proper orders to each conjuncture as it should arise. CHAPTER XV ANTIETAM: THE FIGHT ON THE RIGHT Hooker astir early--The field near the Dunker Church--Artillery combat--Positions of Hooker's divisions--Rocky ledges in the woods--Advance of Doubleday through Miller's orchard and garden--Enemy's fire from West Wood--They rush for Gibbon's battery--Repulse--Advance of Patrick's brigade--Fierce fighting along the turnpike--Ricketts's division in the East Wood--Fresh effort of Meade's division in the centre--A lull in the battle--Mansfield's corps reaches the field--Conflicting opinions as to the hour--Mansfield killed--Command devolves on Williams--Advance through East Wood--Hooker wounded--Meade in command of the corps--It withdraws--Greene's division reaches the Dunker Church--Crawford's in the East Wood--Terrible effects on the Confederates--Sumner's corps coming up--Its formation--It moves on the Dunker Church from the east--Divergence of the divisions--Sedgwick's passes to right of Greene--Attacked in flank and broken--Rallying at the Poffenberger hill--Twelfth Corps hanging on near the church--Advance of French's division--Richardson follows later--Bloody Lane reached--The Piper house--Franklin's corps arrives--Charge of Irwin's brigade. Before the break of day on Wednesday the 17th, it was discovered that Doubleday's division of Hooker's corps lay exposed to artillery fire from batteries of the enemy supposed to be in position on their front and right. In rousing the men and changing their place, the stillness of the night was so far broken that the Confederates believed they were advancing to attack, and a lively cannonade and picket firing anticipated the dawn. [Footnote: R. R. Dawes, Service with the Sixth Wisconsin, p. 87.] The chance for getting their breakfast was thus destroyed, and Hooker prepared his whole command for action as soon as it should be light enough to move. Looking south from the Poffenberger farm along the turnpike, he then saw a gently rolling landscape of which the commanding point was the Dunker Church, whose white brick walls appeared on the right of the road, backed by the foliage of the West Wood, which came toward him filling a hollow that ran parallel to the turnpike, with a single row of fields between. On the east side of the turnpike was the Miller house, with its barn and stack-yard across the road to the right, and beyond these the ground dipped into a little depression. Still further on was seen a large cornfield between the East Wood and the turnpike, rising again to the higher level, and Hooker noticed the glint from a long line of bayonets beyond the corn, struck by the first rays of the rising sun. There was, however, another little hollow at the further side of the cornfield, which could not be seen from Hooker's position; and on the farthest ridge, near the church and extending across the turnpike toward the East Wood, were the Confederate lines, partly sheltered by piles of rails