Mississippi, and propagates an error which may pollute the current of
history.

We live in an age of progress, and it requires a progressive age to
produce a military critic who should discover that a soldier deserved
no credit for availing himself of the accidents of ground. One half of
the science of war consists in teaching how to take advantage of the
irregularities of the ground on which military movements are to be
made, or defensive works are to be constructed. The highest reputation
of Generals in every age has resulted in their skill in military
topography. The most marked compliment ever paid by one General to
another, was that of Napoleon to Cæsar, when he halted on his
encampments without a previous reconnoisance. But the regiment did not
rally as stated, for it had not been dispersed; neither was their
movement the result of their own necessity, or adopted for their own
safety. They were marching by the flank, on the side of a ravine, when
the enemy's cavalry were seen approaching. They could have halted on
the side of the ravine, which was so precipitous that they would have
been there as sate from a charge as if they had been in Mississippi.
They could have gone down into the ravine, and have been concealed
even from the sight of the cavalry. The necessity was to prevent the
cavalry from passing to the rear of our line of battle, where they
might have attacked, and probably carried our batteries, which were
then without the protection of our infantry escort. It was our
country's necessity and not our own which prompted the service there
performed. For this the regiment was formed square across the plain,
and there stood motionless as a rock, silent as death, and eager as a
greyhound for the approach of the enemy, at least nine times,
numerically, their superiors. Some Indiana troops were formed on the
brink of the ravine with the right flank of the Mississippi Regiment,