brigades of D. H. Hill, they were still north of the pike and contending for every inch of ground between it and the cornfield in front. At the moment when their ammunition was absolutely exhausted and all had been used from the boxes and pockets of dead comrades, the reinforcements of Hill and Hood, above referred to, came up and stayed the tide for a short time. Now Sumner with his three divisions put in appearance, when our thin lines were slowly pressed back by the weight of numbers into the woods, and beyond the church to the edge of a field to the south, through which the divisions of Walker and McLaws were hurrying to our assistance.
Garland’s brigade under Colonel McRae went into action with alacrity, but owing to an unfortunate blunder of one of the captains, several of its regiments became unsteady and fell back in much confusion. The Twenty-third, General Hill reports, was kept intact, and moved to the sunken road. Portions of this brigade were rallied by Colonel McRae and Captain Garnett and others, and again joined in the battle.
A little before ten, General Walker, having been ordered from the right, pushed into the smoke and confusion of combat just behind Hood. Walker s division, consisting of Walker’s own brigade and Ransom’s brigade, was, with the exception of two regiments, composed of North Carolinians. His own brigade, under Manning and then under Col. E. D. Hall, of the Forty-sixth North Carolina, included the Twenty-seventh, Col. J. R. Cooke; the Forty-sixth, Colonel Hall, and the Forty-eighth, Col. R. C. Hill, North Carolina regiments; and Ransom’s brigade comprised the Twenty-fourth, Col. J. L. Harris; the Twenty-fifth, Col. H. M. Rutledge; the Thirty-fifth, Col. M. W. Ransom, and the Forty-ninth, Lieut.-Col. L. M. McAfee, North Carolina regiments. As General Walker went in, he was notified that there was a gap of a third of a mile to the left of General Hill, and he detached the Twenty-seventh North Carolina and the Third Arkansas, under Col. J. R. Cooke, of the Carolina
