Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: June 23, 2025
"The Bucktails cut their throats the first day that they encamped at the mill," said Miss Priscilla. "Them Bucktails great fellers," said the tall man; "them Bucktails awful on sheep: they loves 'em so!" He relapsed again for a few minutes, when he continued: "You don't like fellers to bag yer poultry and sheep, do you?" Miss Priscilla replied that it was both dishonest and cruel.
A fence is torn down, and with this and whatever is nearest at hand a breastwork is hastily improvised. A few of the Bucktails have rallied on their right, and thrown up a similar defense of logs, rails, any thing that can stop a bullet. Here the line seems to terminate; but just beyond and a little back, is a brass battery, concealed by bushes, every gun charged with grape and canister.
To his great disgust, his appeals were unheeded, and he turned to me saying we would go alone. But now we saw some of the Bucktails coming forward, and soon about twenty of us were deployed at skirmish distance, advancing on the rebel rear. Their line could be seen stretching far to right and left. Our Spencers rattled among the trees as we rained the bullets upon them.
From rank to rank there passed something like a sobbing cry. The 58th charged. Bradley Johnson with the Maryland Line dislodged the Bucktails, captured their colonel and many others, killed and wounded many. The coppice, from soaked mould to smoky treetop, hung in the twilight like a wood in Hades. It was full dusk when Fremont's advance drew back, retreating sullenly to its camp at Harrisonburg.
Again Colonel Pattee's voice rings out: "DEPLOY SKIRMISHERS!" and in less than a minute a line of Bucktails stretches through the woods, facing the enemy. There is no waiting. "FORWARD!" passes down the line, and we move out into the open field in front. A hundred yards ahead the cavalry are stubbornly facing a heavy force of rebel infantry that is crowding on them and steadily pushing them back.
They moved down the stream some distance, and halted in the midst of a beautiful farm. Before them was a valley, across which the Bucktails were advancing as skirmishers, and beyond this the ground rose again, and curved off toward woods in the distance. Scarcely had our line reached this point, when the enemy "came down like the wolf on the fold."
"Of course," murmured the Special Messenger, gently tapping her riding skirt with her whip. "Because," continued the Colonel, "headquarters is stripping this depot of troops. The Bucktails go to-day; Casson's New York brigade and Darrel's cavalry left yesterday. What remains is a mighty small garrison for a big supply depot eleven hundred effectives, and they may take some of them at any moment.
Orders stand; the Bucktails are going, and I'm worried to death." He shoved his empty pipe into his mouth and bit viciously at the stem. "Then," she said, "if I'm to do anything I'd better hurry, hadn't I?" The young officer's face grew grimmer. "Certainly; but I've been a month at it and I'm no wiser.
Judging from the promptness and vigor with which they assailed us, they evidently counted on making our enterprise another Ball's Bluff affair. As the Bucktails advanced, their rapid firing warned us that they had discovered the advance of the enemy. Dust was seen rising on the high ground beyond, and horses were dimly seen. We judged that batteries were coming into position.
And with this irritating and constant leaking out of information I'm horribly afraid he'll strike us as soon as the Bucktails entrain." "Why don't you hold the Pennsylvania infantry until we can find out where the trouble lies?" asked the girl, raising her dark eyes to the nervous young Colonel. "I haven't the authority; I've asked for it twice.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking