552 NortH CARoLina Troops, 1861-65.

three days, resulting in a complete rout of the enemy, caus-

ing General Pope to move his “Headquarters in the Saddle”
many miles nearer Alexandria. During this battle Captain
S. A. Ashe, Assistant Adjutant-General, was captured.

On 1 September the brigade engaged the enemy at Ox Hill,
where Colonel R. H. Riddick, the gallant commander of the
Sixteenth Regiment, was killed, and after a desperate strug-
gle, we succeeded in driving him back, and on the 15th the
brigade assisted in the capture of Harper’s Ferry, with about
11,000 prisoners and 70 pieces of artillery. The brigade
was present at the battle of Sharpsburg 17 September, after
which it recrossed the Potomac, and on the 20th, with Arch-
er’s Brigade, drove a large body of the enemy into the river at
Shepherdstown, with a loss to them of some 3,000 killed,
wounded and drowned. Soon after this the Thirteenth
North Carolina Regiment, commanded by Colonel A. M.
Seales, petitioned General Lee to be transferred to this bri-
gade, now commanded by General Pender, who had been the
first Colonel of that regiment. Previous to this time, the
regiment was in Garland’s Brigade and participated in all the
hard fought battles above enumerated, sustaining heavy
losses of officers and men.

Pender’s Brigade, now composed of the Thirteenth, Six-
teenth, Twenty-second, Thirty-fourth and T hirty-eighth Reg-
linents of North Carolina Troops, A. P. Hill’s Division,
crossed the Blue Ridge Mountain and, on 13 December, met
Burnside’s army at Fredericksburg, where a desperate bat-
tle was fought, the enemy being driven across the river with
great loss in killed, wounded and imprisoned. General Pen-
der was wounded in this battle and Lieutenant Sheppard, A.
1. C., was killed, and for a short time the command of the
brigade devolved on Colonel A. M. Scales, of the Thirteenth.

The brigade remained in winter quarters near Fredericks-
burg until 2 May, 1863, when it began the march to Chancel-
lorsville to meet “Fighting Joe Hooker,” who had strongly

entrenched his army there. Here the immortal “Stonewall”
Jackson with his staff, having gone too near the enemy’s line
on his return in the darkness of the night, received from his
own men by a fearful mistake, the wounds from which he

 

THe Prenper-Scates BRIGADE. 553

died within a few days. By this, not only did General
Lee lose his “Right Arm,” but the Confederacy one
of the greatest generals the world has ever seen. This bri-
gade participated in those fearful onslaughts which resulted
in a complete rout of the enemy, forcing him back across the
Rappahannock river, and eliciting from General Pender the
commendation that “I can truly say that my brigade fought
with unsurpassed courage and determination.” The brigade
lost about 700 in killed and wounded in this battle, among
the latter being General Pender and Colonel Seales.

On 13 June Colonel A. M. Scales was made Brigadier-
General of this brigade (General Pender having been pro-
moted to Major-General) with these changes in the Staff:

Captain L. H. Hunt, A. A. G. (transferred from Captain
Jompany C, Thirteenth Regiment; Captain S. S. Kirkland,
A. A. G.; Lieutenant A. D. Montgomery, A. D. C. (pro-
moted from private Company H, Thirteenth Regiment) ;
Captain E. D. Scales, Assistant Brigade Commissary (pro-
moted from private Company H, Thirteenth Regiment) ;
Major A. H. Galloway, Q. M. (promoted from Captain Com-
pany F, Forty-fifth Regiment, 4 July, 1863); Captain G. F.
Bason, Ordnance Officer; Dr. J. H. McAden, Surgeon (pro-
moted from Surgeon of Thirteenth Regiment 13 June, 1863).

Soon after this Lee’s army crossed the Potomae river and
Pender’s Division arrived at Gettysburg on the afternoon of
1 July, and formed line of battle, with Scales’ Brigade on
the extreme left of the division, resting on the Chambersburg
Pike, from which point a desperate charge was made, driving
the enemy back to those “ramparts of death” that thus be-
eame historic. In this charge the brigade lost some 400
killed and wounded, among the latter being Colonel Seales,
Captain Riddick and General Pender, from the effects of
which General Pender died on 18 July. The brigade was
engaged in the fight during the three days and on 3 July, in
that mad charge across the “Crimson Plain” had nearly
every officer killed or disabled, but sueceeded in penetrating
the enemy’s lines, where a large number were killed.

On the night of 4 July the army fell back, afterwards re-
crossing the Potomae and engaged in the battle of Bristoe