The Christmas Victory

The days seemed to fly by. Every day was filled with activity. A few days were spent marching to their next objective, the little town of New Hope Church, in Orange, Virginia, where they were to join forces with Colonel John Taylor's pickets. As they marched, they sang several songs like “Rally Round the Flag” and “Battle Hymn of the Republic.” Finally they reached their objective, found Taylor's pickets and joined forces with them as planned. The combined force attempted to move forward but found it difficult due to the particular undergrowth in that area. But they managed to advance far enough to engage the confederate forces.

He had tried to read something from the Bible every day, as the young chaplain had advised him, but some days, there just wasn't time. But he always prayed and he faced each battle with his renewed confidence of his future estate.

Once, when there was a lull in the fighting, he was asked: “Hey, Lieutenant, Sir, aint you afraid?”

“Not at all” he would reply. “I have my faith in God and Jesus and I know where I'm going if I should happen to die.”

“Hey, fellows, the Lieutenant's got religion.”

“So, you've become a Jesus follower, Sir?”

“Well, I guess you could say I have. All I know is the Chaplain said if we pray to Him, we go to heaven when we die.”

“So only Jesus believers go to heaven? What about the Buddhists, Muslims and followers of other faiths?”

“Aw, you're just using that for an excuse, Rick.”

“Come on, fellows. Let's not argue about religion. We have a war to fight.”

“But aren't you afraid of getting' hit? I wonder what it feels like. Probably hurts like hell.”

“What what feels like?”

“Being hit by a bullet.”

“Of course I'm afraid of being hit,” Charles answered. “It probably would hurt like hell, but I try not to think about it.”

But, he was soon to learn what it felt like. It happened that Friday, the 27^th of November, 1863. He decided to lead his Battery further forward, although the going was tough due to the underbrush. He managed to get his group a few feet closer, and then decided to dig in there. They took cover behind the bushes and trees that were there and kept firing. The battle was going well at first. The rebels were being driven back by the barrage of union fire. Then, he ran out of ammunition and noticed that several of his men had stopped firing as well. He yelled to the supply sergeant “Hey Joe, pass us some more ammo up here.”

“Sorry, Sir, that's all we have.”

“Are you sure, Joe? There must be more.” He decided to go and look for himself. But as he moved out from behind the bush where he was hiding, a confederate bullet hit him in the shoulder. He felt the sting as it entered his body and ricocheted down part of his spine. He had never known such pain, even when he had had the Typhoid fever. He fell to the ground screaming.

The men went crazy. “The Lieutenant's down!”

“Hold your fire.”

One of the men raised up a white handkerchief on his rifle and the fighting stopped.

“He seems to be hurt bad. Better take him to the nearest field hospital.”

******

The next thing he knew, he was lying on stretcher in the hospital, with a doctor bending over him.