The Fourteenth advanced by the right flank, commanded by Capt. Hall, the senior officer present. For some time after the fall of Col. Gardiner, he had been in command of the regiment. Solid shot were flying just over our heads. We marched through a rut in a stone wall, and down toward lower ground; while batteries were galloping for positions back of us, unlimbering, and opening fire on the heights beyond and in front of us, the enemy's last position. The infantry formed an L-shaped line, facing the Rebel batteries, the Fourteenth forming a part of the right branch. Then, for a few minutes, a brilliant artillery duel ensued, the shells screeching over our heads, in both directions. But what is that terrible commotion? that hoarse and mixed roar of battle? There is confusion in the Rebel redoubt. Look! then see the sudden spring of the prone infantry! Hear that strange, wild, exultant shout, which they only can send forth who have fought and won. Away to the right, and beyond the enemy's rear, flashes to us a spectacle vivid in its glory, because novel to the Fourteenth, and peculiar on any field. We caught the flashing of their sabres, as Averill and Merritt and Custer drove the enemy from their guns like a flock of sheep. The infantry moved on the heights, in line of battle, the Rebel prisoners by hundreds flocking through, between the Union battalions. The day was won, the Rebel army "sent whirling through Winchester." By brigades and battalions the Union army moved by the right flank over the ground last held by the enemy, and on, into, and through Winchester. We passed Rebel dead and wounded, with here and there a blue-coat lying in sad contrast with the gray. It was six o'clock, and a day's work for the Union was done.

A STAFF-OFFICER'S STORY.

225

ANOTHER ACCOUNT.

The following is taken from an account of the battle written by Lieut. Carroll D. Wright, afterwards colonel of the Fourteenth, who was at that time A.A.A.G. on the brigade-staff.

At two o'clock, on the morning of the 19th of September, the Sixth and Nineteenth Corps abandoned their intrenched camps in front of Berryville, and moved out toward Winchester. The muffled roar of artillery was heard at intervals during the morning, caused by the shelling of the advanced cavalry skirmishers. It was one of the most beautiful of earlyautumn days: the air was cool and mellow, the sun shed a tempered warmth, and the whole face of nature smiled in the harvest-time. Carelessly and unconsciously, with laugh and jest, our boys marched on to the harvest of death and mutilation; soon, however, meeting wounded cavalry skirmishers being borne to the rear, a sight to silence song and laughter.

Grover's four brigades were seen to pass through a gorge, cross a creek, and disappear in the hollows beyond; the men swinging along at the usual jaunty route-step, but with silent, determined countenances. At eleven o'clock both corps had completed their dispositions, -the long lines of the Sixth reaching east from Opequan Creek; while the Nineteenth occupied the ground to the right, but with a wide space intervening. The divisions were generally disposed in two parallel lines, a little distance apart. In front of our lines was a belt of forest; and, beyond, an uneven field; and, still farther, another belt of wood, in which was posted the Rebel infantry, supporting batteries on elevations in the rear.

It was nearly high-noon when the bugles sounded the grand advance. The old, but infinitely beautiful, panorama of all battle-fields, made still more impressive by the natural aspects of this most lovely of valleys, was spread before and around. Away to the bases of the Blue Ridge and the Cumberland faded stretches of forest, and fields dotted by dwellings, sparkling with streams, and glowing with the kisses of approaching

autumn. Nearer, could be seen the enemy's line of battle; and, still nearer, the splendid marching columns of our own infantry; while the sharpshooters and skirmishers of both lines specked the intervening space, so soon to be the theatre of deadly conflict.

Our artillery opened heavily, answered by the boom of the Rebel guns. Our forces advanced through the first wood, upon the open field, giving their fire to the enemy. For a few seconds the gleaming muskets vibrated before they entered the timber filled with Rebels, and then were lost in the shadows and smoke. The roar of the battle, as the two lines fairly met, sounding in a thunderous burst of volleys, pealed up from that wood; and smoke and flame streamed out in a long line, as though the whole forest had been suddenly ignited. The conflict was as fierce as the fiercest battle fought by Grant, from the Rapidan to Petersburg. The determination to win the battle, which seemed to inspire every man in our army, urged Birge's brigade of Grover's division so impetuously as almost to isolate it from the corps; while the whole front line of the division charged furiously through the wood

"Into the jaws of death,

Into the mouth of hell."

There was a brief and desperate encounter, a crossing of bayonets, and an incessant crash of rifles; and then that old second division, which marched so gayly over the mountains, was hurled back into the clearing, stunned, mangled, and shattered, emerging from the deadly grasp of the whole left wing of Early's army.

The Rebel advance was an advance no longer: the route was turned. Back, over the fences and ravines, and into the woods beyond, their flying and broken lines were pushed. The Eighth Corps was brought in on the right, and the flanks of the enemy were forced back, while his centre partially gave way. Battery after battery of the enemy was silenced. The word is still "Forward!" along three miles of contest. "Forward!" and you shall hear it from the lips of commanders everywhere;