The Killer Angels

”In a while, in a while.”

There was a ca

Sellars said, his voice touched with desperation, “General, will you look at the ground? We can’t even mount artillery.”

”All right.” Longstreet decided to ride with him. Time was ru

He came on Hood, preparing to move out. There was something rare in his face; a light was shining from his eyes. Longstreet had heard men talk of Hood’s face in a fight, but he had not seen it; the fight had not yet begun. But Hood’s eyes, normally so soft and sad, were wide and black as round coals, shining with a black heat.

Hood said, “General, the ground is strewn with boulders.

They are dug in all over the ground and there are guns in the rocks above. Every move I make is observed. If I attack as ordered I will lose half my Division, and they will still be looking down our throats from that hill. We must move to the right.”

Longstreet said nothing. He looked down; through thick woods he could begin to see the boulders, great boulders tall as houses, piled one upon another like the wreckage of a vast explosion.

Hood said, “How can you mount ca

Longstreet: “Sam…” He shook his head. He thought of it again. No. Too late. I ca

Hood stared at him with the black round eyes. Longstreet felt an overwhelming wave of sadness. They’re all going in to die. But he could say nothing. Hood stared at him.

Hood: “Let me move to the right, up the Round Hill. If I could get a battery up there…”

Longstreet shook his head. “Not enough time. You’d have to cut trees; it would be dark before you were in action.”

But he was staring upward at the top of the Rocky Hill.

Everywhere you went, that damned hill looked down on you. The key to the position. Once they got a battery up there. Longstreet said, “You’re going to have to take that hill.”

He pointed.

Hood said, “They don’t even need rifles to defend that. All they need to do is roll rocks down on you.”

Longstreet said, “But you’re going to have to take it.”

”General, I do this under protest.”

Longstreet nodded. Hood turned. His staff was waiting.

He began issuing orders in a low voice. Longstreet backed away. Hood saluted and rode off. Longstreet rode back toward McLaws.

Goodbye, Sam. You’re right. You’re the best I’ve got. If I lose you, I don’t know what I’ll do. God bless you, Sam.

Longstreet was rattled. Never been this rattled in a fight.

But the guns began and the sound livened him. We’ll brood later. We’ll count the dead and brood later. With any luck at all… but did you see those rocks?

He rode out into the open. That damned rocky hill stood off to his right, overlooking the field. That they should leave it uncovered was incredible. He saw motion: signal flags?

Something was up there. Not a battery, not yet. The fire of Hood was spreading. The first brigade had hit. There was no wind now, the air all dead around him. Hood’s smoke stayed where it was, then slowly, very slowly, like a huge ghost, the white cloud came drifting gracefully up the ridge, clinging to the trees, drifting and tearing. The second brigade was following. The fire grew. Longstreet moved to where McLaws and Barksdale were standing together.

Wofford had come up.

They all stood together, waiting. The old man who was guarding the clothing of that one Mississippi regiment was asleep against the rail fence, his mouth open. Longstreet rode forward with Barksdale. The man was eager to go in.

McLaws moved back and forth, checking the line.

There were woods in front of them, to the left a gray farmhouse. The men were scattered all through the trees, red pe

Longstreet saw a shell burst in the woods ahead, another, another. The Yanks knew they were there, knew they were coming. God, did Meade have the whole Union Army here?

Against my two divisions?

McLaws came up. Even McLaws was getting nervous “Well, sir? When do I go in?”

”Calmly,” Longstreet said, “calmly” He stared through his glasses. He could see through the trees a Union battery firing from an orchard on the far side of the road. He said, “We’ll all go in directly.” Something in Longstreet was savage now; he enjoyed holding them back, the savage power. He could feel the fire building in McLaws, in Barksdale, as water builds behind a damn.

But it was the point of an echelon attack. You begin on one side. The enemy is pressed and begins to move troops there. At the right moment your attack opens in another place. The enemy does not know where to move troops now, or to move any at all. He delays. He is upset where he is, not quite so definite. With luck, you catch him on the move. He does not realize the attack is en echelon for a while; he thinks perhaps it is a diversion, and he will be hit on another flank. So he waits, and then gradually he is enveloped where he is, and if his line was thin to begin with, you have not allowed him to concentrate, and if he gambled and concentrated, then he is very weak somewhere, and somewhere you break through. So restraint was necessary now, and Longstreet got down off the horse and sat astride the fence for a while, chatting, the fire growing all around him, shells coming down in the woods ahead, begi

”Not yet, not yet,” Longstreet said cheerily, but he got back on his horse and began riding slowly forward into the trees. In the dark of the trees he could smell splintered wood and see white upturned faces with wide white dirty flowers and he looked out to see a battery working steadily, firing into the woods. He heard the first moans but saw no dead.

Almost time now. At his elbow, Barksdale was saying something, pleading. The Mississippi boys were staring not at Barksdale but at Longstreet. Longstreet looked down.

”Well,” he said, “I guess it’s time. If you’re ready, sir, why don’t you go take that battery, that battery right there?”

He pointed. Barksdale screamed, waved his hat. The men rose. Barksdale formed them in line, the shells zipping the leaves above them. They stepped out of the woods, Barksdale in front, on foot, forbidden to ride, and Longstreet saw them go off across the field and saw the enemy fire open up, a whole fence suddenly puff into white smoke, and the bullets whirred by and clipped among the leaves and thunked the trees, and Longstreet rode out into the open and took off his hat. Barksdale was going straight for the guns, ru

Longstreet rode behind him, his hat off, waving, screaming, Go! Go you Mississippi! Go!