He had already demanded reinforcements from General Lee; and in anticipation of their speedy arrival their orders had been already framed.  They had not been called for to sustain his front, or to occupy a new position.  Despite the thronging masses of the Federals, despite the fact that his line was already broken, attack, and attack only, was in Jackson’s mind, and the reserves and the opportunity arrived together.  A staff officer was dispatched to direct Walker, on the left, to sustain the Texans, to clear the West Wood, and to place a detachment in the gap between the Dunkard Church and the batteries of Colonel Lee;* (* Sharpsburg.  By Major-General J.G.  Walker, C.S.A.  Battles and Leaders volume 2 pages 677 and 678.) while Jackson himself, riding to meet McLaws, ordered him “to drive the enemy back and turn his right.”  Anderson’s brigade was sent to support McLaws, and Semmes’ brigade of McLaws’ division was detached to strengthen Stuart.