Coffee and
warm food were served to them during a momentary stop among the trees,
and then the Winchester regiment moved forward again toward Champion Hill.
Rifle shots were now heard ahead of them. They were scattered, but the
lads knew that the hostile skirmishers had come in contact. Presently
the reports increased and through the woods they saw puffs of smoke.
Trumpets to right and left were calling up the brigades.
"Open up for the guns!" cried an aide, and a battery lumbered through,
the men swearing at their panting horses. But the Southern cannon were
already at work. From the bare crest of Champion Hill they were sending
shells which crashed in the ranks of the advancing foe. Two or three
of the Winchesters were hit, and a wounded horse, losing its rider, ran
screaming through the wood.
The forest and thickets now grew so dense that the officers dismounted,
giving their horses to an orderly, and led on foot. The country before
them was most difficult. Besides the trees and brush it was seared with
ravines. A swarm of skirmishers in front whom they could not see now
poured bullets among them, and the shells, curving over the heads of the
ambushed sharpshooters, fell in the Union ranks.
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