A second brigade follows the first, to attack and be slaughtered, but some of the men, escaping the ditch and surviving the tempest of death, press on and upward. Some climb the embankment. Three battle flags are planted on its top and are instantly pulled down. An officer with his hand on the muzzle of a cannon demands surrender of the fort and is immediately blown to pieces. Others also demand it and are felled. A dozen courageous men get into the bastion, are surrounded and disarmed. Two hundred prisoners are taken and sent to the rear. The garrison has helpers in the defence and bravely they stand or move on steady feet. They are sons of Michigan and Massachusetts.[42] Hopeless of success the storming party retreat, and the defenders shout, “Hurrah! hurrah! hurrah!” Distant soldiers listen and are glad, for the Union is triumphant. The star-spangled banner still floats in the air where it was unfurled when the sun rose.[43] The ground between the fort and the crest is strewn with the slain and with wounded men crying for help. The ditch is filled with them almost to the brim. Burnside tenders a flag of truce and it is accepted. Now bury the dead and care for the wounded. Bring up the empty ambulances and send them away full to the hospitals. See to the bodies of Confederate soldiers piled one upon another. Some are dead and some are dying. Others are injured but will survive. Pull away the corpses--ruddy-faced in battle a little while ago, now white-faced in death. Let the living men who are lying underneath have fresh air. How glad they are to breathe freely again and to be in the sunlight! Draw them forth, whether they are silent or groaning. What is that? One of them speaks. “O God,” he cries, “this is horrible.”[44] And so it is. Let us depart from the scene. Finally, call the roll, and count the losses of the contending parties. The difference in numbers of their killed and wounded resembles that of the battle of New Orleans, between such losses in the armies of Jackson and Packenham. Of the United States soldiers, there were eight killed and five wounded.[45] Of the Confederate officers and men, there were probably seven hundred killed and wounded and three hundred taken prisoners. The stands of arms captured were to be counted by the thousands. On both sides the military conduct was heroic. Gen. Burnside said: “The gallantry of this defence has not been excelled during the war.” He congratulated the division of Gen. Ferrero, particularly Lieut. Benjamin and the officers and men with him in the fort, upon “this great achievement.” Pollard (Confederate) says: “Never, excepting at Gettysburg, was there in the history of the war, a disaster adorned with the glory of such devout courage as Longstreet’s repulse at Knoxville.”