July 2nd at the Peach Orchard - Gettysburg Battle Walk with Ranger Angie Atkinson

Added: 2026-05-18

[00:00:02]All right. Well, I think we are going to go ahead and begin. Um, so welcome to Gettysburg National Military Park and to our spring hike series. This is the last one. We're going to close it out on the warmest day of of the year as we've been talking.

[00:00:21]Uh, my name is Angie Atinson. I am a park ranger here. I don't come out and do these a ton. um used to but haven't been on the field in a while. So, we're going to dust off July 2nd and bring that back out. Uh, one of the things though that I do spend a lot of time doing is I manage the licensed battlefield guide program. Don't come rushing at me at once. Um, but that's that's one of my primary responsibilities is to manage that program here at the park, which is a a very unique guide service started in 1915 and it's still going on today. So, a very interesting and exciting uh part of my job. But today, what we're going to do is we are going to talk about July 2nd, 1863, kind of through the lens of two entities in one area. There's a lot going on July 2nd. We're going to kind of narrow our focus down into the peach orchard, taking a look at some of the interplay between the Mississippi troops that will launch uh in the afternoon of July 2nd and the Massachusetts troops that will receive uh some of that attack. July 2nd, 1863.

[00:01:36]Couple things before we dive. That's general overview. Couple things before we dive in too far. So, it's a little bit warm today and I'm looking around and it does make me a little nervous that I don't see a ton of water bottles.

[00:01:49]Uh so please be aware that while it is slightly cool, we have a breeze.

[00:01:55]It is important that if you start to not feel well that if you are getting hot that you make that command decision and if you need to return back to your cars, please do so. Okay? Do not feel like you have to be on the march with me for 90 minutes. Uh I won't say anything to anybody if you need to head back to your vehicle to that. What we're going to be doing is we've got our brief intro here.

[00:02:20]This is kind of the setup of the program. We will move over into the peach orchard where we're going to kick that LBG out. And uh we're going to set up July 2nd, 1863. Kind of get everybody onto the same page as to why this is even happening, how this area became involved in the conflict. At that point, we're going to make a trek over to the Shery house for shade. Okay, we'll have a little bit of shade here in the orchard. We'll be fighting under the uh branches and the tree and the leaves if there are any. But really, I'm going to take you over to the Sherpie Farm just so that we can have some uh respite. So, you know, get out of the heat for a little bit. Talk about the battle action there. Uh that kind of sets up our retreat, the Union Army's retreat through these fields. And then we will specifically follow to a point the 9inth Massachusetts and the 21st Mississippi.

[00:03:13]Talk a little bit about artillery and how that was used, not used, how that kind of was involved in the frey here.

[00:03:20]And we will walk through the fields and we will end at the barn, the big red barn with the cannonball in it to your east. That is the Trusso Farm. That's where we will end the program and conclude there. So, be forewarned that if you parked here or there or over there, uh, you have to return back this way. So, again, back to those command decisions. If you get through part of the program and you're not feeling great, hit your car on the way back, okay? No worries there. Um, I do have a radio. If we do have any issues uh at the end, please let me know. But again, if you've got any water in your vehicles and we're passing by, might be a good idea. any well not any beverages but the appropriate beverages. Um bring those along please. Okay. This is when we get dicey because we don't think it's hot.

[00:04:14]It gets hot and then we're not quite prepared with that. Check yourself for ticks as we go through the program. Not sure if they're out yet. They're always happy to join us. Okay.

[00:04:26]>> So we can we can double our numbers as far as participants.

[00:04:31]>> Um and just be aware of yourself as we're crossing roads. I'll do my best to stop traffic. Uh, with that, let's head into the peach and talk about July 2nd, 1863.

[00:04:45]>> All right, >> so here's what we're going to do at this stop before we dive in the battle. I want to orient everyone to where we are on the battlefield and also give a little kind of recap of July 1, how we got here, etc. So, battle begins July 1, 1863. Roberty Lee has been looking to bring his army north into Pennsylvania. He's had two years of victories in the south pretty much and he's trying to capitalize on this advantage. Well, Virginia being where most of these battles are fought is struggling. It's, you know, reeling from days and weeks and months of battle. Crops, as you kind of potentially would see in these fields, orchards, just like they would have down there, do not recover right away. It takes a year, two or three to ACTUALLY GET BACK UP to speed. He needs the war out of Virginia. He wants to again uh strike the Union Army, potentially crush the Union Army, end the Civil War if he can possibly do it.

[00:05:54]So, he's going to bring his army up toward Pennsylvania. Now, it's a little difficult to see, but as you look over to the west in this direction, off to your left, my right, we can see a couple things. We see a tree line that is close to us. That is going to be Seminary Ridge. Beyond that, in the distance, in the haze of today, is we see for us east coast individuals a mountain range. All right. Huge mountains, hard to scale, hard to get through. Uh but those are kind of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Lee will be behind those mountains bringing his army up to Pennsylvania.

[00:06:40]He did not bring the motorcycles with him.

[00:06:44]what he's going to do. He has no idea that Gettysburg will become an area to engage in battle. He's actually kind of hoping to do a little bit of an endound and head toward Washington DC if possible.

[00:06:56]It's going to bring his men up. The Union Army is going to come up roadways eventually that lead uh into Gettysburg from all around. Specifically here, the Emittsburg Road that has south to Emittsburg, Maryland. Beyond uh the tree line to our east, the Tony Town Road in THE BALTIMORE PIKE. ALL ROADS LEADING that direction to Baltimore and in a sense Washington DC.

[00:07:20]Lee gets the jump on the Union Army.

[00:07:22]They are having some issues delaying.

[00:07:25]They finally get it in gear. Uh they will pursue the Confederate army through the month of June. Lots of marching June 1 through June 30.

[00:07:36]Eventually though, they will arrive in South Central Pennsylvania.

[00:07:45]Lee's men are taking casualties day by day as you are on the march. It's hot like this. You're carrying teen pounds of gear. You're going to be sick. You're going to have uh you're going to eat terrible food. You're going to eat rotten fruit. And that's all going to, you know, lead to armies taking on casualties. So he's not necessarily at full strength when he arrives here in Gettysburg.

[00:08:11]The Union Army initially starts the campaign campaign commanded by a gentleman named General Joe Hooker. Uh he will have some dealings with Washington DC. Long story short, he offers his resignation as a bluff.

[00:08:27]Lincoln signs off on it. Thank you. And now in place in command is General George Gordon Meat. Meat has been a division commander, a core commander of the fifth corps. Uh he is not really in the loop, not really in, you know, Hooker's mindset. He's got a lot of catching up to do. That change takes place June 28th, 1863.

[00:08:55]But they are pursuing the Confederate army. They must also protect Baltimore and Washington DC.

[00:09:02]Lee will eventually hear that the Union Army is pursuing. He was not aware that they were as close as they were. And he will then, as his MEN HAD BEEN SPREAD OUT all along south central Pennsylvania, he will return them to Gettysburg. To the west on our side of the mountains to the west of Gettysburg.

[00:09:23]The battle will take place July 1, 1863.

[00:09:27]It is not planned. It was not uh on Lee's bingo card that day, but nonetheless, the battle opens up. All day fighting back and forth, Union Army sending up reinforcements, Confederate army receiving reinforcements, and even though again, not planned, the Confederates will take the day on July 1. They will seize the high ground to the west. They will push the Union Army back to something called Cemetery Hill.

[00:09:58]Now, we pointed out Seminary Ridge over here to our west. Cemetery Ridge is going to be over here to our east, your right, my left. If we look, we can see a couple things where we started. If you can remember our starting location, that monument eagle on top has the pillars all around it. If you look just beyond that, you will see a domed structure with an angel on top. Largest monument on the battlefield, Pennsylvania Memorial.

[00:10:29]That monument is placed along Cemetery Ridge.

[00:10:35]That ridge will extend south along the trees to the right to some high ground that will be known as the round tops.

[00:10:42]And it will extend north to our my left, your left. We can see a large even an obelisk, a pointy thing looking like the George Washington Monument in DC that continues up Cemetery Ridge. We continue further.

[00:11:01]We can see a rise of ground with trees.

[00:11:03]There are some small white farm buildings ahead of it. That is Cemetery Hill. That is the ground that the Union Army will retreat back to July 1, 1863 and eventually form a line down Cemetery Ridge.

[00:11:21]roughly I don't know 16,000 casualties 17,000 casualties day one casualties killed wounded missing and captured casualty is not outright dead it's all of those things combine Lee again now wants to seize the advantage he's like I came up here I hadn't planned to fight in this specific location we weren't 100% ready. But as has happened the first two years, we've been able to seize upon this advantage.

[00:12:08]So Lee has a decision. Do we stay here?

[00:12:12]We were thrown into this fight. Do we stay here and continue or do we try to maneuver ourselves to a different location and threaten Washington DC?

[00:12:22]Well, Lee will look at this opportunity and he will say, "We're going to remain and we're going to continue to press the Union Army in hopes of victory."

[00:12:32]With that, the Confederate army will continue to bring men from the west.

[00:12:37]They are actually bringing men from the north also. That was July 1. But more and more troops will begin to arrive on and near the field. The Union Army will also continue to bring troops up the Emittsburg Road, the Tony Town Road, which is on the opposite side of these trees in support.

[00:13:02]Lee's going to have a couple different ideas of how to continue this attack on July 2nd. how to continue to press the high ground that the Union Army has now arrived on.

[00:13:14]One of his thoughts is this.

[00:13:18]Survey the southern area of the battlefield, send out reconnaissance, see if anybody's down here, and then use these open fields to his advantage.

[00:13:28]One of the weakest parts of a line that you can attack, anybody know?

[00:13:34]>> Caling.

[00:13:35]>> The ceiling. salient.

[00:13:37]>> Oh, the salient. That was like a salient.

[00:13:40]>> Oh, >> that would be the flank.

[00:13:42]>> A salient. Yes. Yes, you can have a salient and that would be a weak formation to attack, but a specific part of the line >> flank >> is the flank is the side. So, for example, I'll demonstrate. You are in roughly a line halfhazard as it is. The flank of your line is here.

[00:14:08]It is the end point.

[00:14:11]If we want to attack that end point, that weak point, we don't want to attack front this way cuz everybody else is going to join in. What we want to do is we want to attack perpendicular to your line. And I want to have men this direction and men this direction. That way we can sweep this way.

[00:14:33]And now since you're looking this direction, you now have to reform, you have to oblique, you have to do all these crazy maneuvers. But we can now hit you in the side. We can envelop you in the front, but we can also envelop you from behind in the rear of the line, one of the weakest positions.

[00:14:55]So Lee says, "How can we do that? We need to find out where this flank is."

[00:15:00]So early in the morning, dark 3, 4, 4:30, something like that, there is reconnaissance that's going to be sent out down into the southern portion of the battlefield. Captain Johnston is going to be tasked with this. The idea is find out where the end of the Union line is. Where is that flank? We need to know where they end. We might try and maneuver around them.

[00:15:23]So he's going to do that. Going to send out this reconnaissance. Captain Johnston arrives somewhere. We are not 100% sure where. He says he makes it to Little Round Top.

[00:15:37]Many do not believe that he actually made it to Little Round Top because there were some troops up there. There's other, you know, scattered troops in here. Uh how he made it sight unseen, we don't know. Uh but like a lot of things, we can only rely on the reports that were written down.

[00:15:56]uh what people saw and not everything that's written down is always 100% true, right? Cuz sometimes people make mistakes and then we have to fudge a little bit. BUT SOMEHOW HE ARRIVES SOMEWHERE. He says, "There's nobody down here." He reports back, "There's nobody down in this southern end of the battlefield." This is early in the morning, July 2.

[00:16:17]And Lee says, "Okay, here's what we're going to do. We're going to take a bunch of soldiers. We're going to go down to this southern end of the battlefield.

[00:16:26]And forgive me as I turn around, but we're going to send our troops this way, attacking the flank of the Union line of Cemetery Hill. They would you guys are actually the perfect uh scenario here. So, you guys would be that flank. You would march up the Emittsburg route up through these fields, finding that open flank of the Union position and crushing it, walking into it like this. That way you can envelop behind and envelop in front.

[00:16:59]Unfortunately, in this situation for Lee, things don't get moving as fast as he had hoped. Uh, why do you want to attack in the morning? Throw it out here. Why do you want to attack in the morning?

[00:17:14]It's cooler. Yeah, let's do a program at 2 o'clock in the afternoon. Um, it's definitely cooler. And the battle's in July. It's going to be toasty. These guys are wearing wool. Okay. It's hot.

[00:17:26]So cooler. Definitely. Why else would you want to attack in the morning?

[00:17:32]>> Surprise.

[00:17:33]>> Definitely the element of surprise.

[00:17:36]Because if you have your act together and have that game plan, have that battle plan and you launch, the enemy, in this case the Union Army may not be ready. Why else do you want to attack early?

[00:17:51]>> You can attack all day.

[00:17:53]>> You could I don't know if we're really going for that though. I mean, remember like we're already tired. We've already incurred casualties on the march on the campaign. We've incurred casualties day one, >> but you're kind of close. You're treading close to it. What is another reason why you want to attack early?

[00:18:11]>> They're somewhat rested.

[00:18:13]>> You are. Wolf, but so are they.

[00:18:14]>> More light.

[00:18:15]>> More light time. makeup on.

[00:18:17]>> No.

[00:18:18]>> Hopefully the other side is less prepared.

[00:18:21]>> Less prepared. We're getting closer.

[00:18:23]We're getting closer. They're less prepared because as the day goes on, what can you end up with?

[00:18:28]>> Reinforcement.

[00:18:29]>> Thank you. YOU COULD END UP with reinforcements.

[00:18:32]Okay. You end up with more people.

[00:18:37]And sometimes in these battles, it is about numbers. when they would fire volleys, when they would fire a a group shot effort, it is it is sheer numbers that they're looking for. Okay? Many times numbers can overpower. You can you may have the best tactical position, strategic position, but sometimes if you have more people, just the sheer volume can help um overcome some of those disadvantages. All right? So, that's why Lee wants to attack in the morning and various other reasons. Nonetheless, he wants to attack in the morning. will not happen. All right, the attack will not happen. It will not happen until roughly 4:00 in the afternoon. That is a massive amount of time for things to change, for lines to adjust. And that's exactly what will happen here in the peach or this area will change. We'll look at this and then we'll move over into some shade.

[00:19:31]The area of the peach or Captain Johnson said it was empty. Well, as time ticks on, it starts to become less and less empty, though he would not know this.

[00:19:41]General me, who arrives on the field late July 1 into early morning, July 2, is taking a look at his line down Cemetery Ridge, and he realizes that same problem. We have a flank in the air. The Union line was on Cemetery Hill. And let's connect the dots. It ran down Cemetery Ridge roughly to where you see the obelisk, the George Washington monument. It's really the US regulars monument and then connects to the Pennsylvania Memorial.

[00:20:14]Now, it's not one massive line of people, but if you were to connect the dots, you would start to see this line taking shape.

[00:20:24]Me realizes that yes, that flank is in the air. And what he wants is he wants the Union line extended south. He wants it extended down Cemetery Ridge, we can see a nice gap in the trees. If you can see the red barn, that's the Troal farm.

[00:20:39]Looking directly behind that into those open fields, that's still Cemetery Ridge. It would extend down to the hills off to your right known as the round tops. Little round top, big round top.

[00:20:54]Me realizes this high ground to his south is important. We need to hold that because we don't want the enemy to be on the high ground. Okay. He will assign this task to General Dan Sickls, commander of the Union Third Corps.

[00:21:11]General Dan Sickles is political appointee.

[00:21:14]He has fought in some other battles. Um, and when he receives these orders, he's going to look around and he's not going to be 100% sure about them.

[00:21:28]He was given them, but he's not 100% sure about them. Sickless is going to from those open fields beyond the Trussa farm look for higher ground. He feels that's a valley. I can give that to him.

[00:21:41]You can see that cemetery. Oh, there's a nice bus traveling right where Sichls is kind of supposed to be. It's traveling north.

[00:21:51]It does kind of dip down into a little bit of a valley before it does extend up to the round tops. I'll give him that.

[00:21:58]He wants higher ground. He doesn't want to be stuck in this position for reasons that he has. He will eventually look at this area, this rise of ground as higher ground and he will opt to move his third core here.

[00:22:15]When you do that, see if I can demonstrate this with I should I need longer arms. But so when you have a battle line, it's all nice and connected, right? The idea is that you have troops to your left, troops to your right. YOU CAN RELY on them if things start getting hot.

[00:22:34]What sickles will do is sickles will move his 10,000man third core out into this area and he will disconnect those lines.

[00:22:46]Now he creates something called a salient.

[00:22:51]He creates a salient that's kind of extra what I call bump on a log. All right, we are now way out here. But he has also created something else. He has now created multiple flanks. He has disconnected this line. Now this flank is still in the air and what will be eventually out here is still in the air.

[00:23:12]What does this look like?

[00:23:15]We will sort of use this peach orchard as the point of what is called a salient. A salient is an upside down V.

[00:23:23]All right, we're going to use these trees as the point. And generally speaking, his men would be here at the point. They would head this direction to the east toward the round tops.

[00:23:35]They wouldn't be on them, though. They would be below them in this rocky outcropping called Devil's Dent. Then they would travel along the Emttsburg Road north past the Sharpie Farm, which we'll see in a minute, but ending roughly where you see a red barn with a white house across from it up the Emmensburg Road. Not the red barn with the three kilos on top. The one closer to us with the white house across the street. So now we have a salient sticking out here. This bump on a log.

[00:24:10]We are disconnected from the main union position.

[00:24:14]This is happening about 2 in the afternoon.

[00:24:17]Lee on Seminary Ridge is still well his men on Seminary Ridge are still under the impression that no one is out here.

[00:24:27]But as time ticks on, remember those reasons why you attack early. Things have now changed. What we're going to do now is going to gather our stuff. We're going to walk over to the Shery farm.

[00:24:37]We'll grab some shade. We'll talk about the action unfolding on the afternoon and what that means for those men in this new position.

[00:24:51]Excuse me. All right. Um Okay. Enjoy the shade. take it in a brief respite from the feet for a few minutes. Bless you.

[00:25:03]>> Okay, you're welcome.

[00:25:05]>> So, we mentioned uh let's reorient ourselves. We are here at the Joseph Shery house. He owned a number of peach orchards and an orchards in and around the area. Uh one of which was where we were standing before we came over here.

[00:25:28]When we talked about General Lee wanting to attack in the early morning, his hope was, and now we're a little bit closer to Seminary Ridge. We can see this a little bit better. Again, tree line over to our west, Seminary Ridge. Lee's army, as I mentioned, General Me's army did not come all the way down to the round tops just yet. Lee's army did not come all the way down into the tree line that you see before you. They were still uh bringing up reinforcements as we talked about over there. And again, the original plan was to bring the reinforcements hidden behind these trees down into this area, form a battle line across the Emittsburg Road and attack this direction towards Cemetery Hill.

[00:26:12]That's the first plan.

[00:26:14]Well, with delays that would take place in the morning of July 2nd, there were questions about the plan. There was questions about, well, maybe we should disengage from what was happening here in Gettysburg, and maybe we should shift the Confederate troops to the south, get in between here and Washington DC, and force the Union Army to attack that way.

[00:26:42]that was sort of in thinking with some of the original uh strategy in that Lee when he's coming up into enemy territory does not necessarily want to be offensive. You don't want to be attack attack.

[00:26:56]Uh he is away 150 miles away from his supply line. He is not, you know, within a friendly area. So supply getting supplies is going to be hard. Getting extra troops would be difficult. We're not just jumping on an airplane or a train even and sending people up, folks.

[00:27:13]They arrived here via marching 10, 5, 15, 30, 28 miles a day, just depending on what was required.

[00:27:23]So, one of the ideas was, let's disconnect, let's disengage and move around. Lee wasn't really thinking along those lines now anymore, especially with the advantage he gained on July 1st. uh the success that he gained on July 1st.

[00:27:39]And so he wants to continue these attacks.

[00:27:43]But as time goes on, we get through some delays. Now we've got other delays marching. There's thousands of Confederate troops trying to get down into this position. And they are taking the long way around the bunk. That's the best I can describe it. They were headed one way. They were seen by the Union Army. They had to turn around and go another way. Um it's like a big traffic dam. you just don't, you know, turn around and reroute. Sometimes you got to wait for the people in the front to get out of the way before you can get gun.

[00:28:12]Same idea.

[00:28:14]So, it's taking time and time and time.

[00:28:17]And for the Confederates, that time means that the Union front, the Union battle line is changing. Also, they don't know that, but it is.

[00:28:27]When the Confederate forces finally arrive in this southern portion of the field, we're looking at about 12, 1:30, 2:00 in the afternoon.

[00:28:40]A historian's friend, the public historian's friend is always the word approximately.

[00:28:46]So you can approximately 12 between 12 and two people showed up. Okay? Not everybody had their watches synced, their iPhones together.

[00:28:58]They arrive here in the early afternoon and they pop through the trees. Not all of them, but a handful of them. And when they pop through the trees, slightly dramatic, but the picture in front of them has changed. And it has changed significantly.

[00:29:16]It's not just a skirmish line in front of them. It's not just a random regiment holding space.

[00:29:23]Now, there is there are 10,000 Union soldiers potentially in their front. One of my favorite quotes from a historian.

[00:29:34]Now, this is not from a battle participant, but it's from a historian analyzing, synthesizing all the things that happened here. His name is Harry F.

[00:29:43]He wrote a great book called July 2nd.

[00:29:47]One of the Confederate commanders who popped through those trees was named General Lafayette McClaus. And this is what Harry Fawn surmised how McClaus would have reacted when he came through those trees and saw the Union front.

[00:30:02]He said, "If Mcclaus had sworn mighty oaths when forced to counter march a few hours earlier that day, he must have strained his vocabulary after studying the federal position along the Emittsburg River.

[00:30:17]That's a very polite way of saying we, you know, we've got some stuff in front of us now. And what does that mean?

[00:30:26]We talked about that salient. We talked about the peach orchard being the the point of that V. Well, along this Emittsburg road on the eastern side to start the Union, there would be Union troops again down to the red barn. There would be Union troops from that peach orchard. Now we can see the higher hills. Actually the high hill beyond our monument here is big round top. The smaller hill adjacent to it a slight clearing of trees is little roundtop.

[00:30:56]The rest of that salient goes toward them but not on top of them.

[00:31:03]McClaus is expecting open ground. He is expecting um you know wide open ocean on his way to attack the Union position.

[00:31:12]And now he's got 10,000 people in his front and no plan to go with that.

[00:31:19]So now the plan will change as plans do as battle plans do. There's a there's a common thing and if you visited other battlefields, grab some shade for a second. Um that people well at least here in Gettysburg and maybe in other fields as well.

[00:31:35]People will ask, "Well, what would have happened if Stonewall Jackson was here?

[00:31:40]what the Confederates have won the battle of Getty. Uh, another thing is, well, what would have happened if Sickles did not move out?

[00:31:50]You what what would have happened to July 2nd? Would there have been a larger turning point and we wouldn't have even got to July 3rd and pick its charge?

[00:31:57]Well, those questions are all valid.

[00:32:02]However, they're extremely hard to answer. They're so hard to answer because once you step one foot forward, once you make a change in a plan, everything else has to fall in line for your, you know, conception of the the victory or or whatever to actually occur.

[00:32:24]So, the original plan is now gone for the Confederate army. They have to come up with something new. They cannot now take their line and throw it across the Emittsburg Road. They've got Union soldiers in their front. And what would that do? Where would it place the Union soldiers if the Confederates were to line up like this?

[00:32:46]>> On their flank. Exactly. Weak, weak position. Don't want to do that.

[00:32:56]So, what can they do?

[00:33:01]They will decide up above in the Confederate army will decide on something called an inch echelon attack.

[00:33:10]They will take not the entire Confederate army at the same time, but they will take portions of the Confederate army in smaller chunks, smaller pieces, one at a time. And the idea behind this is, and I'll use you guys again as an example.

[00:33:29]If I am IF I AM YOUR ENEMY and I have a battle line and I am attacking echelon, I am going to send one component of troops, one unit. In this case, we would call it uh they're attacking by brigade.

[00:33:47]So 1,200 men give or take you know depending on the brigade. But what we would do is I would say, "Okay, down this line, starting here from my perspective, you're going to attack at 4:00. The next brigade attacks at 4:30.

[00:34:04]The next brigade comes in and attacks at 5." So, it's like an incremental attack.

[00:34:10]And what this does is it starts to apply pressure. It's a rolling wave of attacks. What does that do to the enemy?

[00:34:21]Or what does it prevent them from doing?

[00:34:24]>> Any idea?

[00:34:25]>> Reinforcing that section.

[00:34:27]>> Yes, it prevents. So if I'm attacking down here, if I launch this attack down here and oh wait, now there's a new one right here and you guys, you know what's coming, right? You know that one's coming up here and then one's coming up here. What you cannot do is you can't leave your post to go help them because what does that create here? gap, >> a gap, >> right? We don't want that because it creates a gap and it creates flanks and then it creates a whole mess, right? So, in an echelon attack keeps that line occupied and that's what the Confederate army will end up doing by brigade level. They will uh extend beyond the tree line that you see. Follow that tree line as far south as you possibly can and it continues around and that's where the start of that inch echelon attack will begin. And where are they going to go?

[00:35:24]They're going to be way down beyond the peach orchard and attacking toward little roundtop.

[00:35:31]Let me say that again. The Confederates are going to line up way down around the south here and they're going to launch this attack about 4:00 and they're going to attack right toward Little Roundtop for the Union Army. What's the problem with that?

[00:35:47]>> Nobody's on little round.

[00:35:48]>> Nobody's on it. Remember we said that Sickle Swine ends down below in this big rocky outcropping called Devil's Den.

[00:35:56]Nobody. Well, there's a few people, but really nobody large scale is on little round pockets.

[00:36:06]And if I stand like this, if you are sick men and you are now going to start receiving this attack across the line and your salient is facing them roughly, where is your weakest point?

[00:36:24]What is the weakest point of this salient?

[00:36:28]>> The front. The point. The point right in the peach orchard which is going to be held by the 68th Pennsylvania. I'm not going to get too in the weeds with numbers of regiments.

[00:36:41]But infantry attacks are always going to be supported by artillery.

[00:36:48]Get to artillery here in a little bit.

[00:36:50]Always supported by artillery. So, they're going to start launching. The Confederates are going to start launching what could be called a canon a you wear down the enemy before you actually send in your infantry men because artillery if we had a cannonball come right here. It would probably wipe 60% of you out depending on the type of shot. If it was shell that exploded above raining shrapnel down if it's a solid shot might be a little bit Last one on the casualty number. Solid shot is best used on the flank because it acts like a bowling ball and just kind of goes right through.

[00:37:29]But one of the soldiers talked about the artillery fire that they were under.

[00:37:41]Okay, there we go. Find my quote for the Union Army when the Confederates launch their artillery.

[00:37:50]Take a look. and you've experienced it that you've experienced it today. The Union Army is out here and they have absolutely nothing to protect them, right? You might hide under some peach trees. You might have a larger tree. You might have some fence boards that might provide you some protection, but really the scope of what they were facing is surmised very well from this soldier.

[00:38:19]He said,"None of the various duties which a soldier is called upon to perform, and none of the various vicissitudes and dangers that he is expected to face call for such bravery and endurance as thus remaining passive under an enemy's artillery fire that has got an accurate range and from which there is no protection."

[00:38:43]We were going to summarize that.

[00:38:46]We were gonna chat GPT. That what that means is we're out here. We're infantry for the Union Army. We are laying down on the ground. We have absolutely nothing to protect us really.

[00:39:01]And now we have cannonballs screaming overhead and there is nothing we can do about it because what have we now been asked to do? We've been asked to defend the high ground.

[00:39:13]Defend means you don't go anywhere. It means you stay. You stay till the last.

[00:39:19]Right? We've heard that expression a lot through the Civil War. A lot of artillery units, uh, artillery batteries, infantry units, hold to the last. Stay to the last. And there is nothing that they can do but receive the artillery fire from along Seminary Ridge and wait until the order is given to defend their position.

[00:39:43]And during that living through that some who did not. And you never know when that whistle comes overhead exactly where that shell or shot is going to land.

[00:39:57]So the artillery barrage starts. THE CONFEDERATES HAVE AN ADVANTAGE on an absolute beautiful field of fire.

[00:40:04]They have absolutely open ground and they will eventually launch the infantry assault by 4:00 to our south attacking little round top. The infantry uh Alabama Texans are going to begin the attack and it will roll up to about 5:00 here approximately 5:00.

[00:40:28]And now some Mississippi Mississippi troops that have been chomping at the bit to get into this fray are ready to attack.

[00:40:38]They've also been waiting.

[00:40:40]Now what they have not been dealing with is a ton of Union artillery response.

[00:40:47]There would be some artillery brought up into this area.

[00:40:51]uh Buckland's guns are going to be brought up here divided amongst the different buildings and firing into the uh eventual advancing confederates. But when Sickles moved out, he was not able to bring a significant amount of artillery. A lot of that artillery doesn't end up here. It actually ends up along the Wheatfield Road, which we'll see in a minute.

[00:41:13]But the press begins. Now, take a look over to that ridge. You are these Union soldiers. Eventually, some of the infantrymen will advance beyond the Sharpie barn. They did have a skirmish line out there to kind of hold things off for a minute, but you're looking out there and now you see the gray rise and you start to see them coming across the fields and you have to hold your position. And they continue and you hold your position and they continue. Yeah, they'll start opening fire. And you might be able to reply, artillery is still now slinging back and forth.

[00:41:50]The barn that you see is not the original Sherpy barn. There was a barn here.

[00:41:56]Uh tons of hay inside of it. And as the Mississippi soldiers would press, infantry units would move up beyond the uh Sherpy house. They would take fire.

[00:42:07]The Confederates would reply back. And not long after the attack starts, this position, the Union position starts to waver. The point of that salient is getting hit now from two different directions. That peach torch is getting hit from troops coming across this way, but also all of those units further to the south have now swung around. And if you are in the peach orchard facing south, I'm now the Confederate army coming directly at you.

[00:42:42]This line starts to waver. It cannot maintain its formation. The 68th PA will start to fall back. There are other units from New York that begin to advance and support, but it cannot hold on to this position.

[00:42:59]Now, if you are an infantry soldier, one of the best things that you can do is make friends with an artillery man because they are your protection when you have to retreat cuz they have the firepower. And soon what will start to happen is this line will waver. There's intense fighting as the Confederates advance. The barn all of a sudden has been um smoldering because of the artillery fire and rifle fire taking place. Unfortunately, it will burn to the ground and unfortunately will take some of the wounded and dead soldiers.

[00:43:35]But Sickle's line is not going to stay here long. It will soon start to collapse. And as it starts to collapse, it will need assistance from its artillery batteries to help protect those men that ironically are fleeing back to that ridge in the distance, Cemetery Ridge, where they actually should have started in the first. So with this, we are now going to dive into an artillery unit, the 9inth Massachusetts, and we are going to follow their support and retreat along with some of the infantry units of the 21st Mississippi who'll be pursuing the 9inth Massachusetts and we're going to make our way to the trestle. Okay, what we're going to do is we're going to kind of cross uh in the same fashion. So, let's all cross over the road to the grassy area. We'll then walk back to the peach orchard intersection and we'll head down to the ninth mass.

[00:44:39]>> Okay. As we were walking down, you may have noticed u some artillery pieces.

[00:44:45]That's the fifth Massachusetts battery representation. And here these green colored guns is the ninth Massachusetts.

[00:44:54]uh plenty more artillery along what is called the wheatfield road. This was a farm lane during the battle and was utilized for the artillery support.

[00:45:04]Remember when I said the point of that that peach orchard is the point of the Union salient that Vshape coming down this direction toward Little Roundtop would eventually be uh Union infantry, but a majority of the space was actually going to be held by these artillery pieces in the interim. So you have infantry up on kind of that hill proper up in the peach orchard support with artillery down the weedfield road and then more infantry behind this tree line this near tree line right here heading toward Devil's Den and Little Roundtop when the Confederates launched. We talked about uh briefly the Mississippians that would be attacking in this direction. They would be coming from Seminary Ridge across those open fields to the Sherpie farm where we were standing. They would push the Union Army back and in the fields behind you is where a number of New York troops reinforcements would be coming up.

[00:46:03]Brewster's brigade and then the initial deployment of Sickle men starts to retreat back through here.

[00:46:13]As the Mississippians were attacking, they have four brigades. They have the 13th, 17th, and 18th Mississippi along with the 21st Mississippi. I say all that not for you to remember, but it's uh four entities. Okay. What's going to happen is they're going to break up percentage-wise 7525.

[00:46:33]75% of Barkstdale's brigade is going to follow those retreating Union soldiers, crash into the support from New York and continue down the fields off to your rear beyond the troal farm behind that farm through those fields. One unit, the 21st Mississippi, is going to see an opportunity and the road will help us with this. You can see where the cars are coming from up the Wheatfield Road.

[00:47:00]THAT IS THE 21st Mississippi approaching. They get to the Emittsburg road and they see an opportunity.

[00:47:09]They see a line of artillery along the road facing what way?

[00:47:14]>> South.

[00:47:15]>> This way. Facing south. And that infantry says, "Perfect.

[00:47:20]We are going to roll up these guns."

[00:47:23]What is one of the best things that you can do when you are facing artillery?

[00:47:28]What's one of the best outcomes that can happen when you are facing artillery?

[00:47:35]>> Say again.

[00:47:36]>> Over you.

[00:47:37]>> Well, okay. Yeah, they can shoot. Okay.

[00:47:40]Yes. Obviously, it goes over. I'm good.

[00:47:43]But >> you captured it. Captured them. Turn it around.

[00:47:46]>> Thank you. Capture that gun and turn it around. Now, no slight to anyone who's in the modern artillery, but it doesn't take a rocket scientist to fire the gun.

[00:47:57]It takes a good mathematician to aim it and have that perfect arc and it's well beyond me. All the little math and I don't know, physics and letters when you add it into math. It's not my thing. But it doesn't take a rocket scientist to fire the gun. All you have to do is again be friends with your artillery people and talk and watch them and figure out, oh, it's just this, this, this. All we need is five people. Boom.

[00:48:22]As long as we have the right accutrants, we can do this. And so the best thing you can possibly do is capture a gun and turn it around and fire it. And actually, it's also, you know, in a sense, one of the most insulting things is to have your own guns turned around on you and now be fired and used against you. But the 21st Mississippi gets to the crest of this hill. I mean, we can see it, right? We can see the crest.

[00:48:52]>> Yeah.

[00:48:52]>> Here we go. Perfect car opportunity coming over. They see the guns and they say, "Jackpot. If we can turn these around, we can help obliterate." Cuz these can fire 3/4 of a mile. You know, the black ones a mile, mile and a half.

[00:49:08]All things, you know, perfect considered.

[00:49:13]So what is going to happen is the and artillery men do not have rifles, okay? They're not carrying rifles. They cannot just stop what they're doing and fire. They can also not just whip the cannon around and take care of what's coming. Okay? It's a little bit more complicated than that.

[00:49:33]The fifth is going and other batteries up top are going to start to receive that initial brunt. Especially once the 68 starts pushing through, they will start following back as well. And it will be left to this battery right here, the 9inth Massachusetts, to hold at all costs.

[00:49:49]Remember we mentioned that at the Sherpie uh house being told hold at all costs. You must you must defend to the last because if you don't, more lives could be sacrificed.

[00:50:02]Sacrifice the few to protect the many.

[00:50:07]So the 9inth Massachusetts first time in battle July 2nd 1863 at roughly 56 o'clock in the afternoon and they are told don't leave hold to the last as these men as the artillery batteries and infantry and start retreating through the field the night Massachusetts has to do something. They need to protect all sides of those retreating men. So they will create not a battle line so to speak, but they will create a shape going down through this field and they will retreat in this shape. It's a shape of a horseshoe or semicircle.

[00:50:46]Okay, they need to do that because Confederate troops are coming through the Rose Farm directly to our south, that stone building. Remember I said they launched at 4:00? Well, guess what?

[00:50:57]They're still coming. So we have troops, Confederate troops advancing here. We have the 21st Mississippi advancing here. We may the Union Army may or may not know it, but we got Wford's Georgian coming behind us advancing as another wave of that attack. We had the Inchelon attack continuing up Seminary Ridge. So there's fire coming from behind. They're trying to protect at all costs. They make this horseshoe here and they will begin to retreat. They are firing as they do so. This is called Retreat by Prolong. There is this cool thing. You can see the guns.

[00:51:36]They have this gray green gray olive thing that goes down to the ground. It's called the trail, right? It keeps it.

[00:51:43]You actually attach that. That's how you get it out here. You limber that up, pull it out here with some horses. Well, the horses are way hundreds of yards back. Okay?

[00:51:56]They're not going to be in the mix of things cuz once those horses are gone, you have no way to get the guns out.

[00:52:04]But we have to maintain fire and we have to retreat at the same time. So we we are going to retreat by prolong.

[00:52:11]At the end of that trail is a very small circle in which you would attach kind of this tea thing that attaches to a long rope. Okay?

[00:52:21]And what will happen is once you fire one of those guns, you have a natural recoil.

[00:52:30]You'll never believe this, but I spent the summer on a cannon crew in Vixsburg, Mississippi in wool. Where's my wool compatrio? In the back. Okay. In wool. It was hot. And we fired Napoleons. That's what those are called.

[00:52:48]They're green. They're brown.

[00:52:51]bronze guns during the battle they turn green. Get a patina without any ammunition in it. It has a three to four foot recoil which is pretty impressive. Like you don't get your feet near that and then you got to roll the gun back up into in that case uh the firing spot and you fire again.

[00:53:10]Well, the Knife Massachusetts is going to use that recoil now probably about 6 feet or more cuz we've got powder um extra powder and we've got a shell or a shot in there. They're going to use this pro this recoil to their advantage. And what they're going to do is they're going to tie that prolong rope.

[00:53:29]Watch that prolong attach the prolong rope. When they fire, the artillery men are going to yank those cannons back to use that momentum, that recoil momentum to keep them going. but also they're going to be loading at the same time. So while that piece is moving back, the number one men, the two men, the three, the four are all working together in this dance to reload that piece under fire and protect their soldiers.

[00:53:58]We're now going to walk the path roughly of the 9inth Massachusetts. We're going to end up at the trousel farm and conclude our program.

[00:54:08]All right.

[00:54:12]So, we made it. Most of us, most of us made it. Um, I want you to take a quick look behind you, uh, you will see not a lot, which is important. Um, you will see that we have come, and you'll probably have noticed when we came through the field to this direction, we were descending the terrain. we've ended up in a little bit of a valley.

[00:54:39]Um, the 9inth Mass, the 21st Mississippi are going to do, of course, much the same.

[00:54:46]So, as I mentioned, the Ninth Massachusetts makes this horseshoe. Okay, they are setting up this defensive position because they have Confederates coming from the south, they have Confederates coming from the west, South Carolinians, Mississippians, some Georgian.

[00:55:03]Um, we talked about the recoil of these guns.

[00:55:07]When you make a horseshoe, it's a big horseshoe, but when you make this horseshoe and these guns are firing kind of, you know, in this fashion from left to right, right to left, as they are retreating and they start to recoil, what begins to happen to that horseshoe?

[00:55:24]>> Collapses.

[00:55:25]>> Starts to collapse a little bit.

[00:55:28]They need to be aware of the infantry men uh retreating back through them.

[00:55:33]They are their position itself is collapsing and they are also realizing that there has been no one else sent up to help them. Remember the 9inth Massachusetts was told hold to the last defend at all costs.

[00:55:49]They were their position begins to collapse and they are moving back through these fields toward the position right here. There was uh some actually there was a question as we were walking earlier about the rock walls. Are they original? Are they not? They many of them are in original locations. They may not be the exact original rocks that were there. They were rebuilt in over time. There were probably more a lot more especially right here. There was a significant rock wall here with a gate.

[00:56:18]There was not a nice open to road for a retreat. Um there was a very narrow gate and the ninth mass would retreat back up to this gate. That was the only entrance egress point for themselves for their pieces. Uh the 21st Mississippi comes charging over the ridge as the ninth mass puts up this final defense right here in front of the troal house in the tros farm. They put up a final defense. The 21st comes across screaming, hollering. Uh the soldiers, a lot of the Union soldiers would write that they had never seen anything like this before. Uh one soldier wrote that, and again, we talk about memory a little bit. Are we always 100% accurate when we're writing everything down? One of the soldiers wrote that, and I don't know how they did this, because these guns get hot if you fire them a lot, but they said one Confederate soldier came up and straddled the gun, sat on top of it as, you know, they're hooting and hollering and and, you know, intimidating and encouraging the men to move on. Again, they get really hot, so I don't know, you know, how that was possible. Maybe it was true.

[00:57:40]The ninth mass will hold. The Union Army will be able to pull most of its troops back. Obviously, there are dead and wounded out on the field.

[00:57:50]The retreat does continue though through the gates. You can't see it. The house is blocking us, unfortunately. But to Cemetery Ridge, some of you might be able to see it through these open trees here, but nonetheless, the tree line um off in the distance They will retreat back to Cemetery Ridge. They will retreat back to where they should have started. Their battle line should have been in the first place.

[00:58:18]The Confederate attack.

[00:58:20]The 13th, 17th, and 18th Mississippi are running through the fields behind us.

[00:58:24]They are going to get blocked by a group of New Yorkers, Willard's Brigade. The Confederate assaults continue up Seminary Ridge. And there was a momentary breakthrough in the Union line.

[00:58:40]Will Cox's men, General Wilcox's Confederates moment Oh, sorry. Um, >> thank you.

[00:58:49]>> Writes men are going to momentarily break through the Union position.

[00:58:57]Depending on who you read, they made it all the way to Cemetery Hill. Um, but really I think they broke through momentarily, fractured the Union line for a second and then unfortunately for them that in echelon attack did not continue the full way up the Confederate position. It started to fade out.

[00:59:16]Nonetheless, the damage had been done to both armies.

[00:59:20]By the end of July 2nd, the fighting rages from roughly 400 p.m. till about 7 8:00 p.m. depending on who you read. Um but the Confederate army for as much havoc as they wre in this multiple you know this multi-unit assault across seminary ridge they are not able to push the Union army off of much that yes they push them off of the peach orchard and yes they push them off of the Emittsburg road and yes they had a momentary breakthrough but by that point there was no other support coming.

[00:59:56]They gain the Confederate army would gain the peach orchard in the Emittsburg road, but it's really no man's land.

[01:00:02]It's far so far. Think about where we started. It's so far from the Union position and it's in the middle of the two lines that it really wasn't worth much sign a significant loss for not much of a position gain at that point.

[01:00:22]July 2nd can be considered by many a tie um in in the sense that the Union Army maintained Little Roundtop.

[01:00:31]They maintained Cemetery Ridge. The Confederate army gained the Peach Orchard. Some of the Emittsburg road did not lose any of Seemin Ridge.

[01:00:42]the great loss of life of course but uh groundwise terrainwise not much exchanged not much not much changed from the evening of July 2nd to the morning of July 2nd lines lengthened but nothing much was exchanged Lee wasn't deterred he was actually slightly encouraged with that breakthrough in the union position way up on Cemetery Ridge. He can now look to the next day. He can look to July 3rd and he sees there's potential promise because if that one brigade was able to break through, imagine what he could do with thousands of men. And so July 2nd will set the stage now for July 3rd, 1863.

[01:01:35]And with that, I'm not going into July 3rd, 1863. I'm done. No. Um, I want to thank everybody for coming out. It was a warm one. I want to thank you all for hanging with us. Um, please make sure when you're done this, you take care of yourselves, hydrate, get in some air conditioning. Uh, if you have any questions, we can chat um, kind of offline. But other than that, again, thank you for coming out and I hope you enjoy the rest of your day.

[01:02:02]Thank you.