But This Distance Had Not Been Gained Without Many Losses, For Every One In The Regiment Was Engaged.

Even those who, on account of the heat, had dropped out along the trail, as soon as the sound of the fight reached them, came limping to the front - and plunged into the firing- line.

It was the only place they could go - there was no other line. With the exception of Church's dressing station and its wounded there were no reserves.

Among the first to be wounded was the correspondent, Edward Marshall, of the New York Journal, who was on the firing-line to the left. He was shot through the body near the spine, and when I saw him he was suffering the most terrible agonies, and passing through a succession of convulsions. He nevertheless, in his brief moments of comparative peace, bore himself with the utmost calm, and was so much a soldier to duty that he continued writing his account of the fight until the fight itself was ended. His courage was the admiration of all the troopers, and he was highly commended by Colonel Wood in the official account of the engagement.

Nothing so well illustrated how desperately each man was needed, and how little was his desire to withdraw, as the fact that the wounded lay where they fell until the hospital stewards found them. Their comrades did not use them as an excuse to go to leave the firing- line. I have watched other fights, where the men engaged were quite willing to unselfishly bear the wounded from the zone of danger.

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