Then ensued for six days a very strange battle. Swarms of Missourians crowded the ravines in the bluffs, behind trees, stones, the walls, fences and chimneys of the houses, and whatever else would afford adequate protection, and kept up an incessant fusillade upon the garrison safely ensconced behind thick banks of earth. When a squad occupying a secure shelter grew tired, or had fired away all its ammunition, it would go back to camp for dinner, when their places would be taken by others eager to share in the noise and excitement and have a story to take back home of the number of Yankees who had fallen under their deadly aim. If all these stories of the men "who had been at Lexington" could have been true, more men would have been sent to the grave than answered Lincoln's call for 500,000 volunteers. The artillerists were as enthusiastic and industrious as the men with "Yager" rifles and shotguns, and banged away with unflagging zeal and corresponding lack of mortality. The walls of the college were badly scarred, but the worst effect was that an occasional shell would take effect among the horses, and drop on the ground carcasses which speedily putrified under the hot sun, and added an unbearable stench to the other hardships of the garrison.
This went on day and night, for the moon was bright, and there was no reason why a man who had powder and shot, and could not get an opportunity at any of the coverts during the day, should not put in pleasantly a few hours at night.
Naturally a rain of bullets, even though they might hit rarer than lightning strokes, had a wearing effect on the garrison.
While this noisy fusillade by the mob of truculent bushwhackers was going on, there were much more soldierly occurrences by the more soldierly men on both sides.
There were sorties and counter-sorties in which the greatest gallantry was displayed on both sides, and in which substantially all the losses occurred. The Secessionists captured a Union flag in one of these, which was balanced by a Secession flag captured by the 1st 111. Cav. Owing to the great superiority of the enemy in numbers, the finality of all these was against the garrison, which was everywhere pushed back from the edges of the bluff, and also from some buildings on the bluffs overlooking the works.