Gettysburg Fighting at Little Round Top

This strife, at the base of Round Top, momentarily ceased, for, having disposed of Sickles’s entire left, Lee put Hill into the fight in the endeavor to advance his own center.

Continuing Battle of Gettysburg,
with a selection from History of the Southern Rebellion by Orville J. Victor published in 1898. This selection is presented in 7.5 easy 5 minute installments. For works benefiting from the latest research see the “More information” section at the bottom of these pages.

Previously in Battle of Gettysburg.

Time: July 1-3, 1863
Place: Gettysburg, Pennsylvania

After twenty minutes of rapid and effective artillery fire, Hood’s division of Longstreet’s command pressed upon Sickles’s extreme left. Two brigades of Birney’s division—De Trobriand’s and Ward’s—held the refused line, from the Emmetsburg pike to the base of the Round Top Mountain. The Third Brigade (Graham’s) faced the road and connected with the left of Sickles’s second division (Humphreys’s). The attack was, indeed, a flanking movement, for, while engaging Birney’s two brigades, Hood swung his right around upon the ridge on whose length Meade’s main line rested.

This effort to flank Sickles was successful, and only a happy circumstance averted the great calamity of the loss of Little Round Top. Chief of Engineers Warren, ascending to the crest of Little Round Top — then used as a signal station — arrived just in time to witness the flanking movement. His ready eye comprehended all in a moment, and he hastened down the rugged declivity for aid to hold the key to the ridge. Happily he encountered the Fifth Corps advance division (Barnes’s), then marching to Sickles’s aid. Assuming the responsibility of detaching Vincent’s brigade, with Hazlett’s battery, Warren led the men up the height, while the battery was literally lifted up by human hands. Not a moment too soon, for the enemy already were mounting the western slope, which commanded the crest, when Vincent’s men came up from the east and north.

The two bodies rushed together like two athletes, Hood’s Texans firing and then resorting to the bayonet, and Vincent’s undaunted fellows using the bayonet or clubbed musket. Officers and men all fought like furies, and in thirty minutes the fray was ended by the appearance, on Vincent’s right, of Weed’s brigade, of Ayres’s division (Fifth Corps). What was left of the Texan regiments retired sullenly to the valley below. There, reinforced, the regiments worked their way up the rocky defile between the two Round Top hills, and suddenly appeared on Vin cent’s flank. Only the bayonet could dislodge Hood’s dogged men, and Colonel Chamberlain put his Maine men to the charge. The enemy again were driven back, and the hill was saved. Among the killed were both General Vincent and General Weed, Captain Hazlett, whose heroism was one of the marked features of that bloody contest, and Colonel O’Rourke, commanding the One Hundred Fortieth New York, which had carried Hazlett’s battery up the hill. The dead lay scattered all over the rough, desolate spot; in many instances Confederate and Unionist were locked in a death embrace.

During this combat on the hill, the battle below was raging with great severity. Resolved to break Sickles’s center, and thus wrest the lower ridge (along the Emmetsburg road) from Meade, Longstreet threw McLaws upon the weak point where Birney’s alignment bent from the road back toward Round Top. That section of the field became a vortex of fire. Meade, as seemed necessary, in order to maintain his left, put in reinforcements, but all to no purpose. De Trobriand’s and Ward’s brigades, terribly cut up, were forced in and lost as brigade formations. The brigades of Tilton and Sweitzer, of Barnes’s division (Fifth Corps) passed to the front, on their line, and nobly stood their ground until McLaws, having penetrated the center, took the brigades in flank, when Barnes withdrew his decimated column. To sustain the center, Humphreys added one brigade from his division, but this reinforcement to Graham’s four regiments could not resist the enemy’s advance over the road and around his left. Humphreys, therefore, faced about his line, now taken in flank, retired his artillery, and fought, facing south, but still retaining his hold (on his right) on the Emmetsburg road. The contested field was then between himself and Round Top, where the antagonists still struggled.

Caldwell’s division, from Hancock’s corps, was put into action to stay the Confederate march, after Sickles’s center and left had given way. The two brigades of Cross and Kelly, first skirting the base of Little Round Top, pushed on through the woods into an open field beyond, whence, after a few moments’ struggle, they were driven, broken and fearfully cut up. Colonel Cross -— a man of astonishing bravery and a zealous soldier from love of his cause -— was left dead on the field. Caldwell’s second line, composed of the brigades of Brooke and Zook, then advanced and fell upon the enemy with such impetuosity as forced Hood’s line back beyond the brook which flows a little to the west of the base of Round Top. It was but a momentary success, however, since, taken in flank by McLaws’s advance, Caldwell had to retire. His brigades suffered dreadfully. The gallant Zook was killed and Brooke wounded. Nearly half of their brave fellows were left upon the blood-dyed field. Sweitzer’s brigade, having preserved its formation, was pressed in to Caldwell’s assistance, but it was hurled back with heavy loss. Ayres’s division of regulars -— less the brigade of Weed -— also moving forward to Caldwell’s aid, was met by a flank and front fire which fearfully riddled his ranks, and the regulars retired to their first battle line, well up the ridge, unable to hold the ground below them.

This strife, at the base of Round Top, momentarily ceased, for, having disposed of Sickles’s entire left, Lee put Hill into the fight in the endeavor to advance his own center. Humphreys’s right and left, being uncovered, Hancock threw forward a brigade (Willard’s) from Hays’s division to Humphreys’s left, and two regiments to his right. These were not fully in position when Hill’s admirably timed attack was made. Taken on front and right flank by Hill, and on the left by McLaws, the division commander had no choice but to retire toward Cemetery Ridge. Sickles, steadying his lines, was stricken down about 6 p.m. -— having, up to that moment, passed the day’s dangers unscathed. The enemy pressed on, under a cutting fire from the ridge crest, but no storm of shot and shell could stay their advancing ranks. Humphreys fell away, contesting every rod of retreat, but leaving gun after gun on the ground with every horse and cannoneer shot away. Hancock, assuming command at Meade’s order, directed the more rapid retirement of what was left of the division, and when it reached the cover of the ridge it was but a wreck of regiments -— mere gatherings of battalions.

Orville J. Victor begins here. Edward A. Pollard begins here. Abraham Lincoln begins here.

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