Existing comment:
Fleeing for Their Lives
8:30 a.m. - 5:00 p.m. July 9, 1864
Distressed that their main escape route had been burned, the stranded Federal skirmishers fought on as they faced periodic Confederate attacks. Late in the afternoon, they gradually fell back towards the Baltimore & Ohio bridge.
About 5:00 p.m., they noticed their compatriots retreating across the Gambrill Mill property toward the Baltimore Pike and fled across the railroad bridge to join them. The skirmishers had protected the Union center and the escape route toward Baltimore. "Your people," Maj. Gen. Lew Wallace wrote 1st Lt. George E. Davis, "held their position with great tenacity."
... we kept together and crossed the railroad bridge, stepping upon the ties, there being no floor. The enemy were at our heels, and before we could get away...[took some] prisoners. One man fell through the bridge to the river, forty feet below, and was taken to Andersonville.
-- 1st Lt. George E. Davis |