,
evidently some friend that he had known at West Point or in the regular
army. This officer leaned forward and said in an earnest manner, "Whose
cavalry is this?" Kilpatrick told him it was his. I then heard him say,
"General Porter," meaning Fitz-John Porter, "is fearful that there is
going to be a break. I wish you would deploy your cavalry in the rear of
our lines and do not allow a man to pass through unless he is wounded."
Whereupon Kilpatrick gave the order "By fours, left about wheel," and
moved the regiment left in front and then into line, with the men at
intervals in close skirmishing order. We no sooner had gotten into
line and advanced toward the woods in which Fitz-John Porter's corps
was, on the left of our army, than I heard the most terrific crashes of
artillery and then the rattle of musketry. This was Longstreet's corps
opening on us. In a few moments Porter's men came swarming out of the
woods. After them came the Confederates, with their batteries close up
with their infantry. Several times I saw our regiments rally, but they
were completely overpowered and swept away, resistance being apparently
impossible. It was this attack of Longstreet's with a superior force
which Porter had predicted and which General Pope had refused to believe
possible, which resulted in the crushing of the left of our army, and
the defeat of General Pope at the second battle of Bull Run.

[Illustration: MAJOR GENERAL JUDSON KILPATRICK]

Having overheard the anxious message of General Porter's staff-officer to
Colonel Kilpatrick, I assumed that it was my duty to carry out
instructions literally, that is, I tried to stop every man I could from
passing to the rear. When all our guns at that part of the field had
limbered up, except those of one regular battery, I met a squad of men
with a major making for the rear. I rode up and told them to go and lie
down beside this battery until I could get more men to act as a support.
He demurred, stating that it was no use, and at my remonstrating with
him, one of his men, an Irishman, spoke up and said, "Who the divil are
you to be talking that way to our officer?" However, the major and his
squad went with me and lay down alongside the battery, when I started
for another squad. I had gone but a few rods when the major got up and
went over the hill with his men. In the light of what I learned
afterwards, the major and those who had seen fighting on the Peninsula
had a better idea of