'Whether they are or not sir, why not move on the bridge, the one Buford tried to hold yesterday? That would be the natural barrier for the right to secure our flank as we advance. If we go charging straight into Taneytown and our right is totally exposed, we could be shattered just like Jackson rolling up the Eleventh Corps at Chancellorsville. It makes me uneasy.' Strong nodded.
'General Sykes says there's only this one corps, Colonel Chamberlain, and if we try to advance on a front from the bridge to the town, we'll be spread out across four miles or more. He wants a concentrated attack. Besides, the town is most likely where they are basing supplies.'
Joshua did not reply. If Sykes had given that order, there was no sense in troubling Strong about it now. Colonels don't countermand corps commanders.
Vincent pulled his watch out, opened it, and then muttered a curse as he started to wind the stem.
'We're already late. We were supposed to go in at approximately ten o'clock. Get your men in formation as I've outlined. The signal will be the massed firing of the batteries now going into position at the center of our line.'
The other regimental commanders saluted and started back to their troops, who were resting in columns on the far side of the village of Harney. Joshua lingered for a moment, and Strong looked over at him.
There was a close bond between the two. Only a short while ago Strong was a regimental commander like Joshua, more experienced and gladly willing to share what he knew with Joshua. 'What are you thinking?' Strong asked.
'Don't like it. We're just asking to get hit from the flank. Being vulnerable against Bobbie Lee just makes my stomach ache.'
Strong chuckled softly. 'That's what this war is like.' 'I have no idea what is going on with this army, how we got flanked, if we're being supported, or not. Do you?' Vincent said nothing. 'So we are alone out here?'
'Looks that way. I heard most of the army is moving toward Westminster. We're the right flank.'
'Strong, if they have not completed their march, which seems likely when you consider the amount of men and the time involved, we'll be flanked in turn.'
'I know that,' Strong replied.
Joshua smiled.
'You figure, then, that we will wind up holding the flank. Is that it?'
'Something like that.' 'Can't we send out a recon.' Strong shook his head.
'Sykes tried after his first probe was turned back. They have a heavy screen of skirmishers out from here clear back to Emmitsburg that can't be penetrated. Also, with Sykes I talked to a couple of staff. They said that around three this morning, headquarters was in a damn panic. Joshua, they're between us and Washington now. You know what that means.'
'We attack no matter what'
Strong said nothing, but the look he gave said it all.
Another bullet zipped through the trees, clipping a branch over their heads. Amusingly a squirrel, which had been sitting on the branch, jumped off, chattering loudly. The. two watched it race up the trunk and disappear into the top of the oak.
They could see the skirmisher who had fired across the creek, just a couple of hundred yards off. One of the cavalry troopers, who had stayed behind, drew a bead with his carbine, fired, and the Reb scurried back up the bank of the creek and into the tangle of brush.
Vincent, without saying a word, stepped back slightly, putting the trunk of the oak between himself and the other side. He caught Joshua's glance and grinned. 'Stupid way to die, the two of us standing out here gabbing.'
Joshua joined him.
'You hear about Adelbert?' Vincent asked. 'General Ames?' and Joshua felt a cold chill. 'Killed the first night in front of the cemetery.' Joshua lowered his head and looked away. Ames had been the commander of the Twentieth Maine who had greeted Joshua to the regiment with the comment, 'Just what the hell am I supposed to do with a book-learning professor?' Word of that one got around and was now something of a joke, one that 'Vincent appreciated.
Ames had taught Joshua nearly everything he knew about soldiering, and he had transformed the Twentieth from a rabble of farmers, loggers, fishermen, and clerks to a fine-edged killing machine. Ames had then moved up to brigade command with Eleventh Corps and Joshua had taken over the Twentieth.
And now Ames was dead.
A couple of more bullets slapped pass, one scoring the bark off of the oak only inches from Joshua's head.
'Ah, sirs, if all you're doing is chatting, maybe you'd better get back,' a trooper announced, firing a reply. 'Them bastards have seen you. And they sure love killin' officers.'
Joshua looked over at the trooper and nodded a thanks. Together, he and Strong walked back through the woods and the line of Union skirmishers, who were lying down on the thick that of leaves and green ferns with orders to not engage until the attack went in.
As they cleared the woods, the open field around the village of Harney was swarming with troops forming into lines of battle.
This was a moment Joshua both loved and hated. The sight of thousands of men falling into the long, double ranks, muskets flashing in the hazy light, blue uniforms almost like a black wall as the line stretched out across hundreds of yards, colors getting unfurled, bronze barrels of Napoleon twelve-pounders flashing in the sunlight, swinging into position; it set his heart racing.
And it always took too damn long. Crawford had been down here the evening before, made a half-hearted attack at dawn, came back across the creek, and now the other two divisions, men who had been up since shortly after midnight, were wearily deploying out.
A lone regiment could be shifted from column of march to battle line in a matter of a few minutes. An entire corps with more than forty regiments filling half a dozen miles of road could take three hours or more.
Three hours of waiting, your stomach knotting, men standing, sweltering in the heat, some so nervous that they'd suddenly turn, stagger back a few feet and vomit, or surfer the embarrassment of a sudden onset of diarrhea, and even the bravest could succumb. 'Old soldier's heart' would strike many, palpitations so fierce that it felt as if your chest would explode. It had hit Joshua once, and for a few minutes he actually feared his heart was exploding and he would die.
Every man had his ritual; some prayed, with pocket Bible out, reading their favorite verses, lips moving silently. Some prayed loudly, calling on God to watch over them, their voices pitched to a near hysteria. If allowed to sit, many would pull out a pencil, find a scrap of paper, and try to pen a farewell sentiment Others would try to show a complete indifference, playing cards, telling jokes, or making ribald jests about others who were praying or crying… though even that was an act
It was the waiting that was wearing. Once it started, then came the rush, the exultation, and, yes, the terror, but at last you were in it It was the waiting that exhausted you and made you wonder, as well, just what in God's name were the generals doing?
And that is what Joshua wondered now: What were they doing?
10:00 AM, JULY 3,1863
HEADQUARTERS, ARMY OF THE POTOMAC IN THE FIELD NEAR LITTLESTOWN
Henry Hunt slowed, head cocked, listening carefully. Artillery, felt more than actually heard, a distant echoing thumping, almost like the sound when a woman at a neighboring farm was beating carpets for spring cleaning.
The long, swaying column of men, filling the road ahead and behind, most not hearing; the 'feel' of gunfire was drowned out by the rhythmic tramping of feet, banging of tin cups on canteens, the myriad of sounds of an army on the march.
He pushed up from the road, riding to a low rise, and reined in. Again the thumping. It rose for a moment, dropped away.
Taneytown? Was Fifth Corps going in?
It was silent again, except for the steady rumble of troops passing on the road below. The pike, which ran
