As the noise of battle died away, from away up the run we heard shouts and cheers, at first scarcely audible, then louder and nearer came the cheers, rolling along down the valley of Bull Run in seeming waves of mingled voices, each wave rising higher and more distinct. Messengers mounted on fleet-footed steeds, which that day had become war horses that sniffed the smoke of battle, not "from afar," but on the very field of strife and carnage, hurried down the lines along the run, shouting, "Victory! victory! victory; complete victory!" Each detachment took up the joyous shout and wafted it on to those below. From Mitchell's Ford, just above us, where Bonham and his South Carolinians on the 18th held the fort and let fly the dogs of war on the enemy's flank, Longstreet's Brigade caught the inspiration and raised its first "Rebel yell" that made the welkin ring, and sent the glad and glorious news on down to Jones and his men at McLean's Ford, and quickly came the echo back in ringing peals. Then details of the victory began to come in. The enemy was completely routed; many prisoners and many guns had been captured. Then it came that "Long Tom," a noted Yankee cannon, was captured; then that Sherman's Battery, the crack artillery of the United States Army, was taken; then that Rickett's, another noted battery, and also Griffin's, had all been captured. The first mentioned battery, with Capt. W. T. Sherman in command, won laurels in the Mexican War, and had been known ever since as Sherman's Battery. Longstreet at once led his brigade forward into the open field, at the farther side of which was a redoubt with abattis in front, where had been stationed the Yankee guns that shelled us all day. How different were our feelings now from what they would have been if we had entered this field during the day, and been met by a shower of shot, shell, grape and canister! Now, we were without fear, exultant and in high spirits; before, we would have been rent with missiles of death, great gaps would have been torn through the column of regiments, and many would have been left wounded and dead on the field. The brigade marched on into the woods beyond the field towards Centreville, bivouacking on the ground of a Yankee camp, which the enemy had just abandoned, leaving evidences of hasty departure; coffee, sugar, hard-tack, and many articles of food and equipments lay scattered around. Some of the men shouted, "Don't eat them things, they may be pizened." Later on the "pizen" was not for a moment considered when a Yankee camp was raided, and when many a hungry Rebel ate to his full once more.