Fire Over Atlanta Read online

  “Oh, yes, she’s healthy all right. Look, she and Cecil are trying to dance again. Cecil isn’t much on a dance floor, I’m afraid.”

  Jeff glanced over as Cecil almost tripped over Leah’s long skirt.

  Lucy said, “Well, I hope he doesn’t fall down and drag Leah with him. That would humiliate her, wouldn’t it …”

  “This is too much to ask a lady to put up with,” Cecil said.

  Leah was somewhat embarrassed, but she said, “No, you’re not going to get any better if you don’t practice.”

  The evening went on and on, and Lucy and Jeff—it seemed to Leah—danced almost every dance together. She herself kept going back to Cecil, who stood much of the time against the wall. “Come along, Cecil,” she would say, taking his hand.

  The more she saw Jeff laughing down at Lucy Driscoll, the more unhappy she became. If I can’t have the prettiest dress, I‘ll have to do something else to get Jeff‘s attention, she thought.

  Leah was not a scheming girl. But having come to the party in such poor style, and then seeing Jeff so taken with Lucy Driscoll, she decided that she had to do something. She toyed with an idea. If he’s going to pay all that much attention to Lucy, then I’m going to make him jealous. I’ll make him jealous of Cecil.

  The thought pleased her, and she moved closer to Cecil, saying, “You do look nice in your uniform, Cecil. I think officers of the Confederacy are so dashing, and I’m sure you’re going to be a perfect hero when you get your chance.”

  Leah had never paid such attention to Cecil before, and he seemed dazzled by her compliments. “Why, Leah, I didn’t know you felt like that!”

  “Oh, I do! Now, let’s try again. One, two, three. One, two, three. That’s it! You’re going to be the best dancer when I get through with you, Cecil Taylor.”

  Leah hardly saw the pleased look that came into Cecil’s eyes. She looked across the room at Jeff and Lucy, thinking, I’ll make him so jealous, he won’t even see Lucy Driscoll.

  2

  Friends Fall Out

  Sgt. Royal Carter entered the tent and found Pvt. A. B. Rose lying limply on his cot.

  “What’s the matter with you, Rosie?” Royal said. “You’re not ready for breakfast?”

  For a moment the gangling soldier stretched out on the cot said nothing. Then he looked past his big feet to reveal a pair of light blue eyes. His tow-colored hair was badly awry. He managed to say mournfully, “Well, sergeant, I reckon my time has come.”

  “The time’s come for breakfast!”

  Rosie shook his head. “Nope, it’s all up with me this time, Royal. I don’t hold out much hope that I can make it anymore.”

  “What’s wrong with you?” Royal stood over him. “You look all right to me.”

  “Well, looks are plumb deceivin’. You ought to know that. I might look good, but I ain’t good inside. No, sir, not a bit of it!”

  A slight smile curled the corners of Royal Carter’s lips. He mused over the limp figure of the tall private a moment more. “Well,” he said, “if you feel so bad, I guess I’d better go and eat those pancakes and ham that the cooks made for us this morning.”

  As Royal had anticipated, the mention of pancakes seemed to bring fresh strength into Rosie. He sat up at once, cleared his throat, and ran his hands through his hair. “Well, now, Professor—maybe if you’ll help me, I can make it to the mess hall. Then if I get one of those pancakes down me, I might feel better.”

  “Just lean on me, Rosie,” Royal said soothingly. Hiding a grin, he pretended to sag as the huge private put an arm over his shoulder and the two started for the eating area.

  Royal, at twenty-two, was not more than five feet nine but was sturdy and strong. He had light hair and blue eyes and was known as Professor by his fellow soldiers primarily because he had some college education. He also was rarely seen without a book.

  The mess hall was a large frame building that had once been a factory but had been seized by the Federal army when it took Chattanooga. It had been turned into a fine kitchen and mess hall combined.

  “Come on, now! You’re going to make it! Just up these steps.”

  Hanging on loosely and shuffling his feet, Rosie said, “I made my will out last night.”

  “Again? That’s the tenth will you’ve made that I know of! I wish I was as sure of living as you are, Rosie. You’re healthy as a horse.”

  Rosie’s craggy features looked pained. “Nobody understands me,” he said. “I’m a sick man.”

  Actually there was no healthier soldier in the Union army than Pvt. A. B. Rose. He was indeed healthy as a horse and as strong as one as well. But he fancied himself sick and repeatedly went to the surgeon of the regiment, trying to explain his ailments. He had an enormous collection of patent medicines, including pills, syrups, and concoctions of all sorts, to which he added some that he himself had invented. His friends warned him that he was going to kill himself with some of these medicines, but Rosie gloomily persisted.

  The two soldiers went into the mess hall, and Royal called out, “Make room, men! Let’s help poor old Rosie try to hold something down.”

  A yell went up from the soldiers, who were putting away pancakes at a prodigious rate.

  Walter Beddows, a short, stocky boy with brown hair and brown eyes, laughed aloud. “Sit down here by me, Rosie. I’ll hold you up while Sergeant Pickens stuffs a few pancakes down your throat.”

  Another private said, “Here, I’ll even pour the syrup on ’em. We got fresh-made sorghum.”

  Rosie sat and looked across the table at Walter and Ira Pickens, a tall, lean sergeant with brown eyes and bushy black hair, who grinned at him.

  “I think he’s gonna die this time, Ira,” Walter said.

  “No, just get some of these pancakes down him. They’d make a corpse come to life.”

  A great deal of wry humor passed back and forth as Rosie slowly forked a pancake onto his plate. He drowned it in syrup, cut it in two, and stuffed half of it into his mouth. Then he annihilated the second half. His eyes brightened. “That’s better, fellas. Let me have a few more of those.”

  Royal watched and winked at his fellow sergeant, Ira Pickens, as Rosie helped himself to a half dozen large pancakes and attacked them.

  “I suppose you’re going to live, aren’t you, Rosie?” Ira asked finally.

  “I reckon I will. If I just had some coffee and a piece of that ham to come out even.”

  Rosie looked up as another private entered. The newcomer was tall, strong-looking, athletic. He had crisp brown hair, gray eyes, and his uniform was spotless. “Well, Drake, I think I’m going to make it. These pancakes, I believe, have got some kind of therapeutic value.”

  Drake Bedford took a seat and lifted his eyebrows at Rosie. They had joined up together and were the best of friends. “You didn’t leave any pancakes for me?” he exclaimed. “What a pig!”

  “Here,” Royal said, “I saved three of them back for you.”

  “Hey, thanks a lot, sergeant.” Drake grinned. “I’ll do the same for you sometime.”

  As Drake began eating his pancakes, talk went around the table about the battle that they had just been through.

  “We sure whipped them Rebs this time!” somebody said. “I reckon the Army of Tennessee is running yet after we charged ’em up Missionary Ridge.”

  Loud cries of agreement sounded, and Walter Beddows said, “You’re right about that. Furthermore, I think we’re gonna run ’em all the way back to Atlanta.”

  “It’s about time we won a battle,” Sergeant Pickens put in. He was a homely young man, a good friend of Leah Carter, and somewhat struck with her. He winked at Royal. “I got me a letter from your sister Leah.”

  Royal grinned. “Are you still tryin’ to court her? I told you—she’s dotty about Jeff Majors.”

  “He’s just an old Confederate,” Ira drawled. “Just let me get close to her again, and I’ll show you what courtin’ really is.”

  Some catcalls went
up at this.

  And then Walter Beddows winked at Rosie and said, “Hey, Drake, how you doin’ with your courtin’?”

  Drake had been eating steadily, but at Walter’s remark his face assumed a frown. “I’m doin’ all right,” he said.

  “Is that right?” Walter continued. He loved to tease. “Why, I heard our sergeant has the inside track on that little ol’ Lori Jenkins.”

  “Cut it out, will you, Walter!” Royal said. He and Drake were competing for Lori Jenkins’s hand, and he knew that Drake hated to be teased.

  But Walter never knew when to stop, and he kept up his teasing until finally Drake said, “Beddows, shut up, or I’ll clean your plow!”

  “Oh, he didn’t mean anything,” Royal said quickly. He hated to see dissension among his squad and shot a warning frown at Walter.

  Drake, however, was extrasensitive. He got up and walked stiffly out of the mess hall.

  “Hey, you left your pancakes!” Rosie called after him. “Do you mind if I have ’em?”

  Drake went out, slamming the door.

  “Whooie, he sure is powerful touchy, isn’t he, Professor?” Walter said.

  “Too touchy—and you fellows lay off of him! You hear me? Especially you, Walter. You never know when to quit.”

  Rosie commandeered the remains of Drake’s breakfast and consumed them with relish. “You’re right about that, Professor. I’ve known Drake a long time. If he didn’t have such a hot temper, he’d live longer. I been tellin’ him he ought to take some of my liver pills.” He swallowed the last bite and sighed with satisfaction. “Come to think of it, I better take some myself.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a huge bottle. He removed the top and shook out a handful of pills. “You fellows want some?” he asked. Getting no takers, he took two and swallowed them easily without water. “Now,” he said, “that ought to calm my innards down a little bit.”

  “They better be calm because we’re gonna be headin’ out of here any time,” Royal said.

  “General Sherman tell you that?” Pickens asked with a grin.

  “Everybody knows about it. We’ll be headin’ for Atlanta, and there’ll be plenty of fightin’ along the way.”

  After the Confederates retreated from Chattanooga, General Sherman at once gave orders to follow them. He had three armies, 110,000 men strong; Gen. Joe E. Johnston’s Army of Tennessee had fewer than 65,000. The Union troops packed up and started out toward Atlanta.

  During the march, Rosie asked, “What do you think about our strategy, Royal? How are we goin’ to whip them Rebs?”

  The others listened avidly, for Royal was the only man in the squad who paid much attention to strategy.

  “Well,” he said, “we’ve got to do two things. First, we’ve got to whip Johnston’s army. And the second thing is, we’ve got to capture Atlanta.”

  “Why do we need Atlanta?” Drake muttered sourly.

  Royal pretended not to notice Drake’s sullen looks. He knew Drake did not like soldiering. “Next to Richmond,” he said, “Atlanta is the most important manufacturing city in the South. If we can capture that, that’ll reduce their ability to wage war. They won’t have anything left to fight with.”

  “What do you think the Confederates are going to do?” Walter Beddows asked.

  “First they’re going to try and whip us. But being so outnumbered, I don’t think they can handle that,” Royal said. “I think they’ll retreat and try to trick us into some ground where they’ll have more of a chance. And, of course, secondly, they’ll hole up and defend Atlanta. But you know what they’re really tryin’ to do is stall for time.”

  “Why they doin’ that?” Rosie inquired.

  “Because, if the war keeps on going on, some of our folks back home might decide it costs too much. And if President Lincoln gets defeated next November, the war might just be stopped. So if they can just hold out, they’ve got a good chance of winning that way.”

  The others listened, but Royal knew they actually paid little attention to theories.

  However, they soon paid attention to the action. When the Federals arrived at a place called Resaca, they made an attack, and there was intense fighting. After this, they pursued the Rebels until they fought again. Johnston and his Confederate forces were waiting for them at Newhope Church, and hard battles were fought there.

  Royal and his squad were sent on a wide, ranging sweep and, after a series of operations, found themselves in front of Kennesaw Mountain. The Northern army had come three-fourths of the way to Atlanta, and so far there had been only isolated pitched battles. But this time Sherman loosed the entire Federal force on Confederate positions.

  Sherman’s troops took considerable mauling, and the general, fighter that he was, decided that Atlanta could not be taken by a frontal assault. The Union forces then moved along the Chattahoochee River, and the Confederates eventually retired across the river to a strong position just north of Atlanta.

  During all of the battles, Drake had fought with courage. He was a man who could endure almost anything except inactivity. He was a social being, loved parties, played the fiddle well, had a good singing voice, and had been very popular in civilian life. Now, once the armies were not fighting but simply waiting it out, he became restless.

  Royal was careful how he spoke to Drake. He considered the man a friend even though the two of them were in fierce competition for Lori Jenkins. But being a responsible sergeant, finally he could overlook Drake’s malingering and laziness no longer. Approaching him one morning as Drake lay outside his tent while the other men were working, he said, “Drake, up and at it! Help the other fellas!”

  Drake, unfortunately, had found some liquor the night before and had gotten drunk. He probably had a terrible headache, for he flinched at the impact of Royal’s voice. Without opening his eyes he said, “You don’t need me, Royal!”

  Even as he spoke, an officer walked by, Lt. Harvey Logan, a hard man on any private who spoke back to his officer or noncom.

  Alarmed, Royal said, “Come on, Drake, get with it!”

  Drake, again without opening his eyes, cursed Royal and told him, “Get away and leave me alone!”

  “On your feet, private!”

  At the rough voice of the lieutenant, Drake did open his eyes, and when he saw the anger on Logan’s face, he scrambled to his feet.

  “If you don’t like to work, I’ll give you something better to do.”

  “I think I can discipline him, lieutenant,” Royal said hastily. “If you don’t mind, sir.”

  “I do mind!” the lieutenant said. “He’s been getting away with murder! Let him ride the horse. See if he likes that. After a few hours, he’ll be glad to go to work.”

  The rest of the squad stood listening to all this, and some of them looked pleased. Royal knew they resented having to do Drake’s work.

  “Get him on that horse!”

  Royal had no choice. “Come on, Private Bedford.”

  Drake had gone too far, but he was a proud young man and would never beg. When he got to the wooden “horse,” which was a rough pole six inches across and suspended six feet in the air by crossed legs, he turned a little pale. Men had been kept straddled on this apparatus until they cried for mercy.

  “On that pole, Bedford,” Lieutenant Logan ordered.

  Drake leaped up and straddled the pole. He held on with his hands in front of him and waited.

  “Tie his feet under there!” Lieutenant Logan said, and with regret Royal obeyed the order.

  “How long do I have to stay up here, sir?”

  “I’ll tell you when you can get down! You can think about what a sorry soldier you are while you’re up there!” Lieutenant Logan gave Royal a hard glance. “You leave him there, sergeant, until I tell you to take him down.”

  “Yes, sir!”

  For the next six hours, Drake sat on the horse. What was at first uncomfortable became literal torture after a while. He tried to shift his position, raising himself
off the pole from time to time. But that was impossible for long.

  Even worse than the torture were the snickers and laughter of the men of A Company who came by. “Ride ’em, cowboy!” they would yell. “You got him, Drake! Just ride him all the way back to Washington!” Such gibes infuriated him, but he could not do anything about it.

  The lieutenant came by at dusk. “All right, sergeant, cut him loose.”

  Royal slit the thongs binding Drake’s feet and said, “Let me help you down, Drake.”

  “Get away from me!” Drake slipped off the pole, clinging to it to keep from falling until the circulation came back to his legs. Then he staggered off, his face set in an air of resentment.

  “He sure doesn’t learn very good, does he, Professor?” Jay Walters remarked.

  “He sure don’t!” Rosie put in. “He’s always shootin’ himself in the foot. Sure wish he would learn to be nice and easygoing. Maybe some of this new syrup I made out of hemlock will help him.”

  Jay shook his head. “I don’t think any medicine is gonna help him. Just a change of heart.”

  “He needs that all right. He’s a right good feller. He’s just got too much temper for one man.”

  3

  Drake Sees a Miracle

  The road to Atlanta wore the Union army threadbare. Day by day the troops slogged forward, fighting battle after battle. The Confederates, led by the wily General Johnston, fought a masterful withdrawal. It was said of Johnston that on retreat he was like a savage wolf, the best general in either army at such tactics.

  After many nasty little battles, Royal Carter sat in front of a sputtering campfire, studying the squad that he was charged with leading. A cold rain was falling, and the fire over which Royal and Walter Beddows were trying to cook bacon and make johnnycakes was a miserable failure.

  “I’m tired of all this!” Walter complained. He suddenly sat back, and the muddy ground squished beneath him. “We fight, and fight, and fight—and those blasted Rebels just back up and hit us again from the sides!”

  Walter had a tin plate in his hand and was hungrily awaiting breakfast. Now he pulled his poncho around his shoulders and tilted his forage cap forward so that the water ran down on his shirtfront. “I’d just as soon bore through to China as get to Atlanta.”