“I thought our guns were going to silence their guns?” Maitland observed cattily.

Swynyard ignored the comment. “It’ll be a plug-ugly infantry fight, gentlemen,” he said grimly. “We’ll have plenty of artillery, though, and the enemy’s coming uphill. The side that stands longest and shoots best will win, and that’s going to be us.” He dismissed the officers, but put an arm into Starbuck’s arm and led him northward toward the woods. “The Legion’s got good men,” he told Starbuck, “but I don’t trust Maitland. He’s yellow. Thinks his white skin is too precious to be punctured by a bullet. That’s why your men are right beside his. If Maitland starts to go back, Nate, step in.”

“Step in?” Starbuck asked. “He outranks me.”

“Just step in. Hold the Legion for me till I can get rid of Maitland. May not happen, Nate. Or maybe the good Lord will see fit to take me home tomorrow, in which case Maitland takes over the whole brigade, and God help these men if he does.” Swynyard stopped and stared down the long slope. “Just have to shoot them down, Nate, just shoot them down.” He said it sadly, imagining the blue masses that would swarm up the hill next morning.

But Swynyard was wrong. The Yankees might well be planning to cross the river and climb the hill, but first they intended a flank attack and late that afternoon, as Starbuck’s men were mauling the trees and raiding the remnants of rail fences for their camp fires, a mass of Northern troops crossed the creek by a bridge that lay well north of the rebel positions. The Yankees climbed to the higher ground and kept marching westward until they reached the Hagerstown Pike and there they camped. Rebel pickets fired at the Yankees, and every now and then the sound of rifles crackled angry and loud as Northern skirmishers tried to drive the Confederates away, but neither side made any attempt to attack the other’s main body. General Lee watched the Federal troops making their camp to his north and their presence told him what to expect in the morning. The Yankees would march south in what promised to be a massive attack straight down the Hagerstown Pike.

But that assault, Lee knew, would be only one attack. Others would come across the creek, and maybe other Yankees would try to curl around his southern flank. So be it. He did not have the men to guard every river crossing, only to hold the high ground around the village and the Dunker church. But at least his army was growing. Two-thirds of Jackson’s men had come from Harper’s Ferry and the remaining third, once they had finished sending the Federal prisoners south to the camps, would hurry toward him the next day. He would start the battle with less than thirty thousand men and he knew that more than twice that number were readying themselves to attack him, but if McClellan was not fought here then he would have to be fought in Virginia. It was better here, Lee decided, where the Yankees would have to climb the hills from the creek into the face of his guns.