As we reached the crest, a never to be forgotten scene
burst upon us. A great basin lay before us full of smoke and fire, and literally
swarming with riderless horses and fighting, fleeing and pursuing men. The air
was saturated with the sulphurous fumes of battle and was ringing with the shouts
and groans of the combatants. The wild cries of charging lines, the rattle of
musketry, the booming of orchestral accompaniments of a scene like very hell itself --
as terrific as the warring of Milton's fiends in Pandemonium. The whole of Sickles
corps, and many other troops which had been sent to its support in that ill-chosen
hollow, were being slaughtered and driven before the impetuous advance of Longstreet.
Captain Porter Farley -- "Reminiscences of the 140th New York Volunteers"
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