midnight
There was only the churned water , filled with scantlings and torn branches of trees . The rain was falling , a great hissing sweep of rain , and the wind howled beneath the thunder . Steve turned blindly ; he did not know where he was going , but he had a conviction that the river was rising and would come after him . A hundred yards from the water , in the midnight wood , as he hurried over earth that the rain was fast turning into morass , he stumbled over some obstacle and fell . Putting out his hands , they came flat against a dead man 's face . He rose and fled with a screech , southwardly now , in the direction of White Oak Swamp . The Grapevine Bridge being at last rebuilt , Stonewall Jackson 's fourteen brigades crossed the Chickahominy , the movement occupying a great part of the night .