CHAPTER 3
By the morning of July 2, 83,000 Union troops were ready to face about 75,000 Confederates. Many of the men had marched all night to reach Gettysburg. Most were too tired and footsore to pitch their tents when they arrived. But by sunrise the exhausted soldiers were on the front line.
The Union troops were set out in General Meade’s “fishhook” line along Cemetery Ridge—a long line that curved at the end like a fishhook. The line curved and ended at Culp’s Hill on the north. For the moment, the northern soldiers held the high ground.
SICKLES’ FOLLY
When General Sickles arrived at Cemetery Ridge that morning, Meade placed him and his 3rd Corps in line, facing west, south of Hancock’s 2nd Corps. Sickles was not pleased. The Cemetery Hill elevation dropped off by the time it got to Sickles’ line. Although Little Round Top flanked the position, the general didn’t think he had enough men to stretch the line far enough to occupy that hill. In front of him was mostly bare ground broken only by a small peach orchard.
Confederate guns shell Union soldiers at Cemetery Ridge.
Sickles wanted to move his men west to occupy the rise around the Peach Orchard, as the battlefield came to be called. Meade said no. Meade wanted an unbroken line of defense along Cemetery Ridge. Sickles’ men would have to remain in place.
Upset, Sickles took matters into his own hands. He moved his corps into position facing west along the Emmitsburg Road and running south to the Peach Orchard. At the orchard, the line turned sharply east and ran through a forest to Houck’s Ridge just west of Little Round Top. It ended at a place the soldiers named Devil’s Den—a field littered with boulders and large rocks. Sickles’ men were now cut off from the rest of the Union line and sticking out almost a mile (1.6 km) in a vulnerable, thinly stretched line.
At 4 p.m., when Meade rode out to inspect the troops, he was horrified to find Sickles gone from his original position. He rode out to the Peach Orchard to confront the general. He arrived just in time for the start of the Confederate attack.
Meade sent one of Hancock’s divisions in to reinforce Sickles’ men. The Union troops were pushed out of the Peach Orchard, a battlefield called the Wheat Field, and into the Devil’s Den. As the Union soldiers fought desperately to hold on, Meade sent in more reinforcements—this time the 5th Corps under General George Sykes.
The fresh soldiers would be of great help to the men in Devil’s Den. But their deployment severely weakened the rest of the battle line. Confederate troops were now moving steadily toward an important position—Little Round Top. If they took it, the Union army would face destruction and a Confederate victory.
Union troops rush to reinforce their fellow soldiers.
LITTLE ROUND TOP
After discovering that Sickles had moved his line, Meade had sent his chief engineer, Major General Gouverneur Warren, to make sure Little Round Top had not been left undefended. There was only a small signal team stationed on the hill. The team’s job was to notify the Union generals of the enemy’s movements.
As Warren watched, he saw Confederate troops on the move. He realized that the Union line was about to be surrounded—and that Little Round Top was the only defensive position that might save it. Warren set out at a gallop with a desperate call for reinforcements.
Warren quickly came upon one unit of Sykes’ brigade. He sent them to defend the hill. The soldiers had barely arrived and started organizing their line when Confederate soldiers swarmed the Union regiments on the southwest slope. The men were able to fight off the first attack, but crumbled under a second assault. Just when it seemed all might be lost, help arrived in the form of the 140th New York, which was able to beat back the Confederate charge.
The 20th Maine regiment held the southeast slope of Little Round Top. Colonel Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain was the regiment’s leader. The soldiers’ position meant that they held the left flank of the entire Union Army of the Potomac. If they couldn’t hold, the way would be clear for a Union defeat.
Twice, Alabama soldiers surged up the hill. Twice, the 20th beat them back. At this point many of the Maine soldiers were out of ammunition. Desperate, they dug through their dead and wounded comrades’ possessions for more. Once again the Confederates surged, and the Union line began to crumble. Chamberlain ordered his men to fix their bayonets and charge the enemy. The Alabamans were stunned by the attack. Many fled. Others threw down their weapons and surrendered.
Little Round Top had been saved, but Sickles’ men in the Devil’s Den were doomed. The 3rd Corps, along with those who had been sent to reinforce them, had finally been pushed back. The survivors beat a hasty retreat to Cemetery Ridge.
HOLDING THE CENTER
Meanwhile, the center of the Union line—from Big and Little Round Top to Hancock’s position on the upper end of Cemetery Ridge—had completely fallen apart. Hancock looked for reinforcements to fill the gap. As a 1,500-man brigade from Alabama headed for his position, Hancock found the 262 men of the 1st Minnesota. Without a moment’s hesitation, the soldiers charged across the open field to confront an enemy with five times as many men.
William Lochren of the 1st Minnesota later wrote, “Every man realized in an instant what that order meant—death or wounds to us all; the sacrifice of the regiment to gain a few minutes’ time and save the position, and probably the battlefield.”
The greatly outnumbered 1st Minnesota volunteers charge the enemy.
The shocked Alabamans stopped their advance momentarily. They quickly regrouped, however, and rained bullets upon the Minnesotans. Only 47 of the men of the 1st Minnesota made it out of the charge unharmed.
“Reinforcements were coming on the run, but I knew that before they could reach the threatened point the Confederates, unless checked, would seize the position,” Hancock wrote later. “I would have ordered that regiment in if I had known that every man would be killed. It had to be done.”
But the 1st Minnesota’s heroic effort didn’t stop the Confederates. A brigade under Confederate General Ambrose Wright was on the verge of cutting the Union line on Cemetery Ridge in two. But the Union troops refused to yield. With night falling and nearly 700 casualties, Wright pulled back.
Though the line on Cemetery Ridge had held, the Union army was still under threat at Culp’s Hill. Most of the soldiers of the 12th Corps under General Slocum were ordered to leave their position to reinforce Sickles. Now just one brigade held the hill. Shortly after 8 p.m., General Richard Ewell’s Confederate troops launched their attack.
A line of artillery just below the cemetery gate had been blasting the Confederates all day. Now the southern troops were advancing, somehow managing to push the northern infantry all the way back to the guns. The men fought among the cannons with bayonets and fists—sometimes using their muskets as clubs—until the Union troops finally retreated through the cemetery.
Then came a counterattack by the Union 11th Corps. With darkness—and more Union soldiers—coming on quickly, the Confederates abandoned the hill.
At Culp’s Hill the Confederate line held a position halfway up the hill as darkness fell. The Union troops could expect a renewed attack in the morning.
That evening General Meade held a conference with his corps commanders. Lee had attacked both the Union’s flanks and failed. There was only one goal left. Meade told his men to prepare for an attack on their center.
CIVILIAN DEATH
Mary Virginia Wade was the only civilian to be killed during the three-day battle at Gettysburg. The 20-year-old woman known as Jennie was staying at her sister’s house, located in the middle of the fighting. Many bullets and artillery shells hit the home during the battle. One struck Jennie as she stood in the kitchen baking bread for the Union soldiers. She was killed instantly.
