We remained out in the rifle pits till this evening, when we
were relieved by the Fifteenth Iowa. John Esher was shot through the face this
afternoon by a rebel sharpshooter. The shot was fired through one of the “portholes”
under the head log of our defenses, where he was at the time loading his gun.
The ball struck his jaw bone, knocking out some of his teeth, but it is thought
that he will recover.1 There is no news from Richmond.
_______________
1 Esher said to me, “I'm going to see what I'm
shooting at,” and walked up to peer through the porthole, when all of a sudden
a ball crashed in, knocking him down, and as he fell back his heels kicked up.
He was right by my side when he was struck and as he fell he cried out. “Oh,
boys, I'm killed!” After he recovered, we laughed a great deal over it, at his
expense, for he thought that now he was really Killed. But although Esher
recovered from the wound, yet he was deformed for life. His head was drawn down
on the side of the wound, since the cords of the neck were shorter than on the
other side. — A. G. D.
Source: Alexander G. Downing, Edited by Olynthus B.,
Clark, Downing’s Civil War Diary, p. 201
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