it had entered the field, and the enemy advanced to recover the battery. On Kershaw’s advance, however, the Sixth again went to the front, and some of them had the pleasure of seeing General Hagood and Captain Kemper of Kershaw s force turn the recaptured guns on their enemies. Shortly after this the arrival of Gen. Kirby Smith s forces on the enemy s right flank ended the battle. The Sixth lost 73 men in killed and wounded. Gen. William Smith (Southern Historical Society’s Papers, Vol. X, p. 439) falls into a grievous mistake about this regiment. He says, "When driven back from the guns, neither the North Carolinians nor the Mississippians remained to renew the charge, but incontinently left the field." The North Carolinians never fell back except when, as explained above, they were fired upon by a regiment thought to be on their own side, and they yielded ground then only after repeated injunctions from their own officers not to fire. They returned with Kershaw, followed the enemy in the direction of Centreville until ordered to return, and at night camped on the battle field. Maj.R. F.Webb and Lieut. B. F. White, detailed to bury the dead, collected twenty-three bodies near the battery, and those of Colonel Fisher and Private Hanna were lying far beyond it. These assertions are substantiated by five officers present on the field, and by the written statements of many others, published years ago.
This battle ended the fighting in Virginia for that year. North Carolina, however, was not so fortunate, for the next month saw Butler s descent upon its coast.
The coast of North Carolina, as will be seen by the accompanying map, is indented by three large sounds: Currituck, Albemarle and Pamlico. Into these the rivers of that section, most of them navigable, empty. These were the great highways of trade, and by them, by the canal from Elizabeth City, and by the railroads from New Bern and Suffolk, the Confederacy was largely supplied with necessary stores. "The command of the
