The Battle of Gettysburg 1863

Little Round Top deserted.

Union Line, Morning.

With the first streak of day the hostile camps were astir. Meade was riding along the ridge, giving orders for posting his troops. All of the Twelfth Corps (Geary's division having vacated the position it had held during the night) planted itself still more firmly on the slopes of Culp's Hill, at the extreme right of the line. Wadsworth's division of the First Corps carried the line across the dip toward Cemetery Hill, where the Eleventh Corps had stood since the afternoon before. The Second Corps now fell in along the ridge, at the left of the Eleventh, resting its right on Ziegler's Grove, a little clump of trees hardly worth the name, growing out at the edge of the ridge, and where it bulges out somewhat brokenly. Next to the Second, the Third Corps lay massed behind the ridge, awaiting orders; it now held the left. The First was in reserve. The Fifth and Sixth were nearing the ground, but the pace was telling on the men.

Since this day's battle was to be fought mostly on ground lying to the left (or south) of Hancock's position, it may be well to glance at its general features.

Left Flank Features.

Emmettsburg Road.

Baltimore Turnpike.

Three roads leave Gettysburg by way of Cemetery Hill, for Baltimore, Taneytown, and Emmettsburg, respectively. Those going to Baltimore and Emmettsburg part just as they begin to mount the slope of Cemetery Hill, the first keeping off to the left over the hill, past the Cemetery, and down the opposite slope, or wholly within the Union lines; the last bearing off to the right, along the foot of the hill, or wholly outside the Union lines, though at first within musket range. All of the Union army, now assembled, lay between these two roads except that part posted at the east of the Cemetery and along Culp's Hill. As for these troops, the Baltimore pike passed close by their rear, the line here taking such a sharp backward sweep that the soldiers posted on Culp's Hill actually turned their backs on those forming the front line. While the Baltimore pike cut the Union position in two, or nearly so, the Taneytown road traversed it from end to end, thus greatly facilitating the moving of troops or guns from one part of the line to the other.

Though the Emmettsburg road closely hugged the Cemetery Heights in going out of Gettysburg, its general direction carried it farther and farther off, in proportion as it went on its way; so that, although actually starting from Cemetery Hill, this road, in going two or three miles, eventually struck across to Seminary Ridge, or from the Union right to the enemy's right.[53 - On the night of the first, the Confederate right did not extend much, if any, south of the Hagerstown, or Fairfield, road. As the fresh troops came up they were used in extending the line southward. Anderson's division was the first to move down to Hill's left. It was his skirmishers that first became engaged with Sickles'.] On the morning of the second it therefore formed debatable ground belonging to neither army, though offering a hazardous way still to belated troops, because the enemy had not yet occupied it. This Emmettsburg road was destined to play an important part in the events of this day.

Little Round Top. See Chap. I.

Big Round Top.

Cavalry gone.

After keeping its high level for some distance, Cemetery Ridge falls away for the space of several hundred yards, to rise again by a gradual slope to a rugged, bowlder-strewn, rather thinly wooded hill, called Little Round Top, which finely overlooks all that part of the field. Thus, what Culp's Hill was to the right Little Round Top was to the left of the Union position – at once bulwark and warder. Still beyond Little Round Top, out across a little valley opening a passage between them, rose a much loftier eminence, called Big Round Top. Strangely enough, neither of these commanding hills was occupied in the morning; for though Geary's pickets lay out before Little Round Top all night, they had been called in at daybreak, when the division itself marched off to rejoin its corps at Culp's Hill.[54 - We have seen Meade first planning an attack on that side, which was why he was drawing troops over there. He designed having the Third Corps occupy the position vacated by Geary, however, and so directed.] Most unfortunately, too, the Union cavalry was no longer there to watch the enemy's movements in this quarter and promptly report them at headquarters, as Meade himself had sent off Buford to the rear of the army.[55 - In consequence of his exhausted condition, from incessant marching and fighting, Buford was to be relieved by other troops.] In military phrase, the whole Union left was in the air.

Up to nine in the morning, therefore, this part of the field where Lee designed to strike his most telling blow was anybody's position, so far as the dispositions for its defence are concerned; but at that hour Sickles[56 - General Daniel E. Sickles, commanding the Third Corps.] began deploying the Third Corps toward Round Top. Presently two of his brigades that had been left behind were seen marching down the Emmettsburg road, under fire from the enemy's skirmishers;[57 - The enemy were seeking to mask their movements to the Union left behind these skirmishers.] so giving them sharp notice that this road was no longer open.

Little Round Top, however, still remained unoccupied, save by a handful of men belonging to the Signal Corps of the army.

Dangerous Marching.

The men of the Third Corps watched the march of their comrades in breathless expectation of hearing the enemy's cannon open upon them, or of seeing some body of infantry suddenly pour a withering volley into them from the cover of the woods. But whether the enemy were too much confounded by the very audacity of the thing, or purposely refrained from hostilities that might expose and frustrate their own movements, now in progress under the mask of these very woods, neither of these things happened. These two lost brigades of Kearney's Peninsula veterans simply closed up their ranks, and strode steadily on between the two armies, without quickening their pace. In vain Sickles looked round him for some cavalry to escort them into his lines. There was no longer a single sabre on the ground.

Sherfy Place.

The Cross-road.

Those of Sickles' soldiers who had thrown themselves down upon the grass behind the stacks now breathed more freely at seeing their comrades turn off from the main road, at a short mile out, where the roofs of a farmhouse and out-buildings glistened in the morning sun. This was the Sherfy place – a very paradise in appearance to these fasting and footsore soldiers, to whom its ripening fruits and luxuriant golden wheat, tall and nearly ripe for the sickle, seemed the incarnation of peace and plenty. Many a wistful glance was cast at the peach orchard, as these troops turned the corner where it stood. The cross-road then came straight down toward Little Round Top, so that in a quarter of an hour more the marching column heard the welcome orders to "Halt!" "Stack arms!" "Rest!"

The Enemy covet it.

If the comparison be not too far-fetched, this Sherfy farm and the angle formed by these two divergent roads were destined to be the La Haie Sainte of this Waterloo. One word more is essential to the description. The ground out there, over which the cross-road passed on toward the Union lines, swells handsomely up to a rounded knoll that makes a very pretty as well as noticeable object in the landscape. The field-glasses of General Lee and of his staff had already determined this knoll to be a splendid position for their artillery.

That peach-orchard angle with the adjoining knoll – in reality the highest point lying between the two armies – was, for this reason, the first object of the Confederates' attention on this day. It was a stepping-stone toward Cemetery Ridge. It was now in possession of Sickles' skirmishers, posted there the night before, and already exchanging shots with those of the enemy.[58 - The peach-orchard knoll was Sickles' bugbear. He thought it much to be preferred to the position he was in. It was, however, fully commanded from Little Round Top.]

The Swale again.

Uneasy at seeing no enemy in front of him, Sickles decided to push his skirmishers still farther out. They accordingly went forward into the woods of Seminary Ridge, where the enemy was supposed to be. They had scarcely arrived there when they fell in with some Confederates, by whom, after a sharp encounter, they were driven back, but not before they had seen heavy columns moving off to gain the Union left under cover of the woods. This information made Sickles still more uneasy, impressed as he was with the belief that an attack upon him was imminent, and that he would have to receive it where the low ground he then occupied[59 - This refers to the swale next north of Little Round Top.] offered little chance for making a successful defence. Little Round Top rose on his left, his front stretched across the adjoining hollow, the peach-orchard knoll loomed threateningly before him in the distance, the skirmish fire was growing hotter out there, his orders were either vague or unsatisfactory, and so Sickles, commanding a single corps of the army, having convinced himself that the line, as formed, was defective, determined in his own mind to abandon it for one of his own choosing, orders or no orders.

Longstreet at Work.

This movement to the left, first detected by Sickles' skirmishers, was Longstreet getting into position for the attack that Lee had ordered. When Longstreet's guns should be heard, Ewell was to assault Culp's Hill and Cemetery Hill; while Hill, in the centre, was to follow up Longstreet's attack as it progressed from right to left. In short, a simultaneous assault on the two wings of Meade's army was to be connected by a second and cumulative wave gathering headway as it rolled on, until this billow of fire and steel should engulf and sweep the whole Union line out of existence.

By this plan of battle Lee expected to disconcert any attempt to reinforce either flank, or should Meade dare weaken his centre for that purpose, Hill could then push in there, and cut the Union army in twain.

Splendid conception! magnificent plan! none the less because too complicated for the execution of generals who either could not or would not comprehend what was required of them. Consoling thought, that not all the stupidity or blundering was on the Union side!

Lee had pointed out the peach orchard to Longstreet, with the injunction that it should be seized first of all.

3.30 P.M.

Though he had received his orders at eleven o'clock, it was not until after half-past three that Longstreet was ready to open the battle. Sluggish by nature, he was well described by his chief as slow to act: once in the thick of the fight, he rose with commanding power as the peerless fighter of that army; and in that part of the field where Longstreet fought, the dead always lay thickest. The confidence reposed in him by Lee is fully attested by the fact of his having assigned the conduct of the battles, both on the second and third, to General Longstreet.

Sickles' Idea.

We have seen how, after some hours of wavering, Sickles had at length decided to choose a new position for himself. Yesterday he had not been able to convince himself that it would be right to move his corps out of line, even that he might go to the aid of his immediate chief and when his doing so would have saved the day. Restrained then by the strict letter of his orders,[60 - Though forming part of Reynolds' command, Sickles was halted between Taneytown and Emmettsburg by Meade's order.] he had remained in a state of feverish uncertainty for some hours, though at length concluding to disobey them. To-day when he was without real responsibility, being now in the presence of the general commanding the army, Sickles sets both orders and chief at defiance. The acts of the two days are, however, in striking accord. Sickles disobeys orders in both instances.

The Third Corps moves out.

At about three o'clock the Union army saw with astonishment, not unmixed with dismay, the whole of the Third Corps moving out to the front in magnificent order, not as troops go into battle with skirmishers well advanced to the front, but as confidently as if going to a review with two grand armies for spectators. It was indeed a gallant sight to see these solid columns go forward, brigade after brigade, battery following battery, as, with flags fluttering in the breeze and bayonets flashing in the sun, the two divisions of Humphreys and Birney began deploying along the Emmettsburg road in front and taking position between the peach orchard and the Devil's Den to their rear, thus putting an elbow in the general line.

In vain we try to imagine one of Napoleon's or Wellington's marshals taking it upon himself to post his troops independently of his commander. It now appears that General Sickles did this regardless of whether he was thwarting the plans of the general-in-chief or not, or whether indeed by so doing he was overthrowing the whole theory of delivering a strictly defensive battle. Instead of allowing Meade his initiative, we find Sickles actually compelling his superior to follow his lead,[61 - Sickles claimed at first that he could not find the position assigned him, namely, that vacated by Geary. The force of this plea will be best appreciated by old soldiers. But in the following remarks all such clumsy pretexts are thrown to the winds; he here takes praise to himself for ignoring his commanding officer. It might be called a plea for insubordination."It may have been imprudent to advance and hold Longstreet at whatever sacrifice, but wasn't it worth a sacrifice to save the key of the position? What were we there for? Were we there to count the cost in blood and men, when the key of the position at Gettysburg was within the enemy's grasp?" (How did Sickles know this?) "What little I know of conduct on a battlefield I learned from Hooker and Kearney." (Kearney was a strict disciplinarian.) "What would Hooker or Kearney have done, finding themselves in an assailable, untenable position, without orders from headquarters as to their dispositions for battle, when they saw masses of the enemy marching to seize a vital point? Would they have hesitated? Would they have sent couriers to headquarters and asked for instructions what to do? Never, never! Well, I learned war from them, and I didn't send any. I simply advanced on to the battlefield and seized Longstreet by the throat and held him there." —Sickles' Music Hall Speech, Boston, 1886.]] not under the stress of some sudden emergency, but deliberately, defiantly. Not that he had penetrated Lee's designs. By no means. Had he done so we should be all the more amazed at his hardihood in going out with his ten thousand men to resist the onslaught of twenty thousand or more.

But the whole corps was not enough to occupy the ground selected. When the right division (Humphreys') reached the road, it had left a space of not less than three-fourths of a mile between itself and the left of the Second Corps. That flank was therefore in the air. The left division (Birney's), or most of it, was formed nearly at right angles with the first, showing a front of three brigades facing south, and posted in a line much broken by the natural features of the ground, which grow more and more rugged in proportion as Round Top is neared. Though stronger, by reason of the natural defences, this flank was a fourth of a mile from Round Top.

While this was going on out at the front, the Sixth and last Union Corps (Sedgwick's) was coming up behind the main position, worn down with marching thirty-six miles almost without a halt. The Fifth had already arrived, also with its men greatly fatigued. The situation, therefore, had so far improved, in that the enemy's delays[62 - John Stark's famous maxim, that one fresh man in battle is worth two fatigued ones, will be heartily endorsed by all who have seen it put to the test.] had given time for the whole Union army to assemble, though the two belated corps were scarcely in fighting trim.

Scarcely had Birney's men time to look about them when the booming of a single gun gave notice that the long-expected battle had begun.

VIII

THE SECOND OF JULY —Continued

Fighting begins.

At this signal all the enemy's batteries opened in succession, and for a space a storm of shot and shell tore through Sickles' lines with crushing effect. His own guns, posted partly in the orchard, partly along the cross-road, on the high knoll behind it, – that is to say, in the very spot selected by Lee in advance for his own, – began to lose both horses and men, nor were the infantry able to shelter themselves from the cross-fire of fifty-four pieces of artillery, some of which were killing men at both sides of the angle with the same shot.[63 - The two roads, Emmettsburg and cross-road, lay on converging ridges, which formed the angle at the orchard. It was a very irregular line, however, running first round the orchard, then along a ravine at the edge of the wheat-field to the Devil's Den, and again across this to the hollow, where it swung back so as to embrace the Den.]

Not many minutes had elapsed before every man on the ground, from general to private soldier, felt that a wretched blunder had been committed in thrusting them out there.

Explanation – R., Round Top; L. R. T., Little Round Top; D., Devil's Den; P. O., Peach Orchard; P. H., Power's Hill; G., Gettysburg.

See his Troops described, p. 26.

By and by the cannonade slackened. This was sufficient notice to old soldiers that something [113][114]more was coming. Before its echoes had died away Longstreet's first assaulting column, led by Hood himself, came down with a crash upon Birney, three lines deep.

The enemy was about to repeat his old tactics, employed at Chancellorsville with so much effect, of getting around the Union left and then rolling it up endwise.[64 - Lee's order of battle had been made in the belief that by throwing Longstreet across the Emmettsburg road he would envelop the Union army's proper left, whereas we have seen that he was wholly at fault, until Sickles made a condition where it did not exist before.] That his calculations in this case were not quite accurate was soon made manifest.

Since noon Longstreet had been working his way round through the woods toward Little Round Top, making a wide circuit to avoid discovery.[65 - In their effort to keep out of sight the enemy lost two hours. Two hours sooner they would have occupied the orchard without hinderance.] Having remonstrated in vain against this movement, he was probably in no great hurry to execute it. It was therefore four o'clock before he was ready to begin. But if slow he was sure.