favorable there, to have Burnside cross and attack south of Sharpsburg. He held Porter east of Antietam in reserve.

The morning of the 17th was threatening, and heavy clouds hung upon the summits of South Mountain. At five o'clock Hooker's men rise from the furrows in the cornfield, shake the dew-drops from their hair, roll their blankets, kindle their fires, and eat their breakfasts.

In the field west of the Dunker church the soldiers of Hood's Confederate division were kindling their fires, breaking open barrels of flour, wetting it with water, and baking cakes in the ashes. General Hood had held the line in the east woods till midnight, when Lawton, Law, and Trimble relieved him.

The Union pickets began the battle, aiming at the dusky forms stirring amid the corn-leaves. Then the batteries opened. A shell from a Confederate cannon burst in the Sixth Wisconsin, disabling eight men, before the regiment made any movement.

Doubleday's brigade, north-east of Poffenburger's house, held Hooker's extreme right. Then came Meade's division, with Ricketts's division in Mead was to lead the advance, and his troops pressed on after the skirmishers towards the woods east of Dr. Miller's house.

rear.

On the Confederate side Lawton's division of Jackson's corps held the position. Ripley's brigade, of D. H. Hill's division, was between the woods and Mr. Muma's house. McClellan's batteries-thirty cannoneast of the Antietam, opened fire, sending solid shot and shell upon Lawton, Ripley, and Hill.

"It enfiladed my line, and was a damaging fire,” said Jackson in his report.

But Jackson's batteries replied, and the cannonade rolled along the valleys, announcing to the people of Hagerstown, Boonesboro', and Sharpsburg that a great battle had begun.

General Ricketts advanced with Christian's and Duryea's brigades, and with the Pennsylvania Reserves moving towards the cornfield south of Miller's house, driving the Confederates. They reached the middle of the field, but were met by a withering fire from Lawton's, Hays's, Trimble's, Walker's, and Douglas's brigades of Jackson's command.

The men dropped thick and fast on both sides, some killed instantly, others hobbling away: the Confederate wounded towards the woods by the Dunker church, the Union wounded towards the east woods. The Confederate cannon planted around the church hurled shells from the front, while the batteries on the hill behind the house of Mr. Nicodemus enfiladed the Union line.

Hooker had, in all, about ten thousand men-ten brigades. Doubleday was reaching out west of the turnpike by Poffenburger's house. If Hooker had known just how Jackson's line was formed-if he had known that the hill behind Nicodemus's house commanded the entire field as far south as Muma's house-he would not have advanced towards the Dunker church, but would have reinforced Doubleday and carried the hill. But he could not see how commanding a position it was; so from that hill the shot and shells came with terrible effect.

In the cornfield, in Mr. Miller's orchard, all over the ground between the east and west woods, the struggle went on, Jackson bringing in all his troops, with the exception of Early's brigade, and all his artillery, and sending in haste for Hood to help him. General Starke, commanding the Stonewall division, was killed; also Colonel Douglas, commanding Lawton's brigade. Lawton, commanding Ewell's division, and Walker, commanding a brigade, were wounded. More than half of Lawton's and Hays's, more than one-third of Trimble's, and all the regimental commanders in these brigades, except two, went down.

On the Union side Ricketts loses one hundred and fifty-three killed and eight hundred and ninety-eight wounded. Of Phelps's brigade nearly one-half were killed or wounded.

By half-past seven o'clock the first act of the drama is over. The musketry dies away, but the cannonade goes on-Battery B, Fourth United States Artillery, Cooper's and Easton's Pennsylvania batteries, and Edget's New Hampshire, on the ridge by Poffenburger's, sending a continuous storm of shells into the woods beyond Nicodemus's house, whence came another storm, riddling Poffenburger's house and barn, upsetting his beehives, ploughing the ground in his garden, exploding in the rail-fences, and whirring away over the heads of the worn and weary men lying upon the ground. Hooker's batteries kept up the fire to prevent Jackson from assuming the offensive, and the Confederate guns replied-possibly to prevent a renewal of the attack, which had all but succeeded.

The cannonade dies away, and the gunners throw themselves upon the ground to rest a while, kindle their fires, and drink a cup of coffee.

At early morn I mounted my horse in Hagerstown, where I had arrived on the preceding evening, upon its evacuation by Longstreet. The people of the town were at the windows and in the streets, listening to the reverberations rolling along the valley. The wind was from the southwest, a gentle breeze; the clouds were sweeping the tree-tops of South Mountain. I had a seven-mile ride before me to reach the field, and half resolved to go down the turnpike to Sharpsburg, gain the rear of the Con

federates, and see the battle from that side. I was in citizen's dress, and might not be turned back by the Confederates; but the people of Hagerstown dissuaded me from attempting it.

The uproar begins again, and a rattle of musketry, like the pattering of the first drops of rain upon a roof, then a roll, crash, roar, and rush like a mighty ocean billow. Riding rapidly down the Boonesboro' Road, I came upon a Confederate soldier who was lying beneath a tree, wrapped in his blanket. He doubtless thought that I was a Union cavalryman, and raised his hand imploringly, as if to ask me not to shoot him. He was thin and pale, had dropped in the retreat, and had not strength enough to move on. There was fever in his hollow cheeks, and I left him with the conviction that he never again would see his Southern home, and that ere many days he would be at rest forever-life's battle ended.

Another mile, and I came upon the drift-wood of the Union army. Every army has soldiers faint of heart in battle. I came upon one group in bright, new uniforms-fresh soldiers, who were fleeing from this their first battle.

"Where does this road lead to?" one asked, with white lips.

"To Hagerstown; but where are you going?"

"Our division has been ordered to Hagerstown, and we are going there to join it."

I knew that he was not telling the truth. They hastened on, cowards for the moment.

Striking across fields towards the white powder-cloud rising above the trees, I came upon the hospital, on the farm of Mr. Hoffman, where, at that early hour, there were long rows of wounded. Turning from the sickening scenes I ascended a hill, and came upon the men of Hooker's corps, who had opened the battle, learned the story of their conflict, and then rode on to Joseph Poffenburger's house, behind which were thirty cannon, and their muzzles pointing south-west. At the moment their brazen lips were cooling. There was a lull in the battle. All was quiet in the oak grove along the Hagerstown Turnpike. I could see no gleaming bayonets amid the trampled corn-rows west of D. R. Miller's barn. I did not know that the line of men in blue lying on the ground by Poffenburger's was the foremost line of the Army of the Potomac. I rode down through the door-yard, where the hollyhocks were opening their white and red bell-shaped flowers to the morning sun. The flowerbeds in the garden were trampled. A Confederate shell had exploded among the beehives; the Union soldiers had gathered the honey, and the swarms were angrily buzzing in the air. I went down the turnpike tow

ards Miller's house, and came upon a Union soldier crouching beneath the wall.

"Where are you going?" he asked.

"I thought that I would go to the front."

"The front! You have passed it. I am on the skirmish line; you had better get out of here mighty quick. The Rebs are in the corn, right there."

I acted upon the timely advice and turned back; none too soon, for a moment later solid shot and shells were screaming through the air. Going south, I came upon the Twelfth Corps, General Mansfield's. It had bivouacked a mile in rear of Hooker's, and did not arrive at the east woods till after eight o'clock.

General Mansfield was an old man, white-haired, but his eye was keen, and he had a resolute will. He deploys his line from Dr. Miller's house south through the garden-the cornfield beyond. He has only two small divisions-Crawford's Crawford's and Greene's. He rides along the line, his long, white hair streaming in the wind. He does not stop to consider that he is a conspicuous object; that Confederate sharp-shooters are crouching in the corn west of the turnpike; that some are but a few rods distant behind Dr. Miller's barn. He rides forward into the orchard south of the house. A minie - bullet comes from the cornfield, and he falls from his horse mortally wounded. General Williams succeeds to the command. Many of the soldiers of the Twelfth Corps are new, and this is their first battle; but they are brigaded with veterans who have been through all the battles of the Peninsula and Bull Run, and move resolutely to the attack.

At the word of command the line moves down the gentle slope, past Miller's house, across the turnpike, through the cornfield beyond, to the west woods. Suddenly they come upon sharp-shooters crouched behind the trees, who retreat as the line advances. On through the woods moves the line to the western edge, to come upon Hood's division, posted behind limestone ledges and a rail-fence. Sheets of flame burst from the hill, where Stuart's cannon hurl canister upon the men in blue under Crawford. The Confederates are well protected, the Union troops wholly exposed.

In the thick of the fight General Hooker is wounded, and the command of the right wing devolves upon General Williams. He has no force in reserve. Hooker's corps is too much broken to come to his support. Hartsuff's and Gibbon's brigades have joined in the attack, but there are no others at hand. Mansfield expected that Sedgwick's divis