Gettysburg: The Last Invasion

by Allen C. Guelzo

  What Alexander did not realize was that the slacking off of the Federal artillery fire was only partly due to the suppressing fire of the Confederate batteries; it was also Henry Hunt’s device to “save up” his artillery elsewhere along the Union line “for the infantry’s fight.” Nor did Alexander realize that the batteries he had seen being pulled away were to be replaced at once by a pair of batteries from the artillery reserve—Andrew Cowan’s 1st New York Independent Battery and Gulian Weir’s Battery C, 5th U.S.—which were already waiting on the reverse slope of Cemetery Ridge to be waved into position. But Pickett was relieved at last to have something to do, and showed Alexander’s note to Longstreet, whom he presumed would be similarly pleased. He wasn’t. Without meeting Pickett’s gaze, Longstreet merely nodded his head. Unsure how to interpret Longstreet’s glum silence, Pickett fell back on the orders he had been given earlier. “I am going to move forward, sir,” and off he galloped.

  Longstreet, still nursing doubts, “mounted and spurred to Alexander’s post” to ask if he was certain. Not entirely, Alexander replied: the bombardment had gone on far longer than he had expected, about forty-five minutes, and that had surely drained the ammunition reserve. Longstreet seized on that caveat: “Stop Pickett immediately and replenish your ammunition.” No, Alexander, replied, that would take too long and give the Federals a chance to reinforce the line Alexander believed had been shattered by the bombardment. Alexander had the sense that “a word of concurrence from me would have stopped the charge then & there,” and he was probably right. Longstreet said, “very emphatically,” that “I don’t [want] to make this attack. It can’t possibly succeed. I would not make it now but that Gen. Lee has ordered it & expects it.” And then the moment was gone: “Pickett’s division swept out of the wood and showed the full length of its gray ranks and shining bayonets, as grand a sight as ever a man looked on.”

  Out to Pickett’s left, Pettigrew’s division also moved out into the sunshine, stretching beyond Alexander’s sight, “farther than I could see.” Way off to the right, Lafayette McLaws joined a little knot of his brigade commanders “and saw the advancing Confederates moving to the charge.” It was “magnificent,” McLaws remembered sixteen years later, “it stirred all the highest and deepest emotion of our nature, of admiration for the splendid bearing and courage of our Southern men.” Even for a Union officer like Philippe Régis de Trobriand, who had seen a good deal of warfare in Europe, “it was a splendid sight.” As the artillery fire petered out, Hancock’s men along Cemetery Ridge shook themselves, stood up to stretch, hoping that the sudden silence meant that the battle was over. But then they saw “a long line of men coming out of the woods,” and the word fluttered nervously up and down the line, They are coming. “The regimental flags and guidons were plainly visible along the whole line,” wrote an officer with the 126th New York’s skirmish line, “the guns and bayonets in the sunlight shone like silver.” Here they come! Here they come! the warning raced around the 19th Massachusetts. Here comes the infantry.4

  Arthur Fremantle and Fitzgerald Ross hoped to make it into the town to view the attack from “some commanding position,” but failed to get there before the Federal bombardment made it impossible. They were forced to turn back, unwillingly accompanied by a local “urchin” who “took a diabolical interest in the bursting of the shells, and screamed with delight when he saw them take effect.” Fremantle might have saved himself trouble if he had known that the cupolas, steeples, and roofs of the town were already crowded with gaping spectators, from civilians to Union prisoners. Even the methodical mathematician, Michael Jacobs, called his eighteen-year-old son, Henry, up to the garret of their house on Middle Street to look through his “small but powerful” telescope. “Quick,” Jacobs called to his son, “Come, Come! You can see now what in all your life you will never see again.” Ten miles south, at the Federal signal station on the Indian lookout above Emmitsburg, crowds of people brought “glasses, viz. telescopes, spy, and opera glasses,” each vying with the others for “a clear view of the field” and “the men in their lines, attending cannon, the cannon themselves, making charges, officers riding along about their lines … In a word the whole scene was spread out to our view.”5

  Pickett’s Division

  Almost every account of any importance describes the jump-off of Pickett’s Charge as “a long gray line” emerging from “the dark fringe of timber on Seminary Ridge,” or “the long gray line of infantry … in nearly perfect alignment,” or a “force … in two lines … their formations opened to sift through the momentarily quiet batteries.” But the closer to the actual event, the less certain the testimony becomes. A survivor of the 27th Connecticut remembered in 1866 that Pickett’s attack developed in “two heavy lines of troops,” and Theodore Gates, whose 80th New York was part of a contingent of 1st Corps survivors posted on Hancock’s left, wrote in his diary on July 3rd that “the enemys Infantry advanced directly upon us in two lines on his right & one on his left.” But Abner Doubleday spoke of the Confederates coming on in three lines, while John Gibbon counted four lines—“a heavy line of skirmishers,” said Gibbon, “then a line of infantry, then another line behind that, and, I believe, a third behind that.”6

  Whatever the formation, Pickett and all of the division’s officers took the moment to dress and align their troops, and give little speeches. Pickett sent staffers to his brigadiers to convey directions; Capt. Robert Bright was sent to Kemper and told to instruct him “to go in dismounted; dress on Garnett and take the red barn,” the big barn belonging to Nicholas Codori, on the far side of the Emmitsburg Road. Kemper, in turn, briefed his staff “as to the character of the movement, the points to be watched and particulars reported.” Lee accompanied Pickett’s division down to the point where Pickett’s left flank was to join Pettigrew’s right, but, true to form, he allowed Pickett and the others to do the talking. At each brigade, Pickett paused, swinging and shouting his cap, “Remember Old Virginia!” (as he passed Garnett’s brigade) or “Up, men, and to your posts! Don’t forget today that you are from Old Virginia!” (to Kemper’s brigade).

  Lewis Armistead, in the rear of Kemper’s and Garnett’s brigades, brought his men up with “Attention, battalion!” and then proceeded to perform a small tableau of his own. Addressing Leander Blackburn, the color sergeant of the 53rd Virginia, Armistead asked theatrically, “Sergeant, are you going to put those colors on the enemy’s works to-day?” On cue, the sergeant replied, “I will try, sir, and if mortal man can do it, it shall be done.” There were last orders—keep “common time,” do not break ranks, do not cheer, carry rifles “at will”—and then the color-bearers, and the corporals and sergeants who made up the color guard, took their mandated four steps forward, and the orders began to leap from “the stentorian lungs” of the regimental colonels: Attention, battalion! … Dress in line, men! … Steady, in the centre! … Guide upon your right, Men! … Forward! … March! … Advance slowly with arms at will … No cheering … No firing … No breaking from common to quick step … Dress on the center. They maneuvered past the long lines of Confederate artillery, whose crews “sat astride their smoking guns” and cheered the infantry as they passed: Give it to ’em, boys; we’ve got ’em demoralized; and you ’uns can make ’em gut up an’ dust out’n them dirt piles! Far to the right, a band began to play “in the same manner that it would, had the division been passing in review.”7

  At some point, the brigades which had been stacked in column moved out into line of battle, and “when their line of battle was formed,” men as far away as Little Round Top could see the Confederate officers dismount and walk forward “with sword in hand” to lead their men. Not all of them, however: the thin, pale Garnett had been kicked viciously by a “fiery steed,” and could barely walk. He was determined to make the charge; however, he would do it mounted on his thoroughbred bay, Red Eye, and dressed in a “fine, new gray uniform,” with a brigadier’s star on the collar, and top boots. Lewis Wil
liams, the colonel of the 1st Virginia, in the center of Kemper’s brigade, argued, “I am sick to-day … will you let me ride,” and so he did; Eppa Hunton, also “being unable to walk,” also remained mounted. It was still early enough for men to joke. Thomas Lewis, a captain in Joseph Mayo’s 3rd Virginia, “carrying his sword point foremost over his shoulder,” was already warning his men, “Don’t crowd, boys; don’t crowd,” when Mayo remarked, “Pretty hot, Captain.” The captain only replied, “It’s redicklopus, Colonel; perfectly redickloous.” Some of Pickett’s men took the ridiculous aspect of the charge more seriously. In the 1st Virginia, a number of men, “in whom there is not sufficient courage,” refused to get to their feet, and Joseph Mayo saw “a disorderly crowd of men” attempt to bolt for the rear, only to be stopped by Pickett and several of his staff. But to the Union soldiers across the fields, they looked compact, orderly, irresistible. “No one who saw them could help admiring the steadiness with which they came on,” wrote John Cook, a captain in the 80th New York. They were like “the shadow of a cloud seen from a distance as it sweeps across a sunny field.”8

  Not for long, though. Each regiment in Pickett’s division told off a detail of skirmishers who spread out in a cautious shield, 200 yards ahead of the main body of infantry; they were followed by details of pioneers, whose job it was to knock down the annoying crisscross of “stake-and-rider fences which obstructed the path of the division” up to the Emmitsburg Road. A Confederate picket line had earlier been posted several hundred yards in front (whose men had spent the bombardment digging holes with “bayonets, pieces of board, any thing to get out of sight”), and as the skirmishers quick-timed through the pickets, they discovered that “with the exception of an orchard covering one tenth of the distance, and one small house, we had no protection whatever.” They also discovered that Union skirmishers were drawn up behind the heavy post-and-board fences lining the Emmitsburg Road and in a small embankment through which the road cut like a natural trench. These skirmishers had proven unusually aggressive about sniping at the Confederate artillery batteries, and now they showed no inclination to yield. “I was surprised … that our skirmishers had been brought to a stand by those of the enemy,” wrote a captain in the 11th Virginia. And no wonder, since the Federal skirmishers were using the top rail of the Emmitsburg Road fence to steady their aim, making their fire “so accurate and severe” that the Yankees could not be forced back. “The latter only gave ground when our line of battle had closed up well inside of a hundred yards of our own skirmishers.” (The captain of one of the Federal skirmish details described it as “the hottest skirmish I was ever in.”) Only then did the Union skirmishers retire “in perfect order” toward Cemetery Ridge, “firing as they fell back.”

  This posed an unanticipated problem for Pickett: the single most important factor in the success of any infantry attack is momentum, not firepower. The impulse for poorly disciplined or inexperienced soldiers when encountering fire was to stop and return the fire, and then prove almost impossible to get moving again. “Men charging,” said Alexander Webb, “are apt to seek any shelter that may offer itself unless forced to move on by their officers … Some would drop behind the irregularities of the ground and stay there as men will do under heavy fire.” A stubborn line of enemy skirmishers would induce precisely that kind of stopping and firing. That, in turn, would give no time for the pioneers to break down the fences along the road; the infantry would have to climb one fence, cross the road, then climb the other, form up, dress ranks, and check alignments, and that would take off still more momentum. Confederate officers had to increase the amount of prodding and shoving: Steady boys … Don’t fire … Close up … Never mind the skirmish line.9

  Pickett’s brigades were not going to be allowed to do this at leisure, either, because after covering only 300 to 500 yards (about a third to a fourth of the distance Pickett’s division would have to travel), the Federal artillery that Hunt had so peevishly commanded to keep quiet now opened with repressed vengeance on the Confederates. Freeman McGilvery had his batteries pulled out of the earthen lunettes their crews had built up that morning and, “by training the whole line of guns obliquely to the right, we had a raking fire through” Pickett’s entire division. They “fired shell and shrapnel until the right” of Pickett’s division “came within 500 yards,” when they switched to canister, “which took good effect.” Up on Little Round Top, several of the 10-pounder Parrott rifles which had been precariously seated there the day before finally came into their own, scorching the 56th Virginia in Garnett’s brigade, and one Federal officer noticed the rebel stretcher-bearers scurry for cover. Andrew Cowan had just brought his battery of six 3-inch Ordnance Rifles into line near the little stand of trees on the ridge when “I saw a body of Confederates appear … They dressed their lines before advancing,” and “we opened at once and continued pouring shell upon them till they came within canister range.” As they did, Cowan could see “gaps opened in their lines,” and behind the gaps a “stream of wounded men” heading to the rear turned from a “rivulet” to become “a river.” But “no sooner had one company of the Confederate column been scattered by the bursting shells than its place was taken promptly and in good order by others.” Cowan watched them close up and maintain “a splendid front,” and it occurred to him that most of these Confederates seemed to be “marching to this copse of trees.”10

  At the right of the 2nd Corps line, Alex Hays was his usual exhilarated self, beaming with the glow of anticipated violence. “Now, boys, look out,” he shouted as the Confederate infantry began rolling forward, “you will see some fun!” Nearby, George Woodruff’s battery was rolled back from its cover under David Zeigler’s orchard with help from men of the 108th New York, and all along his division front Hays was furiously exhorting the men of Smyth’s brigade and the “Harpers Ferry Cowards” to “stand fast and fight like men.” Boys, don’t let ’em touch these pieces, he shouted, and as the Union artillery started shredding the oncoming infantry, Hays began laughing and singing at the top of his voice, Hurrah, boys, we’re giving them hell. Alongside Hays, Eliakim Sherrill also remained mounted “on a white horse, against the entreaties of all his officers,” as if to single-handedly finish wiping out the name of “Harpers Ferry Cowards” from his brigade.11

  To James Crocker, in the 9th Virginia, it seemed as though “men fell like ten-pins in a ten-strike.” The thickening banks of powder smoke darkened the air “with sulphurous clouds,” and even the sun, “lately so glaring, is itself obscured.” Garnett’s brigade “had to climb three high post-and-rail fences,” or else crowd through “at the openings where the fences had been thrown down,” temporarily making superb targets for Union cannoneers. In the 53rd Virginia, “every man of Company F” was “thrown flat to the earth by the explosion of a shell from Round Top,” and the 19th Virginia was struck end-on by shells “which enfiladed nearly our entire line with fearful effect, sometimes as many as 10 men being killed and wounded by the bursting of a single shell.” A soldier in the 14th Virginia could see “now & then a man’s head or arm or leg … fly like feathers before the wind.” A chaplain in Pickett’s division was following on the heels of his regiment with a party of stretcher-bearers when a shell “fell within 6 feet of my brave 20 men and myself and made a hole in the earth large enough to put two horses in.” It killed six of the men with him, and “a fragment of shell blew off my cap and … tore off all the hair from the top of my head.”12

  And yet, “every man who was not killed or desperately wounded sprang to his feet, collected himself and moved forward to close the gap in the regimental front.” On they came, officers with swords outthrust straight from the shoulder, men with the sun dazzling on rifle barrels, and on bayonets brighter than the barrels. In Armistead’s brigade, “our line was steady and unshaken, except the gaps made by the enemy’s fire, which were speedily closed and all necessary maneuvers were performed with the same promptitude and precision as when on Battalion d
rill.” They could do this because the Federal artillery was not, even with these targets, proving to be all that effective. Little Round Top was not the impressive artillery asset people might have supposed, and the preliminary bombardment had wrought more havoc among the Union batteries than even Porter Alexander had realized. “The volume of their fire did not seem great & certainly it failed entirely to check or break up Pickett’s advance” was the estimate of Porter Alexander. “Up to this time we had suffered but little from the enemy’s batteries,” because a number of the guns in the surviving Federal batteries—especially in Cushing’s battery at the angle of the stone walls occupied by the Philadelphia Brigade—really had been “much crippled.” Those that were still ready for action, especially Woodruff’s battery, had only short-range canister left to fire. Above all, the distance being covered by Pickett’s division kept the Virginia division under long-range fire for no longer than fifteen minutes, and the Federal artillery was trying to hit wafer-thin lines of battle rather than stout blocks of column.

  Of course, to the thirty-five hundred infantry of Hancock’s corps on the ridge, Pickett’s division appeared as “acres of soldiers in solid mass,” and a tremor of apprehension replaced the curiosity with which the sight had first been greeted. A few, in the 108th New York, “mounted some stones and waved the colors towards the enemy and shouted to them to come on,” and some of the New Yorkers even opened a premature and undisciplined fire until their colonel “ordered them to reserve their fire until the enemy came closer.” But for others, “it was a terrible sight to us” as the Confederate lines grew relentlessly closer to the Emmitsburg Road, and the skirmishers began falling back. “I looked on our small force” as being “not one tenth of theirs,” wrote a lieutenant in the 126th New York, “I almost felt that we were gone.” To William Davis, in the 69th Pennsylvania, it looked as though “no power could hold them in check.” Even Alex Hays decided to take no chances, and sent off his division provost marshal to find Meade and tell him, “We must have reinforcements or we cannot hold our position.”13