A Stillness at Appomattox (29 page)

Always
the
little
flames
sprang
up,
as
the
blast
from
rifle muzzles
hit
the
dried
leaves
and
the
brittle
pine
twigs,
and the
fear
of
these
flames
haunted
every
soldier.
Often,
when they
were
hit,
men
cried
at
once
for
help—anything
was
better than
to
lie
in
a
firetrap
and
wait
for
the
flames.
It
may
be
that the
heavy
blanket
of
stifling
smoke
that
drifted
on
ahead
of these
fires
was
a
mercy,
for
there
were
men
who
believed
that at
often
suffocated
the
wounded,
quickly
strangling
the
life out
of
them
before
the
fire
could
torture
them
to
death.
⁶

Behind
the
lines,
far
to
the
rear
where
the
smoke-fog
and the
noise
came
rolling
down
the
wind,
there
was
a
constant movement
of
walking
wounded
looking
for
field
hospitals. Some
came
alone,
using
muskets
as
canes
or
crutches.
Others came
in
little
groups,
supporting
each
other,
the
halt
leading the
maimed
and
the
blind.
All
of
them
were
bloody.
Cavalry patrols
ranged
all
approaches
to
the
rear
areas
and
when
a straggler
appeared
their
curt
demand
was:
"show
blood!
"
The man
who
could
not
do
it
was
arrested
as
a
runaway.

The
wounded
came
back
with
tight,
bloodless
hps,
and
in most
cases
their
clothing
was
disarranged.
Unless
he
was totally
disabled,
the
wounded
man's
first
act,
usually,
was
to tear
his
clothing
open
and
look
at
his
wound,
to
see
whether it
was
going
to
be
mortal.
The
examination
over,
some
men would
look
relieved,
confident
that
they
had
little
to
worry about.
Others
would
turn
pale
and
stare
blankly
at
nothing, convinced
that
they
could
not
recover.
These
men
had
seen many
gunshot
wounds,
and
they
were
pretty
fair
diagnosticians.

On
this
day
the
wounded
brought
discouraging
tales
back to
the
dressing
stations.
They
said
the
fighting
was
not
going well,
and
one
man
remarked
glumly
that
"the
Confederates are
shooting
to
kill,
this
time."
Hospitals
were
alive
with rumors
of
disaster:
the
right
wing
had
crumbled,
Lee
had seized
the
Rapidan
crossing,
the
army
would
soon
find
itself surrounded.
The
adolescent
drummer
boys
had
been
pressed into
service,
along
the
firing
lines,
as
stretcher-bearers.
Properly,
this
was
not
drummer
boys'
work,
but
as
one
man
said, "It
was
in
the
Wilderness,
under
Grant,"
where
"even
boys counted."
⁷

Along
the
Plank
Road
there
was
complete
pandemonium. The
narrow
lane
was
choked
with
moving
men—regiments and
bits
of
regiments
trying
to
re-form,
hundreds
of
Confederate
prisoners
who
had
been
disarmed
and
told
to
hike
to the
rear
and
who
were
trying
hard
to
get
back
out
of
range, stretcher-bearers
and
walking
wounded
moving
along
with the
same
idea
in
mind,
dazed
stragglers
and
lost
men
hunting in
vain
for
their
regiments
or
for
some
quiet
place
to
hide
or for
a
safe
road
to
the
back
country.
There
was
such
a
tangle in
every
great
battle,
of
course,
and
during
every
attack
there were
places
just
behind
the
front
where
it
looked
as
if
the army
were
coming
apart.
Yet
the
confusion
in
the
Wilderness this
morning
was
something
special.
⁸
The
commanders
behind the
lines—Grant,
smoking
and
whittling
and
noting
all
the dispatches,
Meade
near
him
talking
busily
with
staff
officers, Hancock
at
the
crossroads
ordering
men
forward—they
had
no conception
of
what
was
really
going
on
up
in
front.
They
could not
have
one.
The
battle
was
out
of
their
control,
fighting
itself,
a
great
curtain
of
distance
and
forest
and
choking
smoke cutting
them
off
from
contact
and
knowledge.
Things
were going
wrong,
and
they
could
not
know
about
it—nor,
if
they did
know,
could
they
do
anything
about
it

In
this
forest
it
was
almost
as
bad
to
win
as
to
lose.
Either way,
a
battle
line
was
certain
to
get
thrown
into
hopeless
disorder.
Along
five
miles
of
fighting
front
there
was
hardly
one brigadier
who
could
really
control
his
own
line,
because
there was
hardly
one
brigadier
who
could
put
his
hand
on
more than
a
fraction
of
his
own
command.
The
lines
had
been jumbled
as
they
had
never
been
jumbled
before.
Divisions
and brigades
were
all
divided.
Along
the
zone
of
the
heaviest
firing
there
was
not
a
single
regiment
which
had
on
either
flank a
regiment
which
so
much
as
belonged
to
its
own
army
corps.
⁹