A Stillness at Appomattox (148 page)

What
was
important
was
that
the
war
now
was
on
the
upgrade.
Sherman
had
taken
Atlanta
and
sprightly
old
Admiral Farragut
had
broken
into
Mobile
Bay,
and
now
the
jaunty Rebel
army
in
the
valley
had
been
broken
and
sent
streaming off
in
defeat;
and
here
was
the
point
of
rebound
for
the
whole war.
The
Chicago
platform
might
bewail
failure
and
call for
immediate
peace,
but
now
the
war
very
clearly
was
not a
failure.
Since
spring
the
Confederacy's
one
hope
had
been that
the
people
of
the
North
would
get
tired
and
quit
After Winchester
that
hope
no
longer
had
any
roots.

Sheridan
followed
up
his
victory.
His
army
went
along the
Valley
Pike,
and
just
south
of
Strasburg,
where
a
roll of
high
ground
known
as
Fisher's
Hill
cuts
across
the
Valley from
mountain
to
mountain,
the
Confederates
made
a
stand. Sheridan
lined
up
his
troops,
telling
them
to
keep
up
a
heavy fire
whether
or
not
they
saw
anything
to
shoot
at,
and
while he
bluffed
a
frontal
attack
he
swung
Crook's
corps
far
to
the west
and
brought
it
in
on
the
Confederate
flank.
The
blow was
struck
at
dusk
on
September
22,
and
the
whole
Rebel line
collapsed,
losing
twelve
guns
and
a
thousand
prisoners.

Once
again
the
Federal
storming
columns
going
up
the slope
found
Sheridan
dashing
across
their
front,
orderly
and battle
flag
at
his
heels,
Sheridan's
black
bullet
head
bare
in the
breeze:
and
always
he
was
waving
the
men
on,
calling "Come
on!
Don't
stop!"
Once
he
came
on
a
brigade
which was
winded
and
had
stopped
to
pant,
and
he
reined
up
and gestured
toward
the
retreating
Confederates,
shouting:
"Run, boys,
run!
Don't
wait
to
forml
Don't
let
em
stop!"
Some soldier
piped
up
to
tell
him
that
for
the
moment
they
were just
too
bushed
to
run,
to
which
Sheridan
called
back:
"If you
can't
run,
then
holler!"
And
holler
they
did,
while
the general
rode
off
to
press
the
pursuit.

There
was
a
note
to
all
of
this
that
these
Union
troops
were not
used
to:
a
note
of
triumph
assured,
a
driving
flaming
will to
victory
that
would
stop
for
no
obstacles
and
accept
no excuses.
The
men
responded
to
it,
and
wherever
Sheridan went
now
he
was
greeted
by
passionate
cheers.
A
VI
Corps veteran
wrote
that
ever
since
McClellan's
day
it
had
been
a point
of
pride
with
his
outfit
not
to
cheer
any
officers—but Sheridan
was
different,
and
"tumultuous
hurrahs
came
unbidden
from
the
bottom
of
every
heart
and
conventional restraint
was
forgotten."
¹⁷

While
Early's
main
body
had
been
trying
to
hold
on
at Fisher's
Hill,
the
gray
cavalry
had
been
on
the
other
side
of the
Massanutten
Ridge,
encamped
at
Front
Royal.
Sheridan sent
in
young
General
Wilson
with
his
cavalry
division
to drive
them
out,
and
Wilson
made
his
attack
in
the
dense
fog of
an
early
morning,
splashing
through
the
Shenandoah
fords and
forming
line
of
battle
on
the
outskirts
of
the
town.

No
one
could
see
thirty
yards
in
the
gray
murk
and
Wilson was
afraid
his
units
would
lose
touch,
so
he
passed
the
word that
when
his
own
buglers
sounded
the
charge
all
of
the other
buglers
in
the
division
should
pick
the
call
up
and repeat
it.
Since
every
battery,
troop,
regiment,
and
brigade
in the
division
had
its
own
buglers,
this
meant
a
lot
of
music; and
the
dripping
quiet
of
early
dawn
was
broken
by
the
insistent
notes
of
the
charge,
blown
first
by
the
men
at
division headquarters
and
immediately
picked
up
all
along
the
line, until
250
buglers
were
blaring
away
together,
and
the
high imperious
notes
went
echoing
along
the
Blue
Ridge
until
it sounded
like
the
voice
of
ten
thousand
trumpets.
Under
it there
was
a
great
thunder
of
shod
hooves
on
soft
earth,
and the
Yankee
cavalry
went
in
on
the
gallop,
sabers
swinging, every
man
shouting
with
the
jubilant
confidence
of
an
army that
has
begun
to
feel
that
it
is
invincible.
Front
Royal
was taken
and
the
gray
troopers
went
back
up
the
Valley,
and Wilson
s
regiments
assembled
in
the
town
and
agreed
that
it was
a
great
day
in
the
morning.
¹⁸