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98 Nortu Carona Troops, 1861-65.

was Grant’s way, a continual extending his left with fresh
‘troops and making his line impregnable with the spade and
cannon.

BURGESS MILL.

On the 27th the enemy again felt for our right flank, and
at Burgess’ Mill General MacRae’s Brigade assaulted them,
repulsing the full length of his line of battle, taking a battery
of artillery and passing far to the front, discovered that the
enemy were closing from both his flanks the gap he had just
made. MacRae was on foot leading his command, and point-
ing to the perilous situation, asked them to follow him out,
which they gallantly did by cutting their way out. Our loss
here was very heavy in killed and wounded, but none were
taken prisoners. Hill’s Corps took a great number of prison-
ers. MacRae complained bitterly about his superiors in com-
mand allowing him to be cut to pieces when it could have
been prevented.

Winter had now set in, and the men settled down with some
degree of comfort in their rudely constructed quarters. Some
attended religious worship by our Chaplain. The regiment
in early 1864 had a good Young Men’s Christian Associa-
tion, but no sign of it was visible at the close of the cam-
paign—the members of it having been knocked out. Some
who could raise a Confederate dollar went to the theatre ; yes,
we had a theatre in Davis’ Brigade, built of logs with a dirt
floor and log seats, and such capers the soldier comedians and
tragedians eut by torch light, and music by banjo and. the
fiddle! It was said the theatrical company made money.
Camp life, however, in the winter of 1864-65 was a hard
one, and upon the whole a very sad one. These old soldiers
of many battle fields, though they murmured not, knew a
great deal, and a few who supposed they could bear no more
deserted to the enemy, who stood with outstretched arms to
welcome them. The Forty-seventh furnished very few of
this class.

As General Grant received a steady flow of reinforcements
he invariably sent them to extend his left and in the severest

eit A Sp RE ee bel

Forty-SEVENTH REGIMENT. 99

weather the Forty-seventh was several times called out to
resist the extension.

One of these was on 5 February, 1865. It was sleeting
and very cold when a large force of Federals again moved
around our right to sever our communications. The Forty-
seventh formed a part of the attacking force which was suc-
cessful in driving them back. The regiment’s loss was a due
proportion of our total loss, which was perhaps 1,000, while
that of the enemy was double that number.

Toward the end of March Grant had collected an irresisti-
ble force on his left, which was daily feeling for our right,
and on 2 April broke through our attenuated line nearer to
Petersburg and moved in our rear. At this time the Forty-
seventh, lately reinforced by the last recruits from home,
were further to the right to try to stem the torrent that ap-
peared in that quarter. Lieutenant Westray, of Company
A, with thirty men, were engaged on our old picket line and
they held their position so well that even the enemy passed on
both sides of them and left them in their rear, from which
situation this little body made their way out, and the next
day turned up for duty across the Appomattox.

The skirmishers of the Forty-seventh had done picket duty
on the extreme of our right the night of the 1st and were re-
turning on the morning of the 2d along the breastworks held
by some Floridians. These were dividing out their day’s
rations, and if they had pickets out, they would evidently have
been quietly captured. The head of a Federal cavalry column
was approaching the breastworks and was within seventy-five
yards, when our skirmishers halted, had a parley with the
Federals and ascertaining they were enemies, poured a volley
into them, which drove them off, and we moved off again,
without having halted five minutes and without exchanging
a word with our friends. Thus we saved them from a com-
plete surprise.

Things everywhere on our side were now getting in a des-
perate fix, the battle raging, seemingly, everywhere. Our
skirmishers, about 100 in number, of whom thirty were from
the Forty-seventh, got up with our brigade near Southerland’s
Station, where McRae was so pressed 2 April that he must