whole line the loud shouts of triumph rang out, and on they pressed up the hill crowned with cannon and crowded with rifles. The rebels loaded their guns with canister and grape. But our troops clung to the hill, sometimes lying on their faces to let the storm drive over them, and swarmed up the hill. The flags constantly advancing, first one and then another, up they went through that storm of death. The whole ridge seems heaving with volcanic fires. "From peak to peak, the rattling crags among, Leaps the live thunder." Baird, Wood, Granger, Johnson, are everywhere active and cool. Color-bearers fall; but on go the flags. The men press steadily through the sheet of flame. Bullets are as thick as snow-flakes in a winter storm. The rebels light fuses, and roll shells down the hill: they hurl rocks even, and load their guns with handfuls of cartridges in their hurry. But nothing breaks the line of blue-coats: they swarm up; the flags still ascend. There is a long, loud cheer from thousands of victorious men: the ridge is won. For a few minutes, the bloody struggle continues between the masses of infuriated troops. Artillerists are bayoneted at their guns, and the guns turned on the retreating foe. Whole regiments surrender: others fling themselves down the mountain-side, followed by clouds of rifle-bullets. The rebel centre is broken; the wings are doubling up in confusion; the victory is complete. It had only been a march of fifty-five minutes; but in those minutes thousands of heroic men had taken their last, long march to the realms of death. "On Fame's eternal camping-ground And Glory guards with solemn round Gen. Grant, who had been under fire all day, was now recognized on the hill; and the men greeted him with loud cheers wherever he moved. 66 It Bragg, powerless to resist, was retiring, probably in the spirit of his note to Grant,—that "prudence required non-combatants to leave." He was astonished. was a position," he said, "which a line of skirmishers ought to have maintained against any assault." The German soldiers engaged fought with the steadiness and courage with which their race, battling for fatherland, conquered Napoleon at Leipsic, and drove his victorious legions beyond the banks of the Rhine. Grant captured over six thousand prisoners, forty pieces of artillery, and seven thousand stand of arms, — the largest capture which had been made on any open field during the war. Our loss in killed and wounded was five thousand. At seven o'clock in the evening, Gen. Grant sent the following modest despatch to Washington, making no mention of himself in any manner : Although the battle lasted from early dawn till dark this evening, I believe I am not premature in announcing a complete victory over Bragg. Lookout-mountain top, all the rifle-pits in Chattanooga Valley, and Missionary Ridge entire, have been carried, and are now held by us. U. S. GRANT, Major-General. Gen. Meigs, the Quarter-Master-General of the United-States army, who was at Chattanooga at this 6 time, and an eye-witness of the battle, wrote a full account of these military operations to Gen. Halleck, in which he said, "Probably not so well-directed, so well-ordered a battle has taken place during the war. Kentucky and Tennessee are rescued; Georgia and the South-east are threatened in the rear; and another victory is added to the chapter of unconditional-surrender Grant." " The victory was worthy of such announcement. Jefferson Davis was a very vain man; and, when a great battle was about to be fought, he would hurry to the scene of the contest, and interfere with the plans of his generals. If a victory ensued, he claimed it as the result of his advice; if a defeat, he alleged it was because he could not remain and personally direct the carrying-out of his plans. Only a few weeks before the great battle at Chattanooga, he stood on the lofty summit of Missionary Ridge, and surveyed the field of the impending contest, with Generals Bragg and Pemberton. As he looked down on the Union camps in the valley, he said exultingly, "The Federals are in just the trap I set for them. The green fields of Tennessee will soon be ours." Gen. Pemberton, whose remembrance of Vicksburg was still fresh, replied, "Mr. Davis, you are commander-in-chief, and, of course, will direct as you judge best. I have been blamed for not attacking the enemy when they were drawing around me at Vicksburg; but do you order an attack on these troops now, and, my life on it, not a single man will ever come back over the valley, except as a prisoner." But Davis predicted only conquest. The reader of sacred history will be reminded of another arch-rebel, who once ascended "an exceeding high mountain," and promised dominion and power over broad regions he did not possess, and never conquered. A high rock from which the Confederate President addressed the troops has since been called "The Devil's Pulpit." CHAPTER XXI. IT THE BATTLE OF RINGGOLD. T was not Gen. Grant's disposition to rest satisfied with the first-fruits of victory; and Sheridan was ordered to pursue the retreating enemy, which he did with such vigor, that Bragg barely escaped capture with his whole staff. About a mile in the rear of the battle-field was a hill, on which the rebels planted a formidable battery, and endeavored to rally their broken columns ; but Sheridan and his men charged with the same bayonets and the same impetuosity which had carried them up the heights of Missionary Ridge. "It was now dark; and, just as the head of one of these columns reached the summit of the hill, the moon rose from behind, and a medallion view of the column was disclosed as it crossed the disk of the moon and attacked the enemy. Outflanked on right and left, the rebels fled, leaving the coveted artillery and trains. Those who escaped capture were driven across Chickamauga Creek, where they burned the bridges almost while they passed.' Early the next morning, the army pushed on to destroy the enemy, and to relieve Burnside at Knox *Badeau. |