was forced to fall back with heavy loss. On the left, Whiting, with his batteries, drove back an advance of the Federal line upon Taylor's brigade, holding Jackson's centre; but this was decisive of no results.

On the right the command of Magruder and Huger gallantly advanced to the attack. Several determined efforts were made to storm the Federal position near Crewe's house, and the brigades advanced without faltering across the open field, in face of a hundred pieces of artillery which tore their lines as they rushed forward, and a deadly and destructive fire of musketry from the masses of infantry upon the crest. As they approached the hill some of the brigades gave way, and recoiled before the awful fire directed upon them; but others continued to advance, and, charging the Federal guns, drove them and their infantry supports from the position, leaving their dead mingled with those of the Federal troops upon the hill.

But these efforts were all unavailing. The position of the enemy was so powerful, and the absence of concert between the Confederate columns so fatal, that the Federal lines remained unbroken; and after struggling desperately to hold the ground thus won, the Confederate lines were compelled to fall back and surrender their hard-earned advantage. The firing continued until nine at night, when silence settled upon the battle-field, and the weary troops lay down within a hundred yards of the Federal guns.

Such was the battle of Malvern Hill, one of the most fierce and sanguinary engagements of the war. Our sketch has been tame and unequal to the subject; perhaps the reader may find in the following sentences of a newspaper writer, soon after the action, a more animated description:

"General McClellan," says this writer, "prepared, in the language of one of his officers, to clothe the hill in sheets of flame.' Every ravine swarmed with his thousands, and along the crest of every hill flashed forth his numerous artillery, having for the most part an unbroken play over the ascending slope, and across cleared fields of twelve hundred yards in length.

"Notwithstanding the formidable nature of this position, it was determined to attack him, and late in the afternoon of Tuesday, July 1st, this tremendous contest commenced. Soon Malvern Hill was sheeted with ascending and descending flames of fire. Thirty-seven pieces of artillery, supported at a greater distance by heavy and more numerous batteries, and by his gunboats, kept faithful ward over the enemy's position, and ploughed through our columns even before they could see the enemy or deploy into line of battle. Undismayed by the most terrific cannonading of the war, the advance of Magruder's forces commenced. Onward, in the face of a storm of shot and shell, they pressed forward, until within musket range of the enemy, aud then they opened their fire. Whole lines of the enemy fell as they stood, or, attempting retreat, were overtaken by the bullets of our troops, who never veered in their aim or recoiled while the enemy's infantry remained in range; and when forced back for a time by the avalanche of converging artillery, yet when the infantry of the enemy ventured again beyond their batteries, our lines advanced with shout and bayonet and drove them back among the reserves and behind the wall of fire which flamed along the mouths of the circling cannon. Thus the contest ebbed and flowed until night spread its mantle on the battlefield.

"The batteries of the enemy were not captured by assault, because no line of men could live in their converging fires, sweeping unobstructed the attacking forces for twelve hundred yards, but his line of infantry was repeatedly broken with frightful slaughter by the fierce charges of our troops, who held their position and slept on the field, within one hundred yards of the enemy's guns. The extent of the carnage of the enemy no one imagined until daylight revealed it in the horrors of the battlefield. Our dead lay close together, producing thus upon the beholder an exaggerated impression of the number; but an examination showed that the loss of the enemy much exceeded ours. His dead lay everywhere-here in line of battle, there in wild confusion of rout and retreat; not a ravine, not a glade, not a

hill that was not dotted by their mangled forms, while every dwelling, outhouse, barn and stable for miles around, was crowded with their dead and dying. In many places groups of dead were found distant from the battle-field, where it was evident they were carried, with the intent of bearing them to the river, and where they were roughly and rudely tossed on the wayside when the panic overtook their escort. Every indication showed the wildest flight of the enemy. Cannon and caissons were abandoned, and for miles the road was filled with knapsacks, rifles, muskets, etc. Loaded wagons were left on the road, with vast quantities of ammunition unexploded. Caisson drivers opened their ammunition chests, and threw out their powder and round shot to lighten their loads, to enable them to keep up with the rapid flight. It is hazarding but little to say that when night put an end to the battle, the whole army of McClellan, with the exception of the artillery, and its diminished infantry guard near Crewe's and Turner's houses, was utterly disorganized, and had become a mob of stragglers. At daylight next morning nothing could be seen of his army except some cavalry pickets that in the distance observed our advance. We do not believe that 15,000 of the Grand Army of the Potomac retreated from the bloody heights of Malvern Hill as soldiery. If nature had scooped out the bed of James River, twenty miles distant from Malvern Hill, the Grand Army of the Potomac would have ceased to exist."

The Federal army had indeed retreated in the night to Harrison's Landing, and the long agony was over.

CHAPTER VI.

FEDERAL ACCOUNTS OF THE RETREAT.

GENERAL MCCLELLAN had thus made good his retreat, but in so doing he had passed through scenes the description of which in army letters harrowed for many months the blood of the whole Northern people.

The aim of this work is to present as faithful a picture as possible of the great series of events in which Jackson took part, and the statements of some Federal writers will here be given in reference to General McClellan's retreat. They are vivid, and paint the great lurid picture in bloody colors. That picture is a part of the present subject, since Jackson's corps first broke the Federal lines and compelled them to fall back; and his troops followed closely on the Federal rear, and largely contributed to the decisive result. A correspondent of the New York "Tribune" thus describes the scene:

"Huddled among the wagons were 10,000 stragglers-for the credit of the nation be it said that four-fifths of them were wounded, sick, or utterly exhausted, and could not have stirred but for dread of the tobacco warehouses of the South. The confusion of this herd of men and mules, wagons and wounded, men on horses, men on foot, men by the roadside, men perched on wagons, men searching for water, men famishing for food, men lame and bleeding, men with ghostly eyes, looking out between bloody bandages, that hid the face-turn to some vivid account of the most pitiful part of Napoleon's retreat from Russia, and fill out the picture-the grim, gaunt, bloody picture of war in its most terrible features.

"It was determined to move on during the night. The distance to Turkey Island bridge, the point on James River which was to be reached, by the direct road, was six miles. But those vast numbers could not move over one narrow road in days;

hence every by-road, no matter how circuitous, had been searched out by questioning prisoners and by cavalry excursions. Every one was filled by one of the advancing columns. The whole front was in motion by seven P. M., General Keyes in command of the advance.

"I rode with General Howe's brigade of Couch's division, taking a wagon track through dense woods and precipitous ravines winding sinuously far around to the left, and striking the river some distance below Turkey Island. Commencing at dusk, the march continued until daylight. The night was dark and fearful. Heavy thunder rolled in turn along each point of the heavens, and dark clouds spread the entire canopy. We were forbidden to speak aloud; or, lest the light of a cigar should present a target for an ambushed rifle, we were cautioned not to smoke. Ten miles of weary marching, with frequent halts, as some one of the hundred vehicles of the artillery train, in our centre, by a slight deviation crashed against a tree, wore away the hours to dawn, when we were debouched into a magnificent wheat field, and the smoke stack of the Galena was in sight. Xenophon's remnant of ten thousand, shouting, 'The sea! the sea!' were not more glad than we."

It is certain that the whole Federal army shared this feeling. Another writer in the New York" Times " says: "When an aid of General McClellan rode back and reported that the way was all open to James River, a thrill of relief ran through the whole line, and the sight of the green fields skirting its banks was indeed an oasis in the terrible desert of suspense and apprehension through which they had passed. The teams were now put upon a lively trot, in order to relieve the pressure upon that portion still in the rear.

"General McClellan and staff rode ahead and took possession of the old estate known as Malvern Hill, one mile back from Turkey Island Bend. It is a large, old-fashioned estate, originally built by the French, and has near it, in front, an old earthwork constructed by General Washington during the Revolutionary War. It has a spacious yard shaded by vener