On the morning of July 2, 1863, Union Major General George Meade mounted his horse and rode out with his staff to inspect the defensive positions his army had formed on the hills around Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. He had assumed command of the Army of the Potomac just four days earlier. His chief of artillery, Henry Hunt, studied the terrain and calculated where guns should be placed, knowing that the position of a single battery could decide whether the Union line held or collapsed. The Union position curved like a fishhook along Cemetery Ridge, with the shank running north to south and the hook bending east over Cemetery Hill and Culps Hill.
Meade established his headquarters at the farmhouse of Lydia Leister, a 51-year-old widow who, along with her two youngest children, was moved into the cellar for safety. Meade commanded roughly 95,000 men, though two of his corps had been battered the day before and others were still arriving. By noon, six of his seven corps were in position, while the Sixth Corps under John Sedgwick was still pushing forward after nearly 19 hours of continuous marching. Across the field on Seminary Ridge, Confederate General Robert E.
Lee rose before dawn with his army of about 75,000 men. Lee was in poor health, suffering from what was likely the early signs of heart disease, but he had already decided that the main blow would fall on the Union left. To confirm his plan, he sent out reconnaissance parties into the morning mist. One of them, led by Captain Samuel R.
Johnston, reported that he had ridden as far south as Little Round Top and had found no large concentrations of federal troops in the area, only a small presence of Union cavalry. That report became a source of later controversy. Historians would question how Johnston could have missed roughly 18,000 Union soldiers positioned in the area, including three infantry corps and two cavalry brigades, some of whose campfires should have been visible from a distance. Whether the error came from haste, poor visibility, or the deceptive terrain, its consequences would be enormous.
Around 11 a. m. , Lee ordered Longstreet’s corps to swing south and attack northward along the Emmitsburg Road, rolling up the Union left. Time had already been lost to flawed reconnaissance, and Lee’s patience was wearing thin.
He allowed Longstreet to wait for Evander Law’s brigade, which arrived after marching 25 miles in 11 hours, but he declined to delay for George Pickett’s division, still miles away. Longstreet, uneasy about the plan, remarked that he did not like going into battle with one boot off. The approach to the staging area was slow and confused. Narrow roads were clogged with wagons and artillery, columns stalled, and units were forced to countermarch after their route was exposed to Union observers on Little Round Top.
When General Lafayette McLaws refused to yield the lead of the column, Longstreet relented, losing still more time. During these delays, Confederate cavalry commander Jeb Stuart arrived at Lee’s headquarters after days of absence. Lee’s greeting was cold. He told Stuart he had not heard from him in days and that Stuart was the eyes and ears of his army.
Stuart tried to ease the tension by mentioning captured wagons, but Lee cut him off, saying they were an impediment to him now. Then the moment passed, and Lee quietly told Stuart to help him fight the people opposing them. On the Union side, Major General Daniel Sickles grew uneasy with his assigned position, which he believed left him exposed to enemy artillery. Without orders, he advanced his entire corps of about 10,000 men forward around 3 p.
m. The movement was impressive to watch, with flags waving and bands playing, but it created a dangerous exposed salient and opened gaps in the Union line. Before Meade could correct the situation, the Confederate guns opened fire. At 3:30 p.
m. , nearly 100 cannons erupted at once, and one witness described the scene simply: hell broke loose. At the same time, the most critical moment of the battle was unfolding on Little Round Top, where Union Brigadier General Gouverneur Warren found the hill nearly undefended while Confederate troops were advancing toward it. He sent urgent messages and grabbed passing soldiers to hold the ground.
Strong Vincent stepped forward and accepted the responsibility, racing his brigade up the hill. Among them was the 20th Maine regiment, commanded by Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, who was told he must hold the ground at all costs. The Confederate attack was led by William C. Oates and his Alabamians.
The fighting was close and relentless. The Union line held barely, but ammunition ran low, and the line began to buckle. Chamberlain then ordered a bayonet charge down the slope. The desperate gamble worked, and the Confederates broke, saving the Union left.
By nightfall, the battlefield fell silent, but the cost was immense, with thousands dead and thousands more wounded. The Union line still held that evening, and the battle would continue the next day.