The Better Angels of Our Nature (10 page)

“I’m very small,” the boy said with regret. “Cornelius calls me runt of the litter.”

“You have more than enough character in you to be the kind of man to make your God and your family proud.”

Jesse held the bridle as Ransom swung his long, slender body into the saddle. The Vermonter crossed his arms over the pommel and leaned forward. “My mother always told me that the Almighty sends us only as many trials as he believes we are capable of enduring.” He looked at the boy looking up at him and smiled hesitantly. “Tell this Cornelius next time he calls you a runt that it requires more than height and broad shoulders to be a good soldier.”

“Sir, I’m so sorry about your brother.”

Twenty-year-old Eugene Ransom had fought with the Eleventh Illinois at Donelson, been wounded in the arm and captured, Lieutenant Bennett had told him, by a Rebel horseman in the command of a Colonel Forrest. He was in a prison camp in the South, his exact whereabouts unknown.

“Thank you, Private Davis.” He briefly touched the boy’s shoulder. “Tell me, what reward can I give you for your care of Lieutenant Bennett?”

“I would love to ride your horse, sir.” The boy was still looking up at the colonel, who seemed unable to avert his gaze.

For a moment they stared into each other’s eyes, the officer frowning his confusion, then with what seemed like a superhuman effort, he broke the spell, laughing nervously as he ran his hands over Old Bob’s glossy neck. “Then you may ride Old Bob.” He gathered up the reins. “Yes, that can be arranged. Good-bye.”

“When, sir, when may I ride Old Bob?” Jesse called out, but the lieutenant colonel had already ridden away.

Jesse walked back to the recovery tent to find the surgeon standing there, blocking the way, his pipe jutting from the corner of his mouth, his hands buried deep in his apron pockets.

“How very touching,” he said with that twisted grin. “What the hell’s between you and that pompous idiot, anyway?” He raised both eyebrows significantly. “You know what
I
think, don’t you? But then it ain’t my business. I’m a doctor, not a judge of folk’s morals.”

“The colonel isn’t pompous, sir,” the boy said calmly, “and he certainly isn’t an idiot.”

“Well, I guess it’s your business. The pamphlet,” he thrust it at the boy’s chest, “on miasmic diseases. You’ll find the correlation between the presence of marsh miasmas and an increased incidence of malarial fever fascinating. Oh, and as I said before, some very good thoughts regarding the emanations arising from all the excrement found around the camps.”

“Thank you, sir.”

The surgeon moved slowly aside, just barely enough for the boy to squeeze by, and as he did so, the breath caught hard in the surgeon’s throat and something like an electric shock jolted his system. He stared after him, his mouth slightly open in an uncharacteristically dumbfounded pose. Then he swallowed and gasped. “Well,
I’ll be…goddamned—
” His voice rose to a crescendo of incredulity and then tailed off into silent shock. His pipe drooped. He looked like a man who had at last found the answer to the eternal question.

Pittsburg Landing had been named for Pitts Tucker, long dead, which was just as well, since he’d made a living selling gut-rot liquor to eager river men. These days he’d have found equally enthusiastic patrons among the soldiers, for in the last week the area had mushroomed into an enormous army camp the like of which awed even old warriors, let alone raw recruits.

Every day transports brought up more men from Savannah, twelve miles away, often docking at the narrow landing beneath the bluff, five deep, and the tents now spread as far as the Eastern Corinth and Hamburg-Savannah Roads, under trees covered with light foliage. Forty-five thousand noisy troops, five divisions, were bivouacked across these once-peaceful fields, and any day now, Buell and his Army of the Ohio would be marching southwest along the Central Alabama Railroad, swelling their ranks to eighty-two thousand men.

Soldiers never before drilled in barrack courtyards found themselves drilled and inspected in the middle of peach orchards where the blossoms had already turned to pink and pleasant morning temperatures gave way during the day to the beginnings of an uncomfortable heat. Spring had come early to the Tennessee Valley. The birds sang joyously and a quick eye could spot squirrels or rabbits, even the occasional fleet-footed deer scampering through the lush, abundant woods. Violets dotted the landscape, peeking up between the tall verdant grasses, and while some soldiers openly admired their surroundings others said contemptuously that Tennessee couldn’t hold a candle to Iowa, Wisconsin, or Michigan, to Ohio, Indiana, or Illinois. Every soldier thought their own land back home as remarkably similar to wherever they were, only better.

Whatever the truth, these myriad creeks and fast-flowing streams, fields of corn and orchards, once alive only with wild life and farmers now echoed to the harsh clatter of musketry and the gruff, insistent voice of a drill sergeant.

Soldiers not easily impressed by pomp or circumstance, by a high-stepping steed or shiny brass buttons, liked to gossip, especially about the frailties of their officers. The higher the rank, the greater the weakness, as though these poor, ill-educated, strong-minded farm boys took comfort from the knowledge that privilege, wealth, education, or arrogance were no surefire guarantees against crass stupidity and excess. Most officers were drunk, corrupt, overambitious, or just plain useless in their eyes and not worth a dime. Some they liked. Some they even loved. Others they weren’t yet sure about. Take Billy Sherman. The stories of his insanity at Kentucky made him suspect, and they never saw him but he looked nervous, fidgety, and kind of wild about the eyes. True, he’d fought bravely at Bull Run, was the last officer to leave the field that shameful day, trying desperately to rally his brigade. He’d won promotion from colonel to brigadier, and even though his superiors now trusted him with an entire division, they weren’t at all sure they wanted to be led into battle by a man the newspapers had called “stark raving mad.” No one had twisted their arm to enlist. Hell, they wanted to fight, but who could blame them for looking at their officers with a certain degree of trepidation. When battle was finally joined, who could accurately predict what was most likely to get them slaughtered: insanity, drunkenness, or ambition?

At the hospital rumors abounded. Some said the Rebs were no longer in Corinth, but were camped less than half a mile away, at night you could see their bivouac fires glowing in the sky. Others argued that this was a reflection of their own campfires, and there wasn’t a Reb for miles, except for stray pickets and the occasional cavalry patrol that skedaddled when they saw blue uniforms. When pickets at Owl Creek went missing, the surgeons said they’d deserted, while the patients, mostly enlisted men who had their reputation to defend, insisted they’d been captured by Reb cavalry. Both groups agreed that Reb sharpshooters were concealed behind every tree waiting to put lead into any Yankee stupid enough to stick his head out.

Jesse Davis listened to the rumors, but was not deterred from taking a trip to the Widow Howell’s farm with a gunnysack and a pocket full of poker winnings. He had heard Dr. Cartwright say, “I wish to God I could give the sick men fresh fruit.”

5

Every fair and manly trait

The Widow Howell had a peach orchard next to her house, but as the old woman told Jesse when the boy came knocking on her door in the pouring rain, offering to buy some peaches,

“Oh Lord, young fella, they ain’t near out. Lord, don’t
you
know that? They won’t be ready ’til near August.” And she laughed at Jesse’s ignorance.

Nevertheless, Jesse left what she considered a fair price for a sack full of peaches on the doorstep after the still-laughing widow closed the door and climbed the fence into the orchard.

Thirty minutes later, with what would have seemed to anyone a heavy sack over her shoulder, Jesse started back to camp. As he crossed the Corinth Road, he looked for the picket guard on duty when he had passed no more than an hour ago. If the guard had returned to camp, another ought to have taken its place. He had almost decided to investigate when he heard the unmistakable rattle of musket fire in the distance, followed by urgent shouts, more gunfire, and the pounding of hooves. The boy plunged into the dense undergrowth, clutching his precious load, and in a few minutes saw seven blue-clad men and two officers running down the muddy road. One of the officers, a red-faced captain called Shotwell, his efforts at retreat made more strenuous by the dress sword between his short legs, was way out in front of his men, as if in an effort to set a record for cowardly flight in the face of the enemy. A few yards behind, using one hand to gather his men together, like an anxious shepherd whose straying flock is pursued by a pack of wolves, and the other hand to stem the flow of blood from a shoulder wound, Jesse recognized the rugged Lieutenant Washington. Bringing up the rear was the massive bulk of Sergeant Bailey, with young Private Atkinson slung over his shoulder like a sack of meal, dripping blood at every jolt.

Suddenly the crack of a single shot rang out and a look of surprise came over Sergeant Bailey’s bearded face. He went down onto his knees and keeled over, his burden slipping off his shoulder into the mud. Another gunshot followed by another in rapid succession and the next to fall was the fleeing captain, taking a Rebel musket ball in the right thigh, and letting out a series of yelps like an animal caught in a trap. Jesse emerged from the bushes and saw Lieutenant Washington gape in astonishment as he ran past him to the two men lying in the mud. A cursory glance at Sergeant Bailey confirmed that he was dead; his red eyes were open, staring up sightlessly at the sky, as blood and brains ran swiftly from a gaping hole in the back of his head. The young private, shot in the face, was lying on his side, struggling with each gasp to catch his breath, making loud, wet, stridorous sounds that could be heard several yards away. When Jesse knelt beside him, it was immediately obvious why. The bullet had carried away part of his jaw, shredding his tongue in the process. The tissues of his mouth and throat had swollen to such a degree that his airway was obstructed. His face had turned ashen and his lips blue. Washington meanwhile had managed to get across the road. He was propped up against a tree not more than a foot away. “How are they?” he called, concerned for his men, though setting his teeth against his own pain.

“The sergeant is dead,” Jesse replied, opening the canvas haversack he now carried, which Jacob had filled with all manner of medical necessities. He found the pocket surgical kit, flipped open the tortoiseshell scalpel, felt around the soldier’s bloodied neck and found the windpipe, and without so much as a second’s hesitation had made a quick horizontal cut.

A horrified Washington screamed out, “What in hell are you doing? You crazy little bastard.” He lunged forward and tried to grab the boy’s arm but missed and fell back, staring at him from a prone position as though the little soldier was the devil incarnate.

Jesse ignored him,
and
the captain, sprawled out in the center of the muddy wagon road crying that he was bleeding to death, and went on with the urgent task. First, a splattering of blood oozed up through the hole in the private’s throat, followed by a slow bubbling. To add further to Washington’s horror Jesse put a finger into the hole made with the scalpel and opened the incision wider. Private Atkinson took a huge gasp of air through the hole, one of his hands coming up, clawlike, to grab at Jesse’s blouse, whether in gratitude or agony, Washington could not have said. After a few seconds, Private Atkinson’s color had improved so significantly that Washington, in a voice of profound awe, said, “God Almighty—”

He got no further as triumphant shouting filled the clearing. In a few seconds, their unhurried pursuers quickly encircled all eight of them, a small unit of butternut troopers led by a handsome captain with shoulder-length blond curls and flowing mustaches. Shotwell propped himself on one elbow and began to shout abuse at the cavalrymen, displaying a now misplaced defiance, since he had already shown his eagerness to desert his men.

“If I can only…get to my feet I’ll finish you…off, do you hear me, you filthy Reb traitors!”

The Rebel captain, unmoved by this display of empty bravado, fell to discussing with his lieutenant what they ought to do with their captives. They were traveling light, on a reconnaissance mission, and evidently did not welcome the burden. Several of them said they should shoot the prisoners and be done with it. Jesse took no heed of this as he rummaged around in his haversack until he found what he was looking for. Like the doctor, he had no tracheotomy tube, but he did have a rubber urinary catheter. He snipped off the end just as he had seen Cartwright do and slipped it through the incision he had made in the soldier’s windpipe, fastened a length of bandage around the tube, and then tied it around the boy’s neck to hold it in place. Having removed his sack jacket to place under the wounded man’s head, he went to Lieutenant Washington, who was now propped up against a tree staring at him.

“What in God’s name did you do to him?” The officer’s eyes were staring.

“I cleared a passageway so that he can breathe, but he must get to a surgeon.” As Jesse reported this, he worked on Washington’s shoulder. Finding no exit wound, he told him, “It isn’t serious, sir, but the ball’s still in there.”

He was placing a wad of lint against the wound when Captain Shotwell called out, “You, boy! Help me—I’m bleeding to death. For God’s sake,
leave him
and help me—I’m bleeding to death, I tell you.”

“Go on, Private, I can tend myself—” Jesse went on swiftly but expertly bandaging Washington’s shoulder.

“Private, do you hear me!” the captain screamed. “I order you to attend me—I’ll have you shot—goddamn you—”

Washington used his good hand to grip Jesse’s slender wrist. In the past few seconds, it had begun to rain again. Blinking rainwater from his eyes, he stared into the boy’s face. “Do as I say, Private, take a look at Cap’in Shotwell before he makes me so goddamned ashamed to admit I serve in the same army as him—never mind the same goddamned regiment.”

“Tell me, boy,” called out one of the Rebel troopers trotting his horse alongside Jesse as he crossed the road to the whining Shotwell. “Does yaw mama know yaw out?”

“I thought you
were
my mama,” came Jesse’s retort as he bent over Captain Shotwell’s bleeding leg. “She has a shawl just like yours.”

The blond captain and his men laughed heartily, for their comrade had only that morning found a lady’s flower-patterned shawl and was wearing it around his neck. Now he tore it off in disgust and threw it in the mud.

“Yaw oughta learn tow respect yaw elders,” said he, waving his pistol in the air menacingly as his horse pranced. “Else yaw gonna git yaw head blowed off.” Since he was not much older than the object of his threat, this made his companions laugh even more.

“Ow—is you boys gonna fight over the baby’s rattle?” teased one of the troopers, a well-set-up sergeant with a bunch of Indian feathers in his hatband and his right arm strapped to his chest with a wide leather belt.

“Send ’em t’bed without no supper,” suggested another.

The young Rebel pointed his pistol at his companions, first one and then another, but the laughter merely increased.

The Rebel captain, who was laughing harder than anyone, leaned over and placed a placating hand on the young trooper’s shoulder. “You have to rise above our joshin’, Henry. There, look at the Yankee-boy, he takes it like a real good sport and gives as good as he gets.”

“
Grab the pistol—
” instructed Captain Shotwell, in an urgent whisper, as Jesse bound up his wound. “—Grab the goddamn pistol, boy, get it to me, I say, while their attention is elsewhere.”

“Sir?” Jesse feigned confusion, though it was evident to Washington across the way that the boy knew exactly what Shotwell was suggesting.

“The gun—
my
gun—you half-witted—” He was stretching his hand toward his Colt lying in the mud where he had dropped it.
“—Give me my gun—”

Jesse glanced up to see the Rebel sergeant watching them, his one good hand on his own pistol, now drawn more than halfway from the leather holster at his side, a snarling smile on his face that was willing,
urging
him to try for the pistol. Jesse kicked the gun out of reach.

“Why you…you goddamned cowardly traitor—what the hell are you doing?”

“Savin’ yer miserable Yankee life,” answered the Rebel captain, slipping his own pistol back into its holster on the horse’s saddle. “You may thank this boy, suh, that we don’t shoot ya all down like the dogs ya are.” He then leaned over and spoke quietly to one of his men, who grinned in agreement and dismounted, coming toward Shotwell with a Bowie knife. Shotwell started to bawl like a baby, until he realized the Rebel was cutting his shoulder straps, not his throat. Next, the Rebel ripped loose the captain’s sash and extracted his sword from its sheath. He put the sash through the sword handle and tied it around Jesse’s narrow waist, laughing whiskey breath into his face as he did so. Then he tossed the shoulder straps to the floor and walked back to his horse.

“Pick them up and wear them,” the Rebel captain told Jesse. “Ya deserve them more than that yellow Yankee dog.” He then yelled something at the top of his lungs, something that might have been the Rebel yell, wheeled his horse around, and galloped off, calling out to the wounded captain as he did so, “Remember ma name and my face, suh, Ah am Captain Preston T. Lightborn, of Forrest’s Regiment, Tennessee Cavalry, under Colonel Nathan B. Forrest. If we meet again, suh, you will not be given a second chance!”

“Let me know when yaw reach yaw tenth birthday, boy!” called out the young horseman, following his comrades, his horse’s hooves churning up mud into Jesse’s face and spattering his private’s blouse. “I’ll send yaw yaw first pair a long pants!”
His
Rebel yell was even louder and more manic than his commander’s, as he spurred away after his comrades.

“The boy’s a dirty little coward, sir, a dirty little coward. I could have bagged you a half-dozen Reb cavalry to question, sir, instead this sniveling little coward prevented me from reaching my pistol—kicked the damn thing out of my reach—not only a coward, sir—but a traitor—a damn Reb spy—” Captain Shotwell fell back onto the litter and lay still, his eyes closed, his bulbous chest heaving, rain spattering on his blanket.

Silently chewing his cigar stub and making no effort to hide his disdain, Sherman jerked his head at the two orderlies and they trotted off with the wounded officer. One hour ago, Colonel Buckland had raised the alarm when a message arrived from the picket guard that there had been no one around to relieve them when they came on duty. Sherman, out reconnoitering the ground nearby with Lieutenant Colonel McPherson when this incident was reported to him, had decided to investigate in person.

“Sir, can I speak up?” Lieutenant Washington came forward. Jesse had used the string that held up his own trousers to make a sling for the lieutenant’s wounded arm and now that worthy officer stood before the division commander’s restless horse, blood seeping through his bandage.

“Get to the hospital, Lieutenant, we’ll talk later,” Sherman instructed.

“No sir, begging your pardon. I couldn’t go to the hospital, sir, I couldn’t rest easy if I didn’t tell what happened. The truth is, sir, the boy saved our hides. If it wasn’t for him, we would have ended up prisoners or dead. Cap’in Shotwell is a darn fool, sir. There was already three of us bleeding, Shotwell himself, Atkinson took a ball in the jaw, he was choking to death, you had to see with your own eyes what the boy did, sir, else you would’na believed it possible, and I was nursing this shoulder, when Shotwell tried to go for his gun. If he’d got one of the Rebs or more especially the captain himself, they would have done for the whole damn lot of us. The boy showed courage, sir, a different kinda courage than that darn fool Shotwell could ever understand. He don’t care a darn for his men. The boy read the situation. He saw the same thing I saw, sir, that the captain was one of those Southrons who appreciates honor in his foe. Do you know what I mean, sir?”