Melee at the Fence

Melee at the Fence. Mill Springs Battlefield. Colonel Speed Fry, commanding the 4th Kentucky Infantry (U.S.), pulled his men back to a split-rail fence on a hill east of the road. As the Union soldiers deployed, the Confederates regrouped in the ravine. They had learned that Confederate General Felix K. Zollicoffer was dead. After this quiet interlude came the fiercest fighting of the battle, bloody and hand-to-hand. The Confederates tried desperately to push the Union soldiers off the fence and the ridge, but they refused to be moved.

The Federals Fall Back , The 15th Mississippi drove the Federals back to the main line and then advanced by lying flat and firing, wheeling on their backs and loading, rising and running forward ten steps, and again dropping and firing. They kept it up until they drove the 10th Indiana from the field.

The Confederates Give Way , The Confederates advanced with fixed bayonets on the 2nd Minnesota. The regiment responded with a horrific yell and for the next forty minutes poured volley after volley of shot at them. When the Confederates finally gave way they were so close to the Federals, with nothing but the fence between them, that some of the men of the 2nd Minnesota pulled the Confederates' guns out of their hands.

Inset for main photo: We were so close on them that one of the men had his beard and whiskers singed by the fire of one of the muskets... another caught hold of one of their muskets and jerked it through the fence the two stood and fired at each other, their muskets crossing; both fell dead. , Col. Horatio P. Van Cleve, 2nd Minnesota U.S. , Left: Colonel Speed Fry, 4th Kentucky Infantry (U.S.)