Colonel Rodgers rode into the ditch that fronted the works, followed by the head of his column; and as the others came up, they scattered around either side. The right wing of the Second Texas was met by the determined front of the Forty-Third Ohio, and a hand-to-hand conflict followed. The onset of the Texans was made with such reckless desperation that the Ohioans were put to flight, leaving one-half of their number killed or wounded on the ground, their brave colonel, J. Kirby-Smith, being among the slain. On the north side of “Robinette” the left wing of the Second Texas came in contact with the Sixty-Third Ohio; and, after a bloody contest at close quarters, the blue column was driven back at the point of the bayonet, leaving fifty-three per cent of its number on the ground. The section of light artillery at that point made its escape to the Union rear. While these bloody conflicts were taking place on both flanks of the fort, Colonel Rodgers climbed upon the parapet and planted the flag of his regiment in triumph at its top. The men who had followed him leaped fearlessly down inside the fort, and, with others who had crawled through the embrasures, unexpectedly engaged the cannoneers in a hand-to-hand conflict. The fight was short and fierce, and thirteen out of twenty-six men of the First U. S. Infantry who manned the guns of the fort were slain, and a number of others, including the commander, Lieutenant Robinette, were wounded. Thus was the fort captured and silenced; but “Fort Williams” continued to pour its deadly fire into the gray, thinned ranks and into the struggling mass of gray and blue, while the Forty-Seventh Illinois, from its elevated position along the railroad, swept the parapets of “Robinette” with long-range rifles as the Confederates scaled them. Meantime a fearful hand-to-hand fight was raging in the heart of the town--around the railroad depot, the Tishomingo Hotel, the Corinth House, and even in the yard around the headquarters of General Rosecrans, the old Duncan homestead. The fighting was furious, but the heavy reserves of fresh troops which the Union commander had massed in the central and the southwest portions of the town met the torn and half-exhausted columns of the Confederates and literally plucked victory from defeat. The victorious reserves of the enemy marched upon “Robinette” from the town, Gen. David S. Stanley advancing from the southeast with the reformed Forty-Third Ohio and two fresh regiments.