Life on the Mississippi - Mark Twain [88]
That fight was an awful sight. General Cheatham made his men strip their coats off and throw them in a pile, and said, “Now follow me to hell or victory!” I heard him say that from the pilothouse; and then he galloped in, at the head of his troops. Old General Pillow, with his white hair, mounted on a white horse, sailed in, too, leading his troops as lively as a boy. By and by the Federals chased the rebels back, and here they came!—tearing along, everybody for himself and Devil take the hindmost!—and down under the bank they scrambled, and took shelter. I was sitting with my legs hanging out of the pilothouse window. All at once I noticed a whizzing sound passing my ear. Judged it was a bullet. I didn’t stop to think about anything, I just tilted over backward and landed on the floor, and stayed there. The balls came booming around. Three cannon balls went through the chimney; one ball took off the corner of the pilothouse; shells were screaming and bursting all around. Mighty warm times—I wished I hadn’t come. I lay there on the pilothouse floor, while the shots came faster and faster. I crept in behind the big stove, in the middle of the pilothouse. Presently a minie ball came through the stove, and just grazed my head, and cut my hat. I judged it was time to go away from there. The captain was on the roof with a red-headed major from Memphis—a fine-looking man. I heard him say he wanted to leave here, but “that pilot is killed.” I crept over to the starboard side to pull the bell to set her back; raised up and took a look, and I saw about fifteen shot holes through the windowpanes; had come so lively I hadn’t noticed them. I glanced out on the water, and the spattering shot were like a hailstorm. I thought best to get out of that place. I went down the pilothouse guy, headfirst—not feet first but headfirst—slid down—before I struck the deck, the captain said we must leave there. So I climbed up the guy and got on the floor again. About that time, they collared my partner and were bringing him up to the pilothouse between two soldiers. Somebody had said I was killed. He put his head in and saw me on the floor reaching for the backing bells. He said, “Oh, hell, he ain’t shot,” and jerked away from the men who had him by the collar, and ran below. We were there until three o’clock in the afternoon, and then got away all right.
The next time I saw my partner, I said, “Now, come out, be honest, and tell me the truth. Where did you go when you went to see that battle?” He says, “I went down in the hold.”
All through that fight I was scared nearly to death. I hardly knew anything, I was so frightened; but you see, nobody knew that but me. Next day General Polk sent for me, and praised me for my bravery and gallant conduct. I never said anything, I let it go at that. I judged it wasn’t so, but it was not for me to contradict a general officer.
Pretty soon after that I was sick, and used up, and had to go off to the Hot Springs. When there, I got a good many letters from commanders saying they wanted me to come back. I declined, because I wasn’t well enough or strong enough; but I kept still, and kept the reputation I had made.
A plain story, straightforwardly told; but Mumford told me that that pilot had “gilded that scare of his, in spots”; that his subsequent career in the war was proof of it.
We struck down through the chute of Island No. 8, and I went below and fell into conversation with a passenger, a handsome man, with easy carriage and an intelligent face. We were approaching Island No. 10, a place so celebrated during the war. This gentleman’s home was on the main shore in its neighborhood. I had some talk with him about the war times; but presently the discourse fell upon “feuds,” for in no part of the South has the vendetta flourished more briskly, or held out longer between warring families, than in this particular