1 Bucks County
Intelligencer, Rifles Talk Death At Fair Oaks. August 30, 1961 Page B-TWO
Col. 6 1
Rifles Talk
Death At
Fair Oaks
Fair Oaks Virginia: 1862.
The men in grey vaulted over
the tiny hill. They came running
with an urgency holding their
rifles high and sloshing their
boots in the mud.
Then, the blistering cannonad-
ing thundred. The battle for
Fair Oaks was underway.
Keep Heads Low
The men in grey hit the damp
earth quickly and took positions
on the slope of the hill. There
weren’t more than fifteen, but
they kept their heads low.
They groped for safety on the
hill’s slope and dug in firmly,
then let their rifles speak. Red
and orange fire flashed from the
mouths of their guns.
They groped for safety on the
hill’s slope and dug in firmly,
then let their rifles speak. Red
and orange fire flashed from the
mouths of their guns.
They concentrated their fire
on a small group of Union
soldiers below, volunteers of the
104th Pennsylvania Regiment.
The Shock
The 104th was the first at Fair
Oaks to receive the overwhelm-
ing shock of the enemy. It was
drawn up in advance of the rest
of the division and was the only
regiment on the right of the Wil-
liamsburg road within sight when
the action began.
Union soldiers stood up firmly
to the bloody work, many as
cheerful as on parade. Its first
line had been dressed in a clear
up furrow, where cartridge pa-
pers lay by the basket full. The
right rested on the edge of the
woods.
Companies A and B made a
move to prevent the enemy as it
tried to outflank the 104th on the
right. It succeeded.
Fix Bayonets”
The cry of “fix bayonets” rung
feverishly throughout the area.
The cannons boomed death from
their ugly mouths.
“Charge bayonets! Forward,
double-quick! March!”, the cry
of Major Gries, of the 104th, was
heard.
Union soldiers sprang forward
toward the enemy with a tre-
mendous yell.
The hill where rebel forces had
trapped the small group of Union
soldiers was clear now. The men
in grey had barreled down the
slope, overtaken the small trench
and slaughtered its occupants.
They lay dead, clutching at the
dirt.
Rushing Feet
The men in grey joined the
fighting in the open field on mud-
caked land where dwarf bushes
crumbled quickly under the rush-
ing feet of men in combat.
Flag bearers for the 104th car-
ried their regimental colors over
a fence to a clearing where the
enemy opened fired, stuck them in
the ground and lay by them.
It staggered the enemy and
open fire kept them in check,
But, no reinforcements had ar-
rived by the time three hours
elapsed and one-third of the Un-
ion soldiers had fallen.
The regiment had to retreat!—
but one flag was left sticking in
the ground.
“I’ll Get It”
I’ll get it, yelled Hiram Pur-
cell, a negro sergeant. He stum-
bled toward the clearing. “I’ll
get it.”
He hit the ground hard and
crawled toward the fence amid
the stink of death.
Another soldier joined Purcell
in his valiant effort, but the ser-
geant reached it first. He climb-
ed the wire fence with the colors
in one hand.
A rebel bullet dropped him.
When he got up, shaking with
pain, he handed the flag to an-
other, who retreated quickly. Aid
came for Purcell in a matter of
minutes.
Major Gries received a fatal
wound while engaged in saving
Purcell’s life. Colonel Davis, reg-
imental commander was shot in
the elbow by a rifle ball.
He did not join his troops until
the next day near sunset. The
battlefront was quiet.
The Chaplain
Many of the wounded were in-
debted to Chaplain Gries for tak-
ing them to the rear. When he
heard the regiment was falling
back, he seized three ambu-
lances and hurried them down
the Nine Mile road.
He came out on the Williams-
burg Road, near the Seven Pines
and continued down it to Sav-
age’s Station, through the mud
and crowds of wounded hurrying
to the rear.
“On Monday, hearing that the
rebels had retired in the night
and that our old camp and battle
ground at Fair Oaks was clear,
I started to search for the
wounded,” said Gries. “When I
reached the regiment, adjutant
Hart accompanied me with a fa-
tigue party.
“I got three ambulances for the
wounded and then started back
for the regiment with them. We
just managed to drag ourselves
back to the rifle pits.”
The regiment lay in the woods
until Wednesday, June 4, recup-
erating and reorganizing its shat-
tered ranks. That day, it was or-
dered down to the Chickahominy.
It left the dead behind.