I'd like to welcome you to Gettysburg National
Military Park, and a special part of the park known as Little Round Top, I'm ranger Chuck
Teague, it's my honor to serve you and to be able to interpret the battle. We have a variety of ranger programs each
day to help you understand this very complex battle. What we're going to be focusing on here is
just one small part of the battlefield, the battlefield is almost 25 square miles and
this particular sector of the battlefield becomes very very famous. What is the value of real estate, if you've
ever bought or sold property obviously the cost of that is going to be very much a matter
of concern, and I can tell many people who come out here for the first time and look
out over this vista, and I can almost see their eyes widen, imagine a retirement home
up here, maybe a vacation home up here, something like that. By the way, sunsets on little round top, do
come back, they're gorgeous from up here. This is a great vantage point to see the battlefield. We're going to talk about what the cost of
this property would be though, because it is enormous and far beyond our capabilities
today. When you ever get on any place on the battlefield,
you need to get your orientation, again, we're on one of many elevations at Gettysburg, this
one's commonly known as little round top. Big Round Top is the elevation to the south
of us, that was fully covered with trees at the time of the battle. That's the highest elevation that you can
find here, little round top wasn't called little round top, many names were given to
this, the one that stuck was little round top. Once you get up here you realize it's not
round at all, it's a rocky craggy ridge which extends northwards. Many elevations in the area were considered
at the time a part of round top, round top is a large conical hill, and little round
top, Bushman's hill, Munchauer's knoll, Devil's den, are all part of what the locals used
to call round top. Look to the North, you can see another elevation,
not so high as us, but that is Cemetery Hill. Almost directly North of us you might make
out a little water tower that is peeking through the woods. Cemetery Hill would be the heart of the battlefield. To the West we have a ridge of trees and a
mountain which is called South Mountain, obviously with multiple elevations, and beyond that
is the great valley, in Pennsylvania that's known as the Cumberland valley, it reaches
down through into Virginia as the Shenandoah valley. Some of the men first arriving here from the
Union side, they're primarily coming up the road which extends up, you can see a bus in
the distance, and several red barns in the distance, that is the Emmitsburg road coming
up from Maryland, about 8 miles to the South of us. This was not an important elevation initially,
it becomes that as the battle goes through its second day, but initially not much of
anything is concerned with this ground. Again you've got two roads coming in from
the west, along the Emmitsburg road and what we call Pumping station road, on which Union
forces would be coming in. There are two roads to the East, the Taneytown
road just behind this hill and the Baltimore Pike, on which further Union forces would
be coming in. When the Yankees were driven back, see that
red barn with the three spikes? Look beyond it and you can see a white steeple,
at the Lutheran seminary. That steeple was not there in 1863, nor was
that barn, but it gives us a good landmark. It was several miles west of that location
where the white steeple is where the first shots were fired, and the Union forces would
be pulling back through the course of the afternoon, in fact would be hammered back
about 4-4:30 in the afternoon from the points to the west and the points to the north which
we cannot see here. The Union forces would be driven back to that
Cemetery Hill and initially form what they called a horseshoe line. A horseshoe line wrapped around the hill and
would eventually be called a horseshoe with wings. Nobody was up here initially, again, this
elevation was not immediately seen as valuable, except to the signal corps. The signal corps was an important role in
the war because not only were they used for observation, but communication, and they would
do it at long distances. There's a boulder actually over there, we
won't go by it but you may want to later, which has a bronze plaque which honors the
work of the signal corps. Signal corps would have squads of maybe 4
or 5 guys and they would go out and take positions. This is a photograph of the position we're
on now, seen from down on the corner of the wheat field, and you can see this was cleared
of trees in 1863 prior to the battle. That's because we make it more tactically
valuable, again, big round top, full of timber, harder to get around, harder to see. Here you have a much more tactically valuable
position. So your corps will get up here, and maybe
like this gentleman were standing up here, high up, and he might have a flag, and the
signal corps position would actually communicate with cemetery hill with flags. This is a grainy photograph, not from Gettysburg,
but it does show a signal corps unit, you can see a man with a flag, you can see a man
with a telescope, another man who's holding the horses, maybe 4 guys altogether. With a telescope he can see far distances,
not only can he see to cemetery hill where there's another signal corps station, but
if you look off to the southwest perhaps you can make out the hill with the ski slope in
it, and on the hill to the right of that is Jack's mountain. When the atmospheric conditions were good,
they always weren't, but when they were good you could get a flag bearer there waving this
red and white flag who could be seen by the guy with the telescope here and vice versa,
and they could actually communicate. So from cemetery hill, to little round top,
to Jack's mountain, and then down to Maryland and then to the telegraph lines. Obviously they're communicating, but what
are they communicating? Largely they're communicating what they're
seeing. Obviously you get up here, and just as today
you can see a grand sweep of the battlefield, they then could see a lot of the battlefield. We're talking about 4 Yankees who are the
first ones who have probably seen any value at all in this ground. We're still in July 1st, in the evening, but
that evening, Robert E. Lee, who's again up near the seminary, that's a good point where
we can remind ourselves where he would be observing, he's watching the Union line forming
wrapped around the hill. It is a crescent line with wings ,one going
down the cemetery ridge and the other heading over to Culp's hill, but the Union forces
that are on the left cannot be seen from the seminary. They're on the lower ground, and actually
it's misleading as you look down there today. You can see all those trees down there, well
this is a photograph that was taken shortly after the battle, and see how few the number
of trees were back then than there are now. So it doesn't seem like it's low ground, but
if you get down there and you walk it you'll see that it is low ground. General Meade, when he first arrives, it's
2 O'clock in the morning, he confers with his commanders, realizes what's happened on
the first day, and he takes a reconnaissance himself at about 4 O'clock in the morning,
the best he can see in the grey of the morning as it would be called. Trying to understand the lay of the land,
as ground is crucial to the fighting of the battle, also where the Confederate forces
are which are wrapping around a larger arc around the hill, and where he decides his
forces to be. His focus is towards the town, because the
front of his army is at cemetery hill facing the front, and in the morning hours he looks
off to the right and he realizes there's a possible vulnerability that the Confederates
might attack over at Culp's Hill. He becomes very worried about that, I want
to emphasize that because this is the backwash of the battlefield, this is not important
if you're going to be making attacks or receiving attacks over at Culp's hill. He first of all thinks there's going to be
a confederate attack and then he plans one of his own, over here. And again, the only value for this ground
here is observation and communication. Tactically it's not seen of any particular
value. He does submit a map, and the map has positions
that he wants each of his corps to be in, and his 3rd corps will be stretched out through
the cemetery ridge all the way down through that low ground there. The commander who takes that position, who's
famously or infamously here, it's Dan Sickles, Dan Sickles, a political general, really brilliant
man but very egotistical, he doesn't like his position there. Throughout the course of the morning communications
back and forth with Meade about his being stuck in a hole, in a morass, and not liking
where he was. The map that Meade submits to each of the
corps commanders for positions does suggest that artillery would be up here, but it has
infantry lined up here and on the lower ground, and indeed does have the 3rd corps to have
forces to its left extending out. Initially there will be cavalry out there,
but those cavalry forces under John Buford will eventually disappear. They had been at the peach orchard, which
is out in this direction amoungst those trees, general Sickles is still worried because he
has troops coming in on the Emmitsbirg road coming up. He's got wagons coming up, and he wants to
know whether that road is to be held, and he doesn't get a clear understanding about
it, there is a lack of communication between the army commander general Meade and general
Sickles. General Sickles will propose a new line, which
will extend out to that high ground, and particularly when general Buford pulls his forces out and
is relieved by Sickles and his division commander Bernie, is concerned about holding that high
ground. General Hunt will come out from headquarters,
look at it and say "that's preferred ground, however you don't have enough men to manage
that forward position. I'll report back to general Meade and you'll
get further instructions". Those instructions never came, the last instructions
that general Sickles received was that he was to connect with the second corps roughly
where the Pennsylvania memorial is, then he was to reach to round top and occupy it if
possible. Within those instructions, the general views
that he could position his men as he deemed best. Well, he is going to move some men out to
the road and actually have several incremental positions which are not very good, throughout
the course of the afternoon. At this point what I want to do is focus upon
what general Lee is intending. Remember the seminary, general Lee's vantage
point that was on the evening of July 1st, it will be on the morning of July 2nd, very
early in the morning before sunrise he will gather key people together including an engineering
officer named Samuel Johnston. He will explain to Johnston that he needs
to take a reconnaissance of the enemy's left, because remember, Lee cannot see where the
enemy's left is, and Lee is very concerned that if he brings an attack he might be walking
into an ambush. You always have to be careful what kind of
defense might be present before you go. So captain Johnston is ordered to make a reconnaissance
of the enemy's left, the enemy's right can be seen, the enemy's center can be seen, but
the enemy's left just disappears. Samuel Johnston will claim, in a series of
letters, that on the morning of July 2nd, starting at 4 O'clock, he will start at the
Lutheran seminary and he will make his way behind that treeline, out in the distance,
and around. He will claim to have skirted the lower slope
of round top, and he will get to this location
with some scouts. You have 3 or 4 Union guys here, you have
3 or 4 rebels coming up here, no report of them ever seeing each other. He will get back and report back about 7 O'clock
in the morning and when he gets back gives a report that Lee finds to be a pleasing one,
by which Lee plans his action for that day. Captain Johnson will say that the only forces
he saw prepared for battle would be some up at the road. What would he see down here? Well, if he's looking there at say 5:30, 6
O'clock in the morning, he might be seeing the Guirrey's division of the 12th corps moving
out, but he will also see 4 brigades of the 3rd corps sleeping in. They had come through in the night, and they
were sleeping in, not much activity there. Indeed, according to his report, they would
not have been prepared for battle, they were whacked. He gets back and Lee is pleased with the report,
tells Longstreet at 8 O'clock he better get going, and Longstreet is going to be giving
directions that day to plan an attack which will be coming in to strike the left side
of the Union line. The idea is that they will come down behind
those trees in the distance, come around to get into position where the tower is there,
swing around, and they can come sweeping over that high ground at the peach orchard, sweeping
down on those unprepared Union forces, they can rout them and begin to roll up the Union
line. I will tell you, things start out a lot slower
that day for the Confederates than Robert E Lee planned. According to various accounts, Lee wanted
the attack to go in as early as possible in the morning, it goes in at 4 O'clock in the
afternoon. In the meantime, general Sickles is worried
beyond the red barns in the distance because he sees evidence of movements, and maneuvers
by rebel forces out there, he's concerned by what is happening, and indeed when general
Meade calls a council of war at 3 O'clock in the afternoon requiring all his corps commanders
to show up, Sickles sends word that the enemy is forming on his front, and he's too busy. Well, you don't tell your boss you're too
busy to come to a meeting he's called, and so the boss sends a parentary order, general
Meade says "you must come", and Sickles will come over to headquarters and as he arrives,
before he even gets in the building *BOOMBOOMBOOM* in the distance there's the thunder of guns,
and Meade runs out, asks what's going on, and what's happening is the Union forces out
at the peach orchard artillery are firing at the Confederates who are slowly wrapping
more and more around. Meade will tell Sickles to get out there as
soon as possible, he will ride out there himself, he will ride out there and as he goes out
he will be sending General Warren, his aide, actually he's the chief of engineers for the
commanding general of the army of the Potomac, he will send him up to this ground to see
what is going on, expecting he would have a vantage point here as indeed you have today. General Warren gets up here and orders guns
down on the Devil's Den to fire out in the distance of those woods, and he will detect
exactly what Sickles was worried about. I want to quote what he says, because Warren
puts it in a dramatic fashion, "as the shot went whisting through the air the sound of
it reached the enemy's troops and caused everyone to look in the direction of it. This motion revealed to me the glistening
of gun barrels and bayonets of the enemy's line of battle, already formed and far outflanking
the position of any of our troops, so that the line of his advance out to little round
top, was unopposed. I have been most particular in telling this,
because this discovery was intensely thrilling to my feelings, and almost appalling". But he had not realized the rebels were wrapping
around, this was the charge that Longstreet was to be made, although in the meantime they
had adjusted their plan to pull general Wood down from farther there. He realizes the rebels have a pretty clear
shot coming over here, and who is left to defend this ground? We have these maybe 4 signalmen. Hoode has got about 8000 men, ready to attack. There's a speedbump at Devil's den, and about
1300 Yankees who are on a ridge there, as the rebels would be coming in. Obviously K. Warren is quite concerned, quite
concerned about what is about to develop. He has no command of troops himself, he simply
has a couple of aides with him. He sends a couple of aides out with an all
points bulletin, "We need help", as the aides go out looking for help he himself will also
go out seeking for help. By the way, as he goes he sees the signal
corps packing up their telescopes and rolling up their flag and getting ready because they
can see that too, and they know what's about to happen. Warren will tell them "No, you stay here and
make this hill look occupied". So 4 men versus 8000, I'm not too sure they
could deter that attack, but what we have here is a race, and the finish line will be
round top. What we'll do is we'll see rebels coming in,
but what Union forces will be coming here? Again, Warren is not a commander, he cannot
command anyone to come here. His staff officers who have gone out, they
are not commanders, they can't command anyone to come here but hopefully they will find
someone, in fact two brigades will be rushed up, one of which is down at the corner of
the wheat field there. We're going to be talking about the story
of that brigade under a guy from Erie, Pennsylvania by the name of Strong Vincent. But we're going to leave this busy spot and
meander down to ridge line here to get an idea of the race and the rebels, as they're
headed this way, Yankees might be getting here, and see who gets to this bastion, what
Longtree will call Gibraltar, that big rock that was the only entry point to the Mediterranean,
well this would be envisioned as a Gibraltar. If you get forces here, can they possibly
be taken down? let's move on. As we pass this, I want to point out these
guns, I'm going to be talking about these guns here, Charles Hayslett's battery here. We're going to be heading down to a position
where we can see the Confederate attack, but I will be referring back to these cannons. Alright, again, looking off into the distance
you can see dark trees beyond the grassy area, that's where the attack would be beginning. Initially there would be cannon fire going
back and forth, and at about 4 O'clock under the direction of general Longstreet, and under
him general Hood, they would be attacking. Longstreet is in operational command of the
attack which is going to be coming in, and again, he takes his time on July second to
form his troops for the attack, an attack which was supposed to happen as early in the
morning as possible. He ends up starting at 4'Oclock in the afternoon
and that loss of time is going to be a factor. Under him will be 2 division commanders who
are present, he has a 3rd Pickett who's not up, but he'll have McClaws and he'll have
Hood, McClaws by the way was leading the column, and he was told that when he got in position
there he would have basically no one on his front. He peeks through the trees there, looking
at the peach orchard, and says "I've got the whole Union army on my front!", which is a
bit of an exaggeration, but the point is they had to make the change which was shifting
troops under John Bell Hood further South. John Bell Hood is a guy, native of Kentucky,
but he claimed Texas when Kentucky did not secede, this guy was very debonaire with the
women, but he was also fierce on the battlefield. In fact one guy said you could always see
the "Fire of battle" in his eyes. This guy really was one of the great warriors
of this great American Civil War. He initially didn't like his orders, because
the orders from General Lee were to attack up the Emmitsburg road, and he's looking from
his position over there where the trees are and he sees this big rocky hill here. He can probably see the guys waving their
flags, he can also see guns on the hill in front of us, that's Hauke's ridge, and there
is a bit of an optical illusion. From his position he could not tell that there
was a valley here. We call in the plum run valley, between Hauke's
ridge and what we now call little round top, and from his position they sort of merged
or blurred together. So it looked like he had just one big rocky
hill, and he did not want to pass his men in front of this hill, subjected to any fire
coming from that hill, or even as he said just "taking rocks and throwing them down
on us". So he brings about what he calls a digression;
a digression is when you're going to get done what you're told to do, your wife has told
you "come right home after work, but go by the 7/11, get milk and cheese and eggs". So after work you start to do that, but some
friends come and say "Hey, let's go out and get a brew", so you stop by the pub, that's
a digression before you get to the 7/11 before you get home. When the finally get home you have done what
you were told to do, except for that digression. When Hood's digression was to take this hill. So he will send his men in this direction,
rather than sending them up. Indeed, when the attack is underway, as his
men are storming across the fields here, he will actually be hit himself by explosive
shell, hit in the shoulder, it knocks him out of the saddle, and will actually paralyze
his arm for the rest of his life. Indeed, since there's no vice-commander at
any level or deputy commander, you've got to reach down and get the senior subordinate
commander, bring him up, and there's going to be a disruption in command and control
of this attack which is going to be going on in the late afternoon of July second. His men are coming this way, and I have to
be careful here, any of you from Texas? Well me mother, my wife, my son, all from
Texas and they all sort of mock me for trying to pretend I'm a Texan because I'm Pennsylvania
born, but I'm the odd man out in the family. I want to quote a Texan here, and I want to
put the spirit of that Texan in, because they really had a way of talking about what's going
on. So he's among these guys coming across there,
and he just says "In one wild and frantic and desperate run, with yelling and screaming
and shouting, over ditches and up and down hills, through garden fences and shrubbery,
and occasionally dodging as a bullet whisked by the ear, on we go with the same speed. We're jumping over, we're plunging through
creeks, we're pulling through mud, we're struggling through the underbrush and still keeping up
that loud, irregular Confederate yell". By the way, high pitched and wavering, are
you ready to demonstrate it? Ready? *Yelling* Ah, that's not scary at all, I want
to hear a real yell from you. Ready? *yelling*. Well anyways, the Yankees would get chills
up their spine as they would hear that yelling coming across there. Again, who's going to stop them? Well, they have a speed bump up there, Hobart
Ward's brigade is going to do what they can, they have those 4 guns on the top there, but
the rest of us are going to be storming up over that. But in the meantime, what about the Yankees? Well I talked about Strong Vincent, who's
going to be bringing forces in. He is a graduate of Harvard university, not
a professional soldier, but he will be swinging his men around from the rear, swinging them
around here and getting into position, by which he can bring about a blockage to that
attack. He does not bring his men to the high point
of the ground, this is the topographical crest where we are. We're going to try to get a position where
we can understand where he would be, because if you look here through the saddle notice
how our everyday road disappears. When you're at the top of a hill you cannot
see the very bottom of it, it's hidden. So what he needs to do is find the military
crest, and from there will deploy his men. Very heroically, and with great drama, he
will send his men from Michigan, from New York, Pennsylvania, and Maine into position
by which he can try to defend this hill and the left flank of the entire Union army. Let's head on. Have you ever done any reading on the different
divisions between the units with the rebel yell? That's correct, there was some competitions
between units as to how they would do it, to try to one up the other units. The only sound recordings we have, we have
one from an old codger many years up in age, and he's trying to give it, but they all agreed
that it was sort of high pitched and wavering, like an Indian yell. Okay we have come down off the topographical
crest somewhat, but I want you to look down to the monument directly behind me, to the
16th Michigan. That is gonna be the unit that Strong Vincent
will put on his right, and then to his left with be the New Yorkers, although their monument
will be at the top. And then the Pennsylvanians and eventually
we'll get to those guys from Maine. As they're coming up here he is getting his
men down to a position where he can see the base. The military crest is valuable for several
reasons. As I mentioned, you can see the base of the
hill, that does not allow the enemy time to reform and to prepare for an attack, it also
allows you, if you're driven back, to still have defendable ground. If you're up here and you're driven back,
you're off the hill altogether. Down there you have room to come back, but
more importantly you're allowing room for reinforcements to come in. Very tactically wise, was the decision by
Strong Vincent to move his men down to the military crest. Coming through this saddle if you will, from
big round top to what we call little round top, would be the rebels. They would also be coming over Devil's den. Strong Vincent disobeys orders to come here,
he had been ordered to stage his men at the wheat field under general Barnes, preparing
to go up to the peach orchard to help defend the position held there by the third corps. He disobeys orders, but this is an example
of how disobeying orders can be the right thing. If he had not disobeyed those orders, in face
when he was trying to get directions from General Barnes, nobody knew where general
Barnes was at the moment, nobody else could give him orders. I can tell you that the aide to the officer
from staff headquarters does not have the authority to tell him to come here, but Strong
Vincent decides it must be done and will be done and it is done by Strong Vincent. He sets his men up here and then we have a
series of attacks that are going to me made on this hill. The guns up there will be following, it's
Charles Hazlet's battery, for years I said it as Hazzlet until one day after a tour with
a group like this one they asked me "why do you say Hazzlet? Our family name is Hazlet and that's how we
say it". So it's Hazlet. Anyways, Charles Hazlet will be bringing guns
up there, in the meantime also K. Warren will be finding other troops to come up here. Longstreet, watching in the distance, is seeing
how this hill is being made into a Gibraltar by there Union forces who are coming in, both
infantry and artillery. Although then general Warren gets back and
sees the guns up there he will tell Charles Hazlet "This is not a place for effective
artillery fire". For distance firing it might be fine, although
you have to have smooth ground, you're not gonna see much smooth ground up here. There's a recoil of about 9 feet for those
guns when they fire, and also you can't fire down the hill, you can't depress your gun
to fire down the hill. So it's fine maybe for long distance, but
to stop them wouldn't make a difference. However, one of those guys down there in the
Union infantry said that 'No military music sounded ever sweeter than the sound of those
guns", to hear that POWPOWPOW coming in from behind you gave those guys a sense of strength
down there. So we have a defense as the rebels are coming
up, and the Texan says "shells and grapeshot, canisters and minie balls, all came cutting
through our ranks, bursting, screaming, whistling. But still we had that same wildness, and unhesitating
rush towards the enemy. A guy from the 16th Michigan, that monument
down there, will say it seemed like every man on both sides was actuated by the most
intense hate, and determined to kill as many of the enemy as possible. By the way, it was so noisy, commands could
not well be heard. So as the attackers are coming up, the fire
of infantry, the fire of artillery, things are getting tighter and Strong Vincent is
doing his best. At one point the 16th Michigan will falter,
and they'll be falling back at some point, we don't know exactly what happens because
the accounts are so chaotic, but we do know that there's a boulder up at the top which
says "Strong Vincent fell here". That's when he was trying to bolster the 16th
Michigan. We also know a marker was put back over there
where he fell, and if it was over there then we know that it was pretty dire circumstances. We don't know exactly what happened but many
men are down. In fact, fortunately, we have Charles Haysley's
account, and another Union brigade is coming in. This brigade is coming in under the command
of Steven Weed, and his first regiment will be with the 140th NewYork, and that's going
to be Patrick O'Rourke. Patty O'Rourke by the way, his monument's
up there, he's on the bas relief with the shiny nose, please do not shine his nose any
more. For some reason people got the idea that you
do it for good luck, it doesn't work, and in fact it harms the monument. When he brings his men over the crest of the
hill "down this way boys!", he is knocked down. Apparently, so close was the soldier from
the rebel forces who struck him down, the others who are with this man could tell who
it was and after the action supposedly went down and found the body of that dead rebel
who had killed the commander with 16 minie ball holes in him. Again, this is very close. The 104th New York comes up and rallies at
the top here, and meanwhile the Confederates are trying to make successive attacks. But understand linear formations which are
used in attacks in the Civil War are very difficult here. For the Yankees, they have taken advantage
of the ground by piling up rocks. In this photograph from after the battle,
shows how they piled up rocks. You can see some displayed down there, you
can understand where the rocks might come from. Not farmer's walls, but primitive breastworks,
if you will, that will be built up. The rebels coming up of course, they have
many boulders to hide behind, but they're not going to be able to advance if they stay
hiding behind that. Indeed, a Texan again, my apologies but boy
they're great in the way they express it "Every tree every rock and stump, that gave us any
protection from the rain of minie balls that were poured down upon us from the crest above,
were soon appropriated. John Griffin and myself preempted a moss covered
old boulder about the size of a 500 pound cotton bale" You can pick which boulder you
want it to be, I don't know which one it was. He says 'Every fellow was his own general,
with privates and soldiers giving commands as loud as officers, and nobody paying much
attention to anybody else." It is absolutely chaotic here as the troops
were trying to storm up here. Sometimes looking like they have the advantage,
but then the Yankees are going to hold their position on and on it goes. In fact there was a huge maelstrom of fire
here, artillery fire as well, in fact this area was described by one as a "smoking crater". The man from the 44th New York, with his position
down there said 'The air was saturated with the sulfurous fumes of battle, and was ringing
with the shouts and groans of the combatants". An extraordinary moment here, who could hold,
who could take this ground. It was not clear for 30 minutes to an hour,
as the rebels continued to surge back and were then driven down, surge up, being driven
back, very very chaotic. Largely through the heroism of Strong Vincent,
and Patty O'Rourke, both who died, Steven Weed, he comes up bringing forces, he will
get hit and he's down. But his last words, very curious. In the 19th century they put a lot of stock
in last words, his last words were, reportedly, "I'm as dead as Julius Caesar". But then Charles Hazlet, he is struck down
and killed. I can't begin to account every death that's
happening here, but I can give you an idea of all of these casualties, and casualties
on both sides as it's coming up. Right now we're talking about 5:30 or 6 O'clock,
we're coming into dusk and evening, and very much smoke covered as it becomes fearful. And a lot of fire at this point, we're not
so much into volleys because it's free fire, as quickly as you can load you will fire,
and the rebels are trying to storm up as best as possible. I will tell you that with the support that
Steven Weed's men bring to the brigade of Strong Vincent, this will be able to be held,
although there are going to be more attacks and defenses. indeed we don't have time to express them
all, but you're going to have a case where the rebels are going to be storming through
the wheat field, storming up here. They're going to be met by the US regulars
who then have to withdraw back, and then the Pennsylvania reserves will attack back, back
and forth, this whole front of this area is going to be continually involved with fire. Indeed, this creek down here known as plum
run will become known as bloody run. This little area down here will become known
as the slaughter pen, so terrible was the fighting along there. But the fighting is not over. Most famously, due to the movie Gettysburg
and the novel Killer Angels, there's a part of the little round top story that involved
the 20th Maine. We cannot interpret it without doing that,
so have you seen the movie or read the book? Okay I see a lot of hands. If you haven't, it's worth it. Although as I was mentioning to the gentleman
coming up, to make a move cohesive you can only take about 4 or 5 storylines, just like
Robert E Lee is a storyline and John Buford is a storyline, so is Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain
a storyline. What he does here is incredible, although
what Steven Weed does here, what Strong Vincent does here, what Charles Hazlet does, there
are a lot of incredible things being done here, at this real estate known as little
round top. We're going to try to get back, there's a
little bit of walking difficulty so I want you to be very careful as you do so, and we're
going to get back across the avenue and get over to the Southern slope. Remember that I said this western slope was
cleared of trees, but over where the 20th Maine will be fighting will not be. Questions? Just really quickly, we're a number of people
being shot from Devil's den down there? Yes. The Confederates will take that position on
the evening of July 2nd, and they will use it as a sharpshooter's nest and throughout
the course of the day on July 3rd they will be firing coming from back and forth. They're particularly trying to fire at officers
and artillerymen, with marksman rifles that had a range of 600-700 yards, maybe even more. We actually have in our museum an incredible
piece that was recovered after the battle which was carried apparently by a Texan there,
the rifle weighs 40 pounds and it has the capacity of perhaps 800 yards firing. Hobart Ward is the Brigade commander under
David Belburney, under Sickles the corps commander, so that's the 1300 men I was talking about
earlier who would be down there, and the 4 guns of Smith's battery plus the 2 guns that
were down in the valley. Did any of those men survive to come up here? Yes they did, many were slain but many did
come up. Famously, we do a program on Devil's den I
don't want to get too much into it, but there was a terrible slaughter there as they were
trying to hold, especially the orange blossoms. I've seen photographs that were taken after
the battles with the dead. There were, and often the dead were laid out,
it was grievous, very grievous. One quick thing, and you don't have to get
into the response, but stuff like this gets the attention and as you know a lot happened
over at Culp's Hill, it seems like the ordinary person forgets about what was happening there,
although this is important too. It is, there are two flanks to an army, the
one on the right, and the one on the left, Harry Fonz who used to be the senior historian
here but retired a number of years ago, in several conversations I had with Harry after
he retired he would ask me "are people inquring about Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain?". Well I said of course they do, every day people
are asking about it. he said "Well when I was here (this would
have been back in the 60s/70s) people didn't ask about him". But then he says "Are they asking about colonel
David Ireland?" and I said, well not really. Colonel Ireland is doing an amazing work on
the far flank as was being done by Chamberlain here, so we don't want to disrespect one as
we honor another, but there's a lot of things going on. In fact, the heaviest day of fighting will
be July 2nd, and there will be a battle of battles because of the amount of attacks coming
in. We have Foote's division, we have McCaw's
division, we have Anderson's division, supposed to be Pender's division, a lot of things are
supposed to be happening, much of it did, and July 2nd was the heaviest day of casualties
in this entire battle. If Johnson went a little further, we don't
know whether he did or not, they would have gotten a good response from them, there's
Meade's train and the 6th corps is over there. Well the 6th corps' not getting up yet, the
6th corps is arriving maybe 2 O'clock in the afternoon and Johnson is doing his reconnaissance
at 2 O'clock in the morning. We suspected that what Johnson saw, is maybe
Johnson got to this point, it's very possible that Johnson got here and saw Sickles men
without being seen by the signal corps men who were up on the other slope of the hill. Alright let's follow me, carefully please. Step over this way and make sure the cars
and buses can get by you. You're right on the 6th corps, but when John
finally got up there, were they help there for the rest of the day? It's a long story. First of all, the advance of the 6th corps
arrived at 2 O'clock, the rest didn't get here until 8 O'clock that evening, they were
to become the reserve, as the 5th corps had been the reserve which would be moved over
here primarily. That's another issue because when they 6th
corps came up, Meade had directed that the 5th corps would move to the left, that would
b 2 O'clock. The 5th corps didn't get over here until 5
O'clock, so there was a delay, and George Sykes as a commander was sometimes called
"Tardy George", I think that he was slow in getting his men here too. This is the brigade marker for Strong Vincent.
and James Rice will take over for him when he's down, you can see the 4 units here. Anytime you have this bronze tablet with the
inclined plane on a granite base, this will be for a brigade, either side. They're very helpful, they have the itinerary
and also casualties. There will be many casualties in this action
here. What we're gonna carefully do is cross a road
which wasn't here in 1863 to a carriage trail which wasn't here in 1863. We've come over to the wooded side of the
hill, but again there wasn't the convenience of maneuver that you have, that wasn't available
to them. Also if you look into the woods, you're not
seeing today what you would have seen in 1863. Because cattle roamed freely and farmers,
whenever they needed wood would just chop off lower branches of trees, it had more of
an appearance of a picnic grove. So the thickness that you see today is not
like it would have been in 1863. We're going to one portion of the field where
we have tried to maintain that image, but it's not so ecologically sound because if
you have no new saplings coming up you have nothing left, but that is what was happening
in 1863. The carriage trail here was put in so visitors
with horses and carriages could meander around and of course later the avenue was put in
for those with cars. There were not here at the time, but we will
be going down to the position which would have been held on the far left. 83rd Pennsylvania, and then the 20th Maine. The 83rd Pennsylvania was Strong Vincent's
own regiment in the brigade; he had been promoted up to brigade command but had not yet received
his promotion to general. A brigade commander is supposed to be a brigadier
general. It had so recently happened that he was still
a colonel when he was fighting here. Although I will tell you that he fought so
well here that he would be posthumously promoted to general, he was a colonel when he was here. To give you an idea, this is a photograph
of Alex Rodgers, a color sergeant of the 83rd Pennsylvania, and look at the flag after this
battle. When I talk about the air being strewn with
iron and lead it's hard to imagine until you see pictures like this, and see the shreds
of this flag which was held on little round top. It is an enormous fight here. Not with so many people compared to the 160,000
who would be fighting on the whole battlefield in the 3 days, we're only talking about several
brigades and we're only talking about a couple hours, but for those men it was very intense. Watch your step here on the rugged ground. Again, notice the appearance more a of a picnic
grove here where you can walk easily underneath it. That's how much of the wooded area would have
been in 1863 but that is not so ecologically sound anymore. What we find here is a right flank marker
for the 20th Maine, it's along a stone fence that was not put here before the battle, in
fact it didn't occur until the 3rd day of battle. There's an iron tablet down there that would
explain that. There's another stone fence that you'll see
down farther there, Chamberlain will say that when they came into position, just like the
other regiments in the brigade they created some breastworks as best they could along
here. We don't know accurately whether this is the
flank marker, we know it's a flank marker but the problem is the flank marker of the
83rd down there is about 50 yards beyond here, they would not typically have had that gap. You don't want that gap appearing between
regiments because gaps can be exploited by the enemy. I think with the road going in here that the
marking of the positions is a little bit obscure. The point being, Strong Vincent puts the units
in position, comes to Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, by the way he bears a striking resemblance
to a younger Jeff Daniels, the actor from the movie Gettysburg. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, a fascinating
man, brilliant man, a professor of Goldman college, who was a strong unionist, and also
a strong abolitionist, believed very strongly in the cause of this war to stop the rebellion,
and hold the Union together and free the slaves. He'd been encouraging his students to join
up, and then in a crisis of conscience realized that he needed to do it too, very poignantly
shown in the movie with his wife Fanny as he says "I've got to go off, I've got to do
this". He had no training in the military whatsoever,
he was a professor of rhetoric, philosophy. religion. He was not a man who had studied the military
at all, but because he was an officer and so well respected he immediately was put into
a field officer command, a major lieutenant colonel. And then when Albert Aimes, the colonel of
the 28th brigade command was promoted, it was sort of natural that he would become commander
of the 28th Maine. Every night before he'd go to bed he was reading
his bible, he was a devout Christian, but he's also reading the manual, "What do I do
tomorrow? How do I put out the orders? How do I explain things?". He will have 2 brothers here, the movie only
shown 1. He will have a brother who's with the US Christian
commission also serving at Gettysburg. He's put down here at the far left flank and
he's told to hold it here at all hazards. That is one thing you did not want to hear. To hold it at all hazards means basically
to the last drop of blood, you have no justification whatsoever of leaving this position. Of course Strong Vincent explained you're
not only the left of the position you're the left of our army, if the enemy get around
you and come into our rear, obviously it could be disastrous. So he has his position which reaches down
here, and you can see a gentleman in an orange shirt near the monument. People ask why it was decided his statue shouldn't
be there, that was decided long ago. The direction of the Gettysburg monument society
was that you could have generic soldiers on your monuments, but otherwise you'd have to
have high ranking generals. You just couldn't put up a statue to your
uncle Billy Bob, you know. When the 83rd Pennsylvania monument went in,
there was some question about it as it sure looked like Strong Vincent on the top of that
monument, and Strong Vincent at the time was a colonel and wouldn't have been worthy of
a monument. Apparently when it was revealed, the commissioner
said "It sure looks like a striking resemblance to Strong Vincent", the veterans say "Now
that you mention it, there is a strong resemblance". In fact there's no question it's Strong Vincent,
he got the monument as a colonel, of course he was posthumously promoted to general. This is a line here that the guys from Maine
would have to take, there were about 400 of these men, and they're going into position
here hearing the roar and the thunder of fighting that we've talked about earlier. The action over there with the 16th Michigan,
that all happened earlier. These guys are well aware of what's happening
over here, but there seems to be no immediate threat to their front. Here I want to change sides and look at a
perspective you don't see much in the movie Gettysburg, and that is the other guy who's
going to be commanding in the sector of the battlefield, that's William Oates. He's from Alabama, colonel Oates as a young
man was a sort of Ne'er do well, indeed as what we'd call a teenager today, got in trouble
with the sheriff and left town for some reason. Went out to Texas where he could gain his
fortune, somehow got involved in a duel, but he had a come a Jesus moment, came back and
repented in Alabama, and tried to make things right with the folks that he had left back
there. He considered becoming a clergyman, ended
up becoming a lawyer, but still trying to be some leader in his community. When the war broke out he was very effective
in recruiting troops, and was soon becoming the colonel of the15th Alabama. His men had marched 25 miles to get to the
battlefield on this day, July 2nd. They had gotten into position in the dark
woods across from the green grass we talked about earlier in the Besecker woods, and his
men were pleading for water, they were so thirsty from that march. He allowed men from each company to gather
all the canteens and go off to a well to find water and return, bu while they were gone
the order came that the attack was to begin. Those guys with the canteens, basically never
heard from again. Anyways, he does say "I can't tell the general
that we're going to hold off until we get our water, you were told to attack, you will
attack". As the attack came in, I talked about the
boulders and the streams and the disrupted ground, there was actually a criss-crossing
which occurred that put him on the right flank. Two brigades switched to the other sides,
the 15th and 47th Alabama ended up fighting on the right. He will be annoyed by sharpshooters, a Union
force that was trying to slow him down, they will draw him towards round top and also the
high ground of the battlefield. He will get his men there, 1 time in my life
have I made the trek that he and his men took and it was too exhausting. I can't imagine after having 25 miles and
then trying to climb that hill, for your convenience we now have a parking lot and a walkway that
you can walk up, but it's still some cardiac exercise to get up there. He gets to the top, and then realizes that
he's got the high ground on the battlefield. The high ground is what you're always seeking
on the battlefield for the advantage it brings. He also spies, back on the Taneytown road,
a wagon park that may be ammunition, and sends one of his companies, about 10% of his men
to try to seize that wagon park which would diminish his available support. In the meantime fighting is happening on here
and word gets up from General Long to General Robertson that "you've got to join, you've
got to join the attack". He tries to dispute with the aide by saying
"Wait a minute, I've got the high ground, you want me to leave the high ground?" and
they said "You've got to". Because this attack was not working without
him. So he will take the 2 regiments, the 15th
Alabama, he's in effective operational control of the 47th Alabama as well, they will have
to leave the top of round top and come down, and by the way it's very difficult coming
down, very dangerous. I don't know how they came down in formation
at all. Some places are cliffs. But anyways, they're dutifully coming down
and we're getting well into the evening of July 2nd, when their attack will come through
what we call the saddle between round top and little round top. They are the men who are going to be facing
Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain. Guys from Alabama, about 800-700 strong, guys
from Maine here about 400 strong. Of course the guys from Maine have put up
these breastworks, and they're in a defensive position, so they have an advantage of position
even though they're outnumbered. This attack will flare through here, and William
Oates will have directions to attacking coming right behind me, around my right shoulder. It is touch and go, in fact Chamberlain will
say "Squads of the enemy broke through our lines in several places, and the fight was
literally hand to hand. The edge of conflict swayed to and fro, in
wild whirlpools and eddies and at times I saw around me more of the enemy than my own
men, with gaps yawning and swallowing and closing up with sharp, convulsive energy". Again, it was very chaotic here, but the Yankees
were able to hold them back, those Alabamians. Of course what's going to happen is that William
Oates is going to have to develop a different strategy, and tactics. He can't attack directly this way, he tried
and was unsuccessful, so he will begin to move his men more around to the right. Chamberlain would also detach one of his companies,
company B, and move them down there to his flank. They will sort of disappear after a while
down there toward the Taneytown road, when it becomes apparent to colonel Chamberlain
that the attack is going to be coming from that direction. He cannot just shift his whole regiment, because
he can't create a gap which can be exploited, he must stretch them. Indeed he stretched them in what we call "refusing"
them which is bending them back around. Left flank here, point there, and then bending
around over well behind you, there's a left flank marker for the 20th Maine. It's almost like a bobby pin, as it bends
back so much. He's gotta protect here but he also has to
defend there. Indeed there will be attacks coming in there
from William Oates. William Oates will swing around to the right,
and he will seek to gain the enemy's rear and drive them from the hill. There's a dispute which I cannot settle, because
in the chaos of the action, you can see we have a guide on a boulder with some folks
over there, that's the Oates boulder, so called because William Oates said his brother died
there, and he wanted to honor where his brother died in the attack. When the rebels got to that point there they
were actually coming in around into the back of the 20th Maine. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain said that that
didn't happen, Oates said it did, I don't know whether it did or not. I'll tell you it was chaotic touch and go
here as well. As the rebels fall back, they're planning
one more attack. There will be the fixing of bayonets, that's
a frightful think, you're turning your musket into a pike, it takes 20-40 seconds to load
a musket, and you often don't have that much time so you have to use your rifle as a pike. William Oates will be planning another attack
coming over there. Chamberlain, according to the movie, kneels
down in the dirt, and he tries to draw out the design of a swinging door. A major said it didn't happen quite like that,
and I wasn't here, but clearly what Chamberlain has done is to order his men to fix bayonets
and to be prepared to attack. A counterattack by bayonet. How it would work would be, almost like a
swinging door if that were a hinge down there, the left wing would swing around and the right
wing would join with it. What we discover is that that's how it happened,
whoever directed it, the rebels realize after all they've done that now they're facing an
attack in their front. Oates will actually respond with one of the
more honest comments that is made, often when people recount what happened here, and how
they saved the battle, and how their men acted, Oates said "we ran like a herd if wild cattle". Very honest, he actually stumbled and fell
himself and two brawny guys from Alabama picked him up and carried him to round top to safety. Now dusk has come, darkness is approaching,
and the action here is finished. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain has held, as the
others have held around here. So it would be, day 2 we'll go on, there will
be more fighting along Cemetery Ridge, there will actually be a breach of the Union line,
Barksdale, Woolcox, Lang, Wright, there'll be attacks by Johnson's division at Culp's
hill that night, there will be attacks by Heye's and Avery's brigades. It is an unbelievable day. I can conclude here by saying that you can
read all the books, and believe me there are a lot of books, now they're producing them
faster than I can read them. You can read every book on Gettysburg and
I will tell you, you do not understand it until you're walked the ground. Until you've seen the actually ground where
it happened, you can begin to realize what they were walking about. Also the chaos of the moment, and the carnage
of the moment, the casualties laid across the ground, and blood everywhere. Unbelievable. Remember when I said at the beginning "What
is the cost, what is the value of this ground here?", well i'll tell you the cost is in
human blood, it's in American blood that was paid for this. This had become, truly, a point of pilgrimage. If you think about it, as you walk you grounds
you are on a place that is very sacred in American history, the battlefield of Gettysburg
and particularly Little Round Top. I want to thank you for coming here today,
if you didn't come I wouldn't have a job, but also I hope that you were enriched by
your experience of being with me. I'll take on any questions that you have,
I do have maps and the schedule of activities. This is an opinion question; do you believe,
without that bayonet charge, they would have taken this hill? It's doubtful, because of the exhaustion level
of those guys from Alabama. I think it's doubtful, any time we get into
counterfactual history "well, what if this had happened" we soon get into fantasy land,
because we don't know how the other side would have responded to the change in operations. It certainly could have caused a rout of the
entire Union army, but it may have been just another segment of the battle. Correct me if I'm wrong, but they'd marched
quite a ways to get here, and now they don't have water. I was in combat in the mid 60s and let me
tell you, you'd do anything for water, anything. I appreciate your comment, because I read
that in the soldier's letters too, about the water. They are willing to put their lives at stake,
I read about soldiers going into the no-man's land looking for canteens from enemy soldiers
or trying to get to a spring. Understand because they perspired so much,
often the dehydration is enormous. Can I ask one question? Here's my question about the hinges down there;
it swung around effectively, the left wing and then the right will join it to drive the
rebels back to round top. Will that leave this open then, for a period
of time until they reform later? If you move the line you'll leave it open. They will actually fall back to this position,
and later that night the 20th Maine will be ordered to the top of big round top. This is a momentary thing, the surge that
goes forward, and then they'll fall back to reestablish this line. Later on as more reinforcements are coming
up they'll be ordered to the top of big round top. Did they have trees like this here at that
time? This is close to the appearance, it would
be more open like this, but you can see 50-100 yards. No underbrush? No underbrush. Both men were very smart, and eventually got
their medals of honor, yes? The idea of the medal of honor has changed
over the year, initially it wasn't to be given to officers, and later on officers got it
and that morphed. There was a big push in the 1890s, that's
when Sickles gets his as well as Chamberlain. For the Confederacy my understanding is there
was no medal, but they did get a piece of paper or something like that. They did, apparently there was a medal that
was proposed, I don't know if it was actually awarded. Not saying they didn't deserve it, but today
there is quite a process to get that. There were occasions that a whole unit got
the medal of honor or something for reenlisting, and if you picked up a flag off the ground
you could get it, so again it was not consistent through the years as to how or why the medal
of honor was awarded. I'd like to say you have excellent knowledge and to thank you. Anybody else have questions?
