THE REMINISCENCES OF CARL SCHURZ
closed his main attack on the left wing of our army, which could not hold its ground against the superior forces the enemy had massed at that point. I had to put in Koltes' and Krzyzanowski's brigades to protect Schenck's left. The contest grew extremely sharp. Koltes fell dead at the head of his regiments, Krzyzanowski's horse was shot under him, and Schenck had to be carried wounded from the field. The ground was thickly strewn with our dead. When Sigel observed that the left wing of the army was being constantly pressed back, and the left of his corps was uncovered and furiously assailed by the enemy's infantry in front, and enfiladed by his artillery so that, in our position, we were substantially fighting alone against overwhelming odds, he ordered me to withdraw my division to the next range of low hills near the “stone house.” I had left Schimmelfennig's brigade with Dilger's battery on my right in reserve, and they now covered the retrograde movement, which was executed in perfect order. Especially Captain Dilger distinguished himself by receiving the pursuing enemy in several positions with grape shot at short range, obliging him twice to turn back, and then following his brigade unmolested. My command come out of the trial sadly thinned, but in a state of firm organization. I could say in my official report: “My men stood like trees until the instruction to retire reached them, and then they fell back slowly and in perfect order.”
When I reached the rising ground indicated to me, a singular spectacle presented itself. I found General McDowell with his staff on horseback, standing still, and around them a confused mass of men, partly in an organized, partly in a disbanded state, and among them army wagons, ambulances, and pieces of artillery, streaming to the rear. Nobody seemed to make an effort to stem the current or to restore order. I
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