3:20 PM, JULY 3,1863
WEST OF TANEYTOWN
"They're coming." The cry raced down the line. Joshua, intent on strengthening his front, urging the men to dig in, pile up logs and fence rails, anything that could offer shelter on this bare slope, paused and looked to where many were now pointing.
His heart swelled at the sight of it. The flags were visible, held up high, materializing beyond the shallow crest now rifle tips, and men the men. He gasped at the sight of it A division advancing as if on the parade ground, line of butternut and gray, their right flank overlapping the road, the left arcing far beyond his own right
Skirmishers, who had been visible for several minutes, darted forward, coming into long rifle range. From out of the center of the advance, he saw something that he had often read about but never witnessed on the field, a battalion of their artillery advancing with the attack, as in the days of Napoleon, one battery of guns actually galloping ahead of the line and then swinging into position atop the low crest four hundred yards away.
He looked back. The corps artillery was enmeshed in a fight for the town. There was not a single piece here to reply. He knew where that fire would be focused: It would be a cauldron of hot iron against human flesh, and it would be his men who bore the brunt.
Unsheathing his sword, Joshua stepped to the center of the line. He was not one for dramatics but felt that if there was a time for it, it had to be now.
He climbed atop a small boulder that studded up out of the thick pasture grass. "Men of Maine!" he cried. "We are the right of the line. We must hold."
The men looked at him. They were veterans. They did not need the false theatrics that some officers indulged in, and they knew better than to expect it of him.
"The fate of the Republic might rest on what we do now," he said, with a passionate, heartfelt intensity. "Let us resolve to stand and, if need be, die for the Union."
The men were silent, but he could see the glint in their eyes, the nods coming from a few. He stepped back down and turned to face the approaching attack.
Rifles that had been stacked while the men dug in were snatched up, uniform jackets put on, the regiment hunkering down behind the flimsy barrier thrown up in the few precious minutes given to them prior to the attack. The watering party came running up from the creek, twenty men burdened down with the canteens of the regiment Most were still empty, the others covered with mud and green slime. The men grabbed for them anyway.
A lone wagon came up behind Joshua, a welcome sight as half a dozen boxes were offloaded, six thousand more rounds of ammunition. The driver, seeing the rebel advance, lashed his mules, continuing down the line.
The boxes were torn open, packages of cartridges passed down the line, men stuffing the packets of ten into pockets and haversacks.
The first shell screamed in, air bursting just behind the line, shrapnel lashing into the grass. Another shot then another, and in a couple of minutes it was a virtual storm as four batteries concentrated their shot on the Twentieth.
The rebel battlefront came relentlessly in, the center brigade breaking to the south of the batteries, the other brigade to the north. Once sufficiently downslope and below the muzzles of the artillery, they started to edge back in to form a solid front
Joshua watched, impressed by their cool, steady advance, their relentless professionalism. It was obvious the enemy brigade to his right would outflank him by several hundred yards. He looked down his line. There was not much he could do other than refuse die right He passed the word.
The gunners had found the range. Several times he was washed with clods of dirt and scorched grass from shell bursts; men were collapsing, wounded beginning to stagger back.
It was down to two hundred yards, the Confederates now coming down the slope into the shallow valley of death.
Joshua stood up tall, raising his sword high. "Volley fire present!"
The men stood up, rifles rising up, held high. "Take aim!"
The three hundred rifles of the Twentieth Maine were lowered. The Confederate advance did not falter, a defiant cry bursting from their ranks.
"Fire!"
The explosion of smoke cloaked the view. To his left the other three regiments were already engaged, tearing volleys ripping across the line.
"Independent fire at will!"
He started to pace the line, crouching down low at times, trying to see what was happening. The charge was still advancing, slowed by the marshy ground but coming on hard. The artillery fire slackened, and he caught a glimpse of men, guns, moving up, coming in closer to extreme canister range.
A volley suddenly tore through his line, men to either side pitching down. The sergeant holding the national colors aloft staggered backward, collapsing, a color guard prying the staff loose from dying hands and hoisting it back up.
His men were down now, crouched behind their cover. Shooting, tearing cartridge, kneeling up to pour the powder in and push the bullet down into the muzzle, charge rammed down, then sliding behind their cover again while capping the nipple, taking aim, and firing.
Flash moments stood out, a man endlessly chanting the first line of the Lord's Prayer while loading and firing, a young soldier screaming hysterically while cradling the body of his brother, an older sergeant laughing, cursing as he coolly loaded and took careful aim, all wreathed in smoke, fire, sections of piled-up fence rails disintegrating, the men behind torn apart with splinters as a solid shot smashed in.
The smoke eddied and swirled, parting momentarily to reveal a surge of rebel troops coming up the slope, stopping and firing a single volley, men in gray and butternut dropping, then slowly falling back… and then surging forward again.
He heard wild shouting, looked to his left and saw a red flag right in the midst of the Eighty-third, a mad melee of clubbed muskets, men clawing at each other, the charge falling back.
To his right the enemy attack had already overlapped, a couple of regiments across the creek angling up the slope into his rear. Grabbing Tom, he sent him down to the end of the line, ordering him to refuse the right yet again, to turn a thin line back at a right angle. He lost sight of his brother.
How long it had gone on it was hard to tell. The sun shone red, dimly through the smoke. Men were standing up, pouring precious water from their canteens down their barrels, the water hissing, boiling, then running a quick swab through in a vain effort to clean out the bore enough so they could continue to fight. Some were tossing aside their rifles, clogged with burnt powder, picking up the weapons of the fallen.
The Confederate artillery relentlessly pounded away. In several places the dry pasture grass was burning, adding to the smoke.
"Chamberlain!" He looked up. To his amazement it was Sykes in plain view, his mount bleeding from several wounds.
"Are you Chamberlain?"
Joshua instinctively saluted. "Yes, sir."
"I'm retiring the corps!" Sykes shouted, voice drowned out for a moment as a shell exploded directly above them.
For a second he thought Sykes had been hit; the man seemed to reel from the shock and then recovered.
"Chamberlain," and Sykes's voice was low-pitched, the general leaning over, staring straight into Joshua's eyes.
"Sir."
"I need twenty minutes, Colonel. Your regiment is staying behind." "Sir?"
"The corps is flanked here. They're counterattacking in the town. The Fifth is fought out I have to save what is left, Colonel. As this brigade begins to fall back, you are to retire, slowly forming a defensive line. Then, sir, you must hold. You must give me twenty minutes to save what is left"
Joshua nodded. The world seemed to be floating. He felt a strange distant detachment from it all. This man was ordering the annihilation of his regiment and all he could do was nod in agreement