Ramseur desperately tried to hold to his tenuous position, and immediately ordered Brig. Gen. Cullen A. Battle’s Brigade of Alabamians to the left to form a line parallel to the attackers. Battle’s Brigade, which had performed admirably at Winchester, found itself supporting Major Thomas J. Kirkpatrick’s Amherst Battery (part of Major William Nelson’s artillery battalion) and the only obstacle between Crook’s Federals and the Confederate left. As the attackers rushed onward, the gunners of the Amherst Battery fired canister into their foe, and Battle — wielding a cedar fence stake — urged his men to stand firm and shouted, ‘Close up! On your life!’

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Even though they were facing a hopeless situation, Battle’s Brigade put up enough resistance to gain Crook’s attention. ‘On a prominent ridge about one mile from the base of the mountain,’ Crook penned in his after-action report, ‘where one of their main batteries was posted, the enemy made his most stubborn stand.’ Regardless of that tenacity, however, Crook claimed his men soon drove the Confederates ‘pell-mell from their position.’

As the men of Hayes’ and Thoburn’s divisions pounded the Confederate left, Ramseur sent Brig. Gen. William R. Cox’s Brigade to help Battle. In the confusion of the fight, however, Cox got off track and left the Alabamians to fend for themselves. When the pressure of Crook’s attack became too much to endure, the Alabamians and the guns they supported withdrew from the field.

After Battle’s men pulled out, Grimes’ Brigade of North Carolina Tar Heels was next to bear the weight of the attack. Without orders, Grimes, who was already taking fire to his front, took two of his regiments and faced them to the west to meet Crook’s attack. Grimes’ men fought ably according to most accounts, but fire from the front, left and rear compelled him to fall back. The rout was on. Small pockets of Confederates desperately tried to defend their positions but to no avail.

The regimental historian of the 116th Ohio recorded that they had been’stopped at several points by small bodies of the enemy, but such stops were only momentary, for as soon as a little sharp firing was heard at any point, the men would of their own accord, concentrate there, and in a few moments would be rushing on again.’ Colonel George Wells, commanding Thoburn’s 1st Brigade in the fight, echoed, ‘As long as a rebel was in sight they chased him, and whenever they heard heavy firing and saw that our advance was checked they gathered like bees.’

As darkness began to cloak the field, Early’s men withdrew from their positions, and he later admitted he was quite displeased that the fight was a ‘very brief contest’ and that his men ‘retired in considerable confusion.’ The Southern commander believed that the troops could have provided better resistance to Crook’s flank attack, but as he explained to General Robert E. Lee: ‘In the affair at Fisher’s Hill the cavalry gave way, but it was flanked. This could have been remedied if the troops had remained steady, but a panic seized them at the idea of being flanked, and without being defeated they broke, many of them fleeing shamefully.’ A Virginian agreed with Early, expressing shame that, as he put it, ‘we had disgraced ourselves.’

Battlefield deaths were minimal at Fisher’s Hill; only 30 of Early’s men and 51 of Sheridan’s were killed. Early, however, did have his ranks greatly depleted, with nearly 1,000 of his men captured and more than 200 wounded. Sheridan had slightly more than 400 wounded, but he had more men than Early and could afford the loss. Crook lost 162 men in the fight, about 30 percent of the Federal casualties.

Sheridan’s army pursued the Confederates south past Woodstock after the battle, but were unable to put the finishing touches on Early. ‘Our success was very great,’ lamented Sheridan, ‘yet I had anticipated results still more pregnant.’ Early had slipped away once again. Following his second defeat in three days Early retreated south and by month’s end was near Waynesboro.

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