of ultimate success, but each felt within himself that this was to be the decisive battle of the war, and as a consequence it would be stubborn and bloody.  Soldiers looked in the faces of their fellow-soldiers with a silent sympathy that spoke more eloquently than words an exhibition of brotherly love never before witnessed in the 1st corps.  They felt a sympathy for those whom they knew, before the setting of the sun, would feel touch of the elbow for the last time, and who must fall upon this distant field and in an enemy’s country.

About noon we were moved over the crest and halted behind a stone wall that ran parallel to a county road, our center being near a gateway in the wall.  As soon as the halt was made the soldiers fell down, and soon the most of them were fast asleep.  While here, it was necessary for some troops of Hill’s to pass over up and through the gate.  The head of the column was lead by a doughty General clad in a brilliant new uniform, a crimson sash encircling his waist, its deep, heavy hanging down to his sword scabbard, while great golden curls hung in maiden ringlets to his very shoulders.  His movement was superb and he sat his horse in true Knightly manner.  On the whole, such a turn-out was a sight seldom witnessed by the staid soldiers of the First Corps.  As he was passing a man in Company D, 3d South Carolina, roused up from his broken sleep, saw for the first time the soldier wonder with the long curls.  He called out to him, not knowing he was an officer of such rank, “Say, Mister, come right down out of that hair,” a foolish and unnecessary expression that was common throughout the army when anything unusual hove in sight.

This hail roused all the ire in the flashy General, he became as “mad as a March hare,” and wheeling his horse, dashed up to where the challenge appeared to have come from and demanded in an angry tone, “Who was that spoke?  Who commands this company?” And as no reply was given he turned away, saying, “D——­d if I only knew who it was that insulted me, I would put a ball in him.”  But as he rode off the soldier gave him a Parthian shot by calling after him, “Say, Mister, don’t get so mad about it, I thought you were some d——­n wagon master.”

Slowly again our column began moving to the right.  The center of the division was halted in front of little Round Top.  Kershaw was then on the right, Barksdale with his Mississippians on his left, Wofford and Semmes with their Georgians in rear as support.  Everything was quiet in our front, as if the enemy had put his house in order and awaited our coming.  Kershaw took position behind a tumbled down wall to await Hood’s movements on our right, and who was to open the battle by the assault on Round Top.  The country on our right, through which Hood had to manoeuver, was very much broken and thickly studded with trees and mountain undergrowth, which delayed that General in getting in battle line.  Anderson’s Georgians, with Hood’s old Texas Brigade under