I’ve been trying to keep straight in my head the results of Daylight Savings Time on correlating our time today to the time 140 years ago. Given “Spring forward” I think 140 years ago it would only be about 8:30 now which means that, on the wooded slopes of Culp’s Hill the charge of the 2d Massachussets and 27th Indiana had already been smashed by concentrated secessionist fire. Fighting would soon break out all along the lines on the hill resulting in the Confederates being turned out of the positions they occupied the night before. Confederate cavalry was moving quickly around the north of town, trying to find the Low Dutch Road and ride it right into the rear of the Federal positions.
By noon, the cavalry of both armies was hotly engaged east of town among small farms and rolling fields. Headlong charges by George Armstrong Custer succeeded in throwing back the usually victorious cavaliers of JEB Stuart’s command and preventing them from executing their planned death blow in rear of the Federal lines. Along the seminary ridge Confederate gunners worked their pieces into position for the titanic barrage the commanding general had ordered to open the day’s assault. Infantry of both armies stared each other across heat-shimmering fields, sure something was coming but not knowing where, or when, the ball would open.
Around 1 o’clock, two signal guns fired from the Confederate position and then – all along the line – the batteries opened, hurling shells with frightful rapidity into the ranks of the Federals not a mile away on their own protective ridge. Federal batteries replied, dueling their opposing numbers but, sensing more was to come, reserved some of their ammunition and so, gradually slackened their fire as the bombardment continued. By 3 the Confederate batteries had all but exhausted their long range ammunition and were in need of their distant trains for resupply. The decision time had come and, rather than halt the firing to resupply the infantry was ordered up – together with whatever artillery support could be mustered – and with words of encouragement to remember homes and family set off across the hazy field.
13,000 men, in three divisions stacked – two in front, one behind, began to tramp across shell-furrowed and smoke stained fields. As they marched, the Federal artillery began to open again upon them. Airburst shells and round shot blew great gaps in their ranks but the veterans simply covered the gaps without breaking stride and pressed on. Half a mile out, more or less, they came to a fence bordering a road, the lines faltered as men fell out to scramble over or through the wooden barrier. More men were falling now, melting away like snowflakes in a warm draft, Federal skirmishers on the flanks were taking a toll and as the tide of secessionists crested the fence and began to rush the last few hundred yards scores of aimed rifles leveled at them and launched a storm of lead into their massed ranks.
Men began to be swept away now, driftwood in a hurricane. Amidst the yelling and thunderous roar of weaponry commanders could be seen rallying their men and screaming to press on. The first two divisions had nearly dissapeared in the waves of fire but the third, the second line, pushed on through the masses of survivors and broke the regiments in front. Suddenly they were within the lines. One gallant Federal regiment stood to its task while surrounded in a sea of enemy men. Other regiments moved to the fore and began to press the Confederates back. Shot and shell rained from the flanks and an entire Federal brigade executed a parade ground wheel and unleashed a volley directly into the flanks of the enemy at nearly point-blank range. Some Confederates rushed a cannon to the right of the main point of impact, the gunner tugged the lanyard and a double-shotted load of 1/2 inch iron balls roared into their faces. When the smoke finally cleared there was nothing left of the milling crowd but blood and bits of cloth.
The tide rolled back, just like an ocean wave, cresting on the rocks and then pouring back across the field. Cheers rang out along the cemetary ridge but most stood, shell-shocked and in awe of what had just happened.
The two armies stared at each other all that afternoon and all the next day. Late on Independence Day, in a driving rain, the long march back to Virginia began. Hundreds of the wounded had to be left behind for lack of transport. Coming to the swollen Potomac the beaten army formed to repel an assault but none was forthcoming. The staggering contest had taken its toll on both forces.
News came that the last citadel on the Mississippi had fallen. The Confederacy was split in two and the Federal forces could now use the river as a great highway, delivering men and materiel to any point in the interior desired. The great battle at Gettysburg would be remembered as the cresting of the wave, the “high water mark” and throughout the next years’ bloody melees down south the memory of stopping and driving off the secessionist hordes would always bring a boost in morale and a remembrance of the possibility of final victory.
But the war would go on.