bstacle
to the right companies, and the ledge would have been somewhat so to the
left companies if Capt. Jordan had not halted his division[9] behind it.
He did this for shelter as the first reason, and because, perceiving there
was no Union force on our left, he knew it was better to have our left
"refused" and hence not so easily "flanked" by the enemy. (See map.)

Second, and more particularly, I wish to state that on Nov. 9, 1894, Major
Wm. N. Robbins, 4th Alabama, Law's brigade, Hood's division of the
Confederate army, met me by appointment on the field and compared
experiences. We had previously had a long correspondence, in which he
persistently referred to seeing a "hesitating" Union regiment which he
ordered his troops to fire into. The result of this fire was the
dispersion of the Union regiment, whereupon he himself went over towards
his left and attended to affairs nearer the great cornfield. After a great
deal of correspondence with every Union and Confederate regiment that
fought in the vicinity, I could not learn of any Union regiment that was
dispersed, either in Sam Poffenberger's field, or in the "field of stone
piles," nor could the Major determine, by consulting the map alone,
whether it was the Smoketown road or Joe Poffenberger's bypath that was on
his left when the Union regiment dispersed.

In November, '94, when we met on the ground, he was sure that the
Smoketown road was on his left. Hence it was plain that it could be only
the 10th Maine that "dispersed."

Yet we certainly did not!!

For a little while it was a very dark problem; then it dawned upon me that
from where the Major stood he did not see (because of the slight rise of
land between us) the movement of our center and right as we deployed,
while the running to the east of Co's F, C, D and G appeared to him
precisely like a dispersion. I do not know a better illustration of how
difficult it is to see things in battle as they really are happening.

With this vexed question settled, it becomes easier to understand the
movements of other regiments, but these do not concern us now, further
than that there was no other regiment at the time and place for Maj.
Robbins to "disperse."

The result of this extensive correspondence assures me that Gen. Mansfield
was wounded by Maj. Robbins' command, to which I will refer presently.

The reader will readily see how easily we can remember these prominent
features of the field, and how surely