Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 5.djvu/74

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62
CONFEDERATE MILITARY HISTORY.


who took the colors. The color-bearer, Sergeant Taylor, fell with the colors in his grasp, as he was planting them forward of the line, and Corporal Hayne, seeing Colonel Hamilton take the flag, seized it, and gallantly going forward, fell mortally wounded. Private Spillman, of Company K, then took the flag and carried it to the final charge in triumph to victory. He was promoted color-bearer on the field for gallant conduct. Among the lamented dead of the First was the gallant and accomplished Lieut.-Col. A. M. Smith, who left a sick bed to take his place in his country s service. In the Twelfth, Colonel Barnes was wounded, but did not leave the field. Lieut. J. W. Delaney, commanding Company B, was killed in the first assault; Captain Vallandingham lost a leg, and Captains Miller, McMeekin and Bookter were wounded. In the Thirteenth, which was mainly in support, the loss was not so heavy, 8 killed and 40 wounded. In the Fourteenth, Colonel McGowan and Maj. W. J. Carter were wounded, as were also Captains Brown, Taggart and Edward Croft, and Lieutenants Brunson, O. W. Allen, Stevens, McCarley, Dorrah and Carter; and the gallant Lieut. O. C. Plunkett, Company H, was killed on the field. The First Rifles (known as Orr’s Rifles) suffered terribly. Its gallant adjutant, J. B. Sloan, Captains Hawthorne and Hennegan, Lieutenants Brown and McFall, and Sergeant-Major McGee died heroically leading in Marshall’s charge. In Gregg’s battle, a section of Capt. D. G. McIntosh’s battery was called into action late in the afternoon, too late to take an active part in the battle, as the enemy’s artillery in front had been silenced, or had retired. He lost 1 man killed and 2 wounded, and 5 horses killed.

The other South Carolina troops at the battle of Games Mill were with Hood and Longstreet. The brigades of Hood and Law composed Whiting’s gallant division, which had marched from Ashland as the advance of Jackson’s corps. They went into battle in the late afternoon,