ng on the
road; the Seventh to the left, its right on the road. The First formed
on the right of the Sixth, the Fifth on the left of the Seventh. The
time for action had come. It was necessary to do one thing or the other.
No troops in the world could have been held there long without going
forward or back.

Custer, accompanied by a single aide, rode along the line from left to
right, encouraging the men by his example and his words. Passing the
road he dashed out in front of the Sixth and taking his hat in his hand,
waved it around his head and called for three cheers. The cheers were
given and then the line rushed forward. Custer quickly changed to the
flank but, though thus rashly exposing himself, with his usual luck, he
escaped without a scratch. Christiancy, his aide, had his horse shot
under him and received two wounds, one a severe one through the thigh.

Gregg's men permitted the Michigan men to pass. In a moment the
Wolverines and the Palmetto men were face to face and the lines very
close. Michigan had Spencers. South Carolina, Enfields. Spencers were
repeaters, Enfields were not. The din of the battle was deafening. It
was heard distinctly back where the infantry was formed and where Grant,
Meade, and Sheridan anxiously were awaiting the event. The Spencers were
used with deadly effect. The South Carolinians, the most stubborn foe
Michigan ever had met in battle, refused to yield and filled the air
with lead from the muzzles of their long range guns as fast as they
could load and fire. The sound of their bullets sweeping the undergrowth
was like that of hot flames crackling through dry timber. The trees were
riddled. Men began to fall. Miles Hutchinson, son of my father's
foreman, who had left home to go to the war with me, fell dead at my
side. "Jimmie" Brown, the handsome and brave sergeant, dropped his piece
and falling, died instantly. Corporal Seth Carey met his fate like a
soldier, his face to the foe. A member of troop H, shot through the
breast, staggered toward me and exclaiming, "Oh, major," fell literally
into my arms, leaving the stains of his blood upon my breast.

This strenuous work did not last long. It may have been ten minutes from
start to finish--from the time we received the South Carolinians' fire
till the worst of it was over and they began to give way. But, in that
brief ten minutes eighteen brave men in the ranks of the Sixth Michigan
had been either killed or mortally wounded; and