214 Norta Caro.ina Troops, 1861-’65.

know which. One morning I dismounted after my usual
morning call to boots and saddle, and swung myself very com-
fortably into Johnston’s single and only camp stool. I
smelled the bacon and sniffed the coffee, and waited. In a
few moments the cook handed me a chip for a plate and a
tin cup of red-hot coffee—so hot I had to.set the cup on the
grass, when Bob spoke, saying: ‘Bradley, you let those
Yankees do you too bad. You have got so scared of them
that you all run the very first dash they make at you.”

“Ts that so, Robert?’ I said. “That’s a pity, but I don’t
know how to help it. I do the best I can. How many Yan-
kee cavalry do you think you are good for ?”’

“Well,” said he, “I’ve got eight hundred muskets present
for duty. By a week’s time, as the boys get back from the
hospital, I’ll have one thousand. Well, with one thousand
muskets, I think I can take care of five thousand Yanks on
horseback.”

“All right,” said I, “wait and see. I hope you can.”

So I got my breakfast and went off mightily tickled at the
conceit of the Tar Heel; for Sheridan’s cavalry, with Custer,
Torbett and Devens, were about as good soldiers as ever took
horse or drew saber. We had drilled them so that in three
years we had taught them to ride. They were always drilled
enough to fight, and they learned the use of the saber from
necessity.

Well, things went on as usual. Every morning Sheridan
would send a regiment out to feel Early—to drive in his
pickets—so as to make sure where he was, and to know where
to find him; and every morning I would ride over to the Ber-
ryville road, re-establish my lines, and get my breakfast off
of Johnston.

By daylight 19 September, a scared cavalryman of my
own command nearly rode over me, as I lay asleep on the
grass, and reported that the Yankees were advancing with a
heavy force of infantry, artillery and cavalry up the Berry-
ville road. Early was up toward Stephenson’s depot, and
Johnston and I were responsible for keeping Sheridan out of
Winchester and protecting the Confederate line of retreat
and of communication up the valley. In two minutes my

THE Tuin Gray Line or Tar Herts. 215

command was mounted (we always saddled up and fed an
hour before dawn) and moving at a trot across the open fields
to the Berryville road and to Johnston’s assistance. There
was not a fence nor a house nor a bush nor a tree to obscure
the view. Away off, more than two miles, we could see the
crest of the hill covered with a cloud of Yankee cavalry, and
in front of them (five hundred yards in front) was a thin,
gray line moving off in retreat stolidly, and with perfect cool-
ness and self-possession. As soon as I got to realize what was
going on I quickened our gait, and when within a mile broke
into a gallop. The scene was as plain as day. A regiment
of cavalry would deploy into line, and then their buglers
would sound the charge and they would swoop down on the
thin gray line of North Carolinians. The instant the Yankee
bugle sounded, North Carolina would halt, face to the rear,
wait until the horses got within one hundred yards, and then
fire as deliberately and coolly as if firing volleys on parade
drill. The cavalry would break and scamper back and North
Carolina would “‘about face” and continue her march in re-
treat as solemnly, stubbornly and with as much discipline and
dignity as if marching in review. But we got there just in
time as cavalry aid to the Tar Heels. Certainly half a dozen
charges had been made at the retreating thin gray line, and
each and every time the charging squadrons had been driven
back, when the enemy sent their line with a rush at the bri-
gade of Tar Heels, and one squadron overlapped the infantry
line, and was just passing it when we got up. In another
minute they would have been behind the line, sabering the
men from the rear while they were held by the fight in front.
But we struck a head-long strain and went through the Yan-
kees by the flank of the North Carolinians, and carried their
adversaries back to the crest of the hill, back through the
guns of their battery, clear back to their infantry lines. In
a moment they rallied, and were charging us in front and on
both flanks; and back we went in a hurry, but the thin gray
line of Old North Carolina was safe. They had gotten back
to the rest of the infantry and formed lines at right angles to
the pike west of Winchester.

I rode up to Bob Johnston, very “pert,” as we say in North