into the rear of Palmer’s and Johnson’s divisions.  Meanwhile, the crash and roar of battle came nearer and nearer, until the attack struck Reynolds on the flank and in rear.  But he had been forewarned, and his line was swung backward, at right angles with his original position, to face the attack from the new direction.  Even then he was forced backward until his men were stretched across the open field in rear of Palmer’s division, and the battle was going on directly behind us.  Something—­a shell perhaps—­set fire to a log house at the upper end of this field, not three hundred yards from our brigade.  This house had been taken for a hospital the night before.  It was filled with wounded men, too badly hurt to be taken farther away in the ambulances, and the regular hospital flag floated above it.  This unfortunate house, with its maimed occupants, was brought between Reynolds’s men and the attacking enemy when the former were driven into the open field; and, despite the non-combatant flag flying from the gable, it was riddled with shells from the Southern batteries.  I do not charge upon those gunners a knowledge of the facts here given:  their batteries were some distance away through the forest.  However, whether they saw the house and the flag or not, their fire swept mercilessly through the house, while many a stout-hearted soldier, knowing what was there, wished that if he were to be hit at all, he might be struck dead at once, and so avoid such sickening horrors.

For the second time on that memorable day it looked for a few moments as if Palmer would have to face his men about and fight to the rear.  Preparations to do this were made on the right of the division, but, fortunately, the appalling disaster which seemed imminent in the complete encompassing of the four divisions of the left was averted.  The enemy yielded at last to the stubborn resistance, and Reynolds re-established his line—­not upon the old ground entirely, but to conform to the altered situation.  He was now the right of the army upon the original field, and four divisions comprised all that was left of the Army of the Cumberland in the position of the morning.

The divisions of the centre and the right—­where were they?  Brannan, and Wood, and Negley, and Davis, and Van Cleve, and gallant Sheridan, who held stubbornly his division even amid the panic at Stone River—­where were they?  And Rosecrans, commander of the army; Thomas, the hero in every fight; rash McCook and unfortunate Crittenden, chiefs of corps?  Gone with the centre and the right of the army; gone with the reserves and the artillery; gone with the ammunition-trains; gone with everything that belonged to the Army of the Cumberland except four divisions of unconquered soldiers with half-filled cartridge-boxes and with hearts that knew no fear.