For all their pride and discipline, the 5th New York could take no more. With his comrades in Company G falling all around him, Davenport saw the panicked recruits take to their heels: 'And then what was left of the Regiment broke and ran for their lives — the Rebels after us, yelling like fiends.' Christian Neuber of Company F admitted, '[it was] every man for himself, what was left of us.' Neuber's captain, George Hager, lay dead on the line in his bloodstained finery, 'a bully looking corpse,' true to his own prediction.

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'I saw my comrades dropping on all sides,' Davenport recalled, 'canteens struck and flying to pieces, haversacks cut off, rifles knocked to pieces; it was a perfect hail of bullets.' Hit in the left shoulder, Andrew Coats 'fell where we stood in line of battle. Just as I fell our Regiment was driven back, and I saw Sergeant Joseph Gates reel and fall, his head and face covered with blood. The Confederates were charging over us then.'

Some men refused to retreat. Brawny, 6-foot-3-inch 1st. Sgt. William McDowell of Company G, a former New York City fireman, was bleeding from a wound in the torso but kept his place, glaring defiantly at the advancing enemy until killed by a bullet in the forehead. Sergeant Phil Wilson also stood his ground. He shot one charging foeman, then reloaded and took aim at a sword-waving officer who was shouting, 'Kill every Yankee you can find!' Before he could pull the trigger, Wilson crumpled, his right knee shattered.

As the line disintegrated, a knot of desperate men clustered around the regimental colors, determined that the precious banners should not fall into Rebel hands. Color Sergeant Andrew Allison, a British army veteran who carried the Stars and Stripes, was shot in the wrist. He passed the flag to another man and started for safety, but then turned back, retook the flag and was immediately shot dead. The banner was raised, shot down, and raised again. Ultimately Corporal Lucien B. Swain bore its bloody folds and splintered staff to safety.

The guardian of the blue regimental colors, 22-year-old Irish-born Sergeant Francis Spelman, was shot in the left arm and fell to the ground. Two soldiers tried to get him off the field, but he spurned their aid and stood again, flag in hand. Moments later, a bullet ripped the length of his right arm to the shoulder and another shot tore through his neck. A group of Southern soldiers made a run for the stricken sergeant, yelling at him to surrender the trophy. In desperate agony, Spelman cried out to Sergeant William Chambers, like the fallen Allison a veteran of the British army, 'For God's sake don't let them take my flag!' Chambers responded, 'I won't if I can help it!' and seized the flag from the stricken bearer. At that moment another bullet slammed into Spelman's head, nearly severing his lower jaw from his face. All but one of the regimental color guard lay dead or dying, but the banners were saved.

The fight now became a hopeless butchery. Continued resistance meant death or capture; as wounded Private Richard Ackerman put it, 'Our men had to run like dogs.' With the Confederates blazing away at their backs, dozens of fleeing Zouaves were sent sprawling in the mad dash for Young's Branch, or fell on the open slope that lay beyond the stream.

Forty-year-old Private Robert Munnie was in full stride when bullets struck him in the buttocks, both legs and neck. Turning to fire one more round, Corporal Theodore Hart, a prewar accountant serving in the ranks of Company A, was shot in the face, the bullet ripping through his head and exiting from his neck. Both sides of Hart's jaw were broken, his palate destroyed and most of his teeth shattered. One tooth was propelled upward and passed out of his right eye.

As the demoralized 'red legs' splashed through the waters of Young's Branch, Private Dennis Guinan tried to get off one last shot. Before he could aim his musket it was shot from his hands, the blow bowling him over into the creek where he struck his head on a submerged log and was knocked unconscious. George Dobiecki of Company E, at 5 foot 312 inches one of the shortest men in the regiment, was bleeding from a buckshot in his right calf when he caught his foot on some submerged debris and slammed into the far bank of Young's Branch. Gasping from a rupture of his left groin, Dobiecki was half dragged by two stalwart comrades up the bullet-swept slope. New recruits William Walker and William Alexander, file mates in the ranks of Company H, were crossing Young's Branch amid a group of retreating 10th New York men when Walker collapsed from a wound in his right leg. As he struggled to rise, another round tore through his left thigh. 'Can I help you?' Alexander shouted. 'No, I can't stand on my feet,' Walker replied. At that moment a Rebel bullet sliced into the calf of Alexander's left leg, and without further ado he limped up the far bank, leaving Walker 'half covered with water.'

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