When I came to consciousness after being wounded the first thing that met my ears was the roar of musketry and the boom of cannon, with the continual swish, swash of the grape and canister striking the trees and ground.  I placed my hand in my bosom, where I felt a dull, deadening sensation.  There I found the warm blood, that filled my inner garments and now trickled down my side as I endeavored to stand upright.  I had been shot through the left lung, and as I felt the great gaping wound in my chest, the blood gushing and spluttering out at every breath, I began to realize my situation.  I tried to get off the field the best I could, the bullet in my leg not troubling me much, and as yet, I felt strong enough to walk.  My brother, who was a surgeon, and served three years in the hospitals in Richmond, but now in the ranks, came to my aid and led me to the rear.  We stopped near the railroad battery, which was belching away, the report of the great gun bringing upon us the concentrated fire of the enemy.  As I sat upon the fallen trunk of a tree my brother made a hasty examination of my wound.  All this while I was fully convinced I was near death’s door.  He pronounced my wound at first as fatal, a bit of very unpleasant information, but after probing my wound with his finger he gave me the flattering assurance that unless I bled to death quite soon my chances might be good!  Gentle reader, were you ever, as you thought, at death’s door, when the grim monster was facing you, when life looked indeed a very brief span?  If so, you can understand my feelings—­I was scared!  As Goldsmith once said, “When you think you are about to die, this world looks mighty tempting and pretty.”  Everything in my front took on the hue of dark green, a pleasant sensation came over me, and I had the strangest feeling ever experienced in my life.  I thought sure I was dying then and there and fell from the log in a death-like swoon.  But I soon revived, having only fainted from loss of blood, and my brother insisted on my going back up the railroad to a farmhouse we had passed, and where our surgeons had established a hospital.  The long stretch of wood we had to travel was lined with the wounded, each wounded soldier with two or three friends helping him off the field.  We had no “litter bearers” or regular detail to care for the wounded at this time, and the friends who undertook this service voluntarily oftentimes depleted the ranks more than the loss in battle.  Hundreds in this way absented themselves for a few days taking care of the wounded.  But all this was changed soon afterwards.  Regular details were made from each regiment, consisting of a non-commissioned officer and five privates, whose duty it was to follow close in rear of the line of battle with their “stretchers” and take off the disabled.