Gettysburg

Chapter Five

6:15 PM, JULY I, 1863

THE LUTHERAN SEMINARY GETTYSBURG, PENNSYLVANIA

"Where is Johnson's division?" Gen. Robert E. Lee's gaze locked onto Walter Taylor and the staff arrayed behind the nervous chief of staff. No one answered.

"Anderson's division is going in." As he spoke, Lee pointed to his right, "But I don't see Johnson!" _ Arrayed behind Seminary Ridge, Anderson's division, a battle line stretching for over a quarter mile southward, nearly five thousand men, was moving forward. The first wave of skirmishers crested the ridge, moving at an oblique to the right in order to sweep around the southern flank of the town and hit Cemetery Hill on its eastern flank.

However, there was no sign that Johnson was launching his attack from the east side of town. The signal, Pegram's massed battery firing a twenty-gun salvo, had cut loose more than ten minutes ago, and still no movement…

"If they don't strike simultaneously…" and Lee's voice trailed off.

He paced back and forth angrily, hands clasped behind his back. He paused, looking back at his staff. "I thought the first strike by Ewell an hour ago, uncoordinated as it was, could perhaps sweep those people off that hill," he announced.

"It was hard to coordinate from the town," Taylor offered. "Ewell's men fought a running battle for two miles; orders did not get through to everyone."

Lee fixed Taylor with his sharp gaze. "Jackson would have found a way. He never would have slowed for an instant. I directly ordered Ewell to take the hill at once and left him with the understanding that the attacks would push forward."

His frustration, ready to boil over, triggered a response that he had spent a lifetime trying to master, to regain an outward calm. Venting his frustration on his staff would only serve to make them nervous and jittery at a time when he needed them to think rationally and with cool judgment He knew the impact his slightest gesture or word could have on this army.

He turned away, leading Traveler by his reins. He caught a glimpse of his headquarters detail watching him at a discreet distance, looking anxious. He ignored their concern, his gaze fixed to the southeast.

Anderson's skirmishers swept down onto the open plains south of town. The first wave, moving two hundred yards behind the skirmishers, came over the ridge, the formation breaking up as it scrambled over barricades and around buildings. A cheer erupted from the regiment nearest to him.

The men were looking his way, pointing, an officer pausing, turning, raising his sword in salute.

Lee raised his hand, and the cheering redoubled, picked up, echoing down the line.

Such displays always embarrassed him, and at moments like this left him humbled. In minutes those boys would wade into an inferno of case shot shrapnel, and canister. More than one was poised at the edge of the eternal.

Why? For Virginia for this thing called the Confederacy? He looked back at Taylor and the others, boys really, just boys dressed up and playing at glory… More than one of them would do it for me. Use such devotion only when you must when there is no other way, he thought with sharp self-reproach.

The first assault on the hill had placed him in that position yet again. An hour ago he had ridden into town, instinct telling him that Ewell would not press the issue hard enough.

He had found his corps commander in the center of the town and issued a direct order to send everything he had in against the hill.

Ewell had argued against it, wishing for Johnson to come up first and secure his own left flank.

"Give me a brigade, sir, and I'll take that hill!"

It was old "Dick" Trimble, attached to Ewell's headquarters, who had interrupted their argument Essentially a general in waiting, he was ready to be slotted in when a command opened up… as they always did on the field of battle.

Lee had looked into Trimble's eyes and seen that gaze, the sense that a man would willingly die at that moment and all he had to do was nod.

He had made that nod, telling Trimble to round up what troops he could, believing that one more push could trigger another panic in the Union ranks… and now Trimble was reportedly dead on that hill, that accursed hill.

He raised his field glasses, scanning to the east side of town. Nothing. It was impossible to see where Johnson was forming, but nevertheless fire from that flank should be increasing; there should be some sign that an attack was underway.

Why wasn't he there?

'Taylor!"

"Sir!"

Within seconds Taylor was at his side. "Ride. I want Ewell to get his people in there! No more waiting." "Sir!"

Taylor viciously raked his spurs, mount half-rearing, and he was off at a gallop, leaping the broken fence that lined the Cashtown Road, riding down the hill and into the center of town, where Ewell's headquarters were located in the square.

6:20PM

CEMETERY HILL

"Here it comes, Howard. My God, what a sight!" Winfield Scott Hancock reined in, raising his glasses, scanning the Reb battle line cresting Seminary Ridge. One brigade was clearly in view, already passing the seminary, angling to their right Mounted officers were farther to the right. Now flags were appearing there as well, skirmishers coming forward on the double.

Down in the open fields, Buford's skirmishers, exhausted from having been in action since dawn, were still doing their job of holding his left flank, reluctantly pulling back yard by yard, retreating in relays, a forward line breaking off, mounting, riding back a couple of hundred yards, passing through a dismounted line of their comrades, who then mounted again.

One-armed Oliver Otis Howard, commander of the shattered Eleventh Corps, remained silent watching the display, like Hancock,' field glasses raised.

The battle below them spilled out across the pastures and the neatly arrayed fields of summer wheat and cornfields to the west of the road to Emmitsburg.

"Smart of Henry to order his guns to cease fire," Hancock said. "Saves ammunition till they're close and clears the smoke a bit"

Howard nodded.

Winfield looked over at him. Howard was still feeling prickly over the orders from Meade to relinquish field command to an officer who had only been promoted to corps command less than a month ago. He sensed that Howard was still shaken by the rout norm of town, but now that the crisis was upon them, nothing showed but a steady calm.

"And still nothing from over there," Howard announced, glasses trained to the east side of town.

One brigade was fully deployed, well over a thousand yards away. Behind it in the dips and swales, he caught glimpses of columns moving along the road, racing through farmyards, tearing aside fences… more troops still maneuvering from marching column to battle line.

Shells flung by Stevens's battery were detonating across the front of the line of the first brigade, where the Rebs crouched in the waist-high corn. To their flank a battery was wheeling into position, a good fourteen hundred yards out

He grinned. A lot of good those guns would do supporting their attack, firing up toward higher ground at that range. Perfect. There was no real position for the Rebs to establish counterbattery and suppress Henry's guns.

"They're off, Howard. By God, they're off. Damn it they should either send that brigade in now with whatever they've got in the town or wait the extra half hour until everyone is formed. God, I can't believe Lee is attacking like this."

"In another hour it'll be getting dark. He must push it now while there's still light"

Hancock nodded. It was obvious that the big salvo from the Reb batteries deployed around the seminary was some sort of signal for a general assault. Strange, at times you could hear something like that twenty miles away, and then at other times you could be a mile off and it was barely noticeable.

"Just wait" Hancock muttered, glasses trained on Johnson's men. "Dear God, a half hour is all I ask."

The silence that had hung over the field for the last ten minutes was shattered when a field piece, one of Wiedrich's guns at the tip of the salient on the north slope, fired. A second later the gun to its left kicked back. The salvo raced across the northern and western slope of Cemetery Hill, jumping to Stewart's battery, then Dilger's, and continued.

The first of the shells sparked, igniting in the air near the seminary above a knot of officers. Geysers of dirt shot up; the line seemed to be smothered under a curtain of fire.

"Thirty-eight… thirty-nine…" one of his staff was counting, voice pitched high with excitement

"Forty-three!"

As the explosion from the last gun on the left drifted away, a cheer echoed along the line and within seconds one of Wiedrich's Napoleons finished reloading and cut loose with a second round.

"With the guns on the east flank of this hill, we roust have sixty pieces, sir!" one of his staff cried excitedly.

"And enough ammunition for a half hour at this rate of fire," Howard replied laconically.

Hancock caught a glimpse of Henry galloping past the gatehouse. Several limber wagons were coming up the road, horses covered with sweat, crews lashing teams that were obviously blown, barely able to walk up the final slope. Henry, waving his hat, reined in, pointing for them to cut off the road. Gunners leapt off the wagons; stragglers on the road were pressed into service, helping to tear down the fence flanking it.

From the crest, Henry's guns were tearing into the advancing line with brutal accuracy. In the still evening air, the smoke was quickly banking up around the hill, but the gunners knew enough to keep depressing their barrels and cutting fuses shorter.

Hancock turned to look back down the Emmitsburg Road and then over to the Baltimore Pike. He had sent word down the former to Dan Sickles to bring up his Third Corps, the same order going to Slocum and the two divisions of his Twelfth Corps coming up the Baltimore Pike from Littlestown.

The Emmitsburg Road was rapidly turning into part of the battlefield. Buford's skirmishers lined the post and rail fence, trading shots with Confederate infantry clear down to a distant rise crowned with a peach orchard.

Baltimore Pike was in chaos, jammed with hundreds of stragglers who would dodge into the woods at the sight of'a provost patrol, then step back out and press on, mingling with the walking wounded, all of them instinctively heading as far away as possible from the carnage.

And there was no relief in sight

6:30 PM

SEMINARY RIDGE

"I'm going back down there," Lee snapped to his staff.

Mounting, he spared a final glance toward Anderson's division. A gale of artillery fire swept over them as the forward brigade advanced into canister range, men struggling to get over the heavy fences lining the pike toward Emmitsburg.

He ordered several of his staff to wait at headquarters across the road from the seminary, edged out onto the road into Gettysburg, and set off at a swift canter, guards of his headquarters company swinging ahead and to either flank, carbines and revolvers drawn.

The road into town was a shambles, covered with the litter of war, upended caissons, overturned ambulances, dead horses, dead men, wounded, both Union and Confederate, lying to either side waiting for help, cast-off rifles, cartridge boxes, blanket rolls, uniform jackets, a broken banjo. Hundreds of torn paper cartridges covered the road, and clinging over it all was the heavy sulfur stench of burnt powder and torn flesh.

A column of Union prisoners stood to one side of the road, pushed back at his approach. They looked up at him, some with surprise, others sullen or openly defiant An officer, bloody bandage around his head, offered a salute, which he returned. "The fight ain't over yet sir," the Yankee officer announced. "This isn't Virginia. You're in the North now."

Lee pressed on, saying nothing.

Hospital flags, both Union and Confederate, hung from houses marking where surgeons were setting up for business. Blue and butternut wounded mingled together outside the makeshift wards. He tried to ignore the hysterical screams coming from an open window and the glimpse of orderlies trying to wrestle a man up onto a table.

A column of infantry, motionless, blocked the center of the road ahead, the men standing at ease, a knot of them squatting in a circle in the middle of the road, while one of their comrades carved generous portions from a smoked ham.

At the sight of his approach, they snapped to attention, the corporal dropping his knife and flipping the edge of a blanket over the ham to try and hide the booty.

He rode past, slowing for a moment at the sight of officers at the head of the motionless column. "Whose troops are these?"

A colonel, eyes red rimmed and half concealed behind mud-splattered spectacles, features pale, wearily looked up, staring blankly, then came to attention. "Mine, sir," he announced, voice barely a whisper. "Colonel Bradley, sir, Thirty-fifth Georgia."

"May I ask, sir, what you are doing here?"

"General, kind of a tangle here, sir. I was told to form my men on this road and await orders. No orders have come."

Lee looked down sharply.

The colonel let his gaze drop and then, inexplicably, his shoulders began to quiver, head going down. A sob escaped him.

"Sir? What is wrong?" Lee asked softly.

The colonel looked back up. "My boy, sir, my only son…" and he froze, eyes wide and unfocused as he fought to regain control.

Lee looked past him. The men of the colonel's command were watching the encounter. It was obvious their sympathy was with their colonel. Lying by the side of the road was a body on a makeshift stretcher, features calm in death, long blond hair brushed back from the face. One of the boy's comrades sat by the stretcher, crying, head lowered.

He could sense this was a tight-knit regiment, most likely men all from the same town or county, the colonel, older, a schoolmaster look to him, the body on the stretcher a young boy, not more than sixteen, most likely a "pet" of the regiment

He caught the eye of a major standing behind the colonel. "Take over, Major. I want your men to put pressure on that hill," and Lee pointed to the south.

He leaned over, hand resting on the colonel's shoulder. "Your son is in the care of Our Savior" Lee whispered. "You, sir, shall be in my prayers tonight"

The colonel looked back up. "How can I ever tell my wife?" the colonel replied, voice haunting and distant He tried to say more but couldn't and turned away, covering his face.

Lee squeezed the man's shoulder and rode on toward the center of town.

What future now for them? he wondered. What comfort can their country ever give them that would repay the loss of an only son.

He thought of his boy wounded at Brandy Station less than four weeks ago, still not recovered. I have four sons, and to lose but one would be all but beyond my heart to bear.

God, I must end this! No more after this. Push it hard today, push it and win so that this madness can finally stop.

The sound of battle echoing from the hill was increasing every second. The crackling of a musket volley ignited like a long string of firecrackers. Passing side streets, he caught glimpses of the smoke-clad heights, ringed with fire, the smoke catching and holding the early evening sunlight which bathed the landscape in a hellish ruddy glow.

The center square of the town was directly ahead. The press of men, the litter of battle, dead horses, knots of prisoners, all made it difficult to move. His troop of cavalry escorts pressed ahead, clearing the way.

Directly in the middle of the square, sitting in an open buckboard carriage, wooden leg propped up, was Dick Ewell, commander of Second Corps. His coat was open, hat off, thin wisps of what little hair he had left plastered down with sweat. A knot of officers stood around him. Jubal Early, commander of the division that had stormed into the town, was one of them.

At his approach, they stiffened. He had left them in this same spot an hour ago, and it seemed like nothing had changed since.

There was. an obvious look of relief on Walter Taylor's face, as if a terrible burden had been lifted. That alone told Lee everything:

"When I left you gentlemen an hour ago," Lee said, deliberately making an effort to stay calm and keep his voice in control, "the understanding was that when Pegram's battalion fired a salvo that would be the signal for you to launch your assault."'

"We heard no salvo, sir," Ewell replied.

Lee looked at him, incredulous. It was indeed possible, but somehow he couldn't force himself to believe it

"Well, can you not hear the guns of those people up there?" and his voice raised slightly as he pointed toward Cemetery Hill. 'Is that not signal enough that the attack is pressing in."

"Sir, my men, sir." It was Jubal Early, standing by the side of Ewell's carriage. "They've marched twelve miles, fighting a running battle for the last two. We're still rounding up prisoners. You shouldn't even be in here, sir. This town is not yet secured."

"I need to be where the battle is," Lee replied sharply, "but, sir, it seems as if no battle is being fought on this flank. An hour ago I told you that hill could be taken if pressed quickly enough;"

"Dick Trimble died, and a fair part of Gordon's brigade died trying for it, sir," Jubal replied softly. "The first attack was premature."

Lee felt his features flush. He could see the look in Walter's eyes, the boy edging forward, trying to intervene, to head off the confrontation. An icy glance told him to back off. Lee turned his attention straight at Ewell and those gathered around him. "Sir, I want that hill taken!"

He pointed south, arm stiff, his voice ringing so that for an instant it seemed as if everyone tangled up in the confusion-filled square had fallen silent.

"No excuses. I have tolerated such excuses too often in the past when we had the chance to smash them, and always they got away.

"I am not advising you gentlemen; I am ordering you. I want that hill taken before dark." His voice echoed. All stood silent, stunned by the outburst.

"Where is Johnson? Why is he not going in?"

"He will any minute now" Ewell replied nervously, obviously startled by the outburst "l sent another courier to urge him to move. One of his brigades somehow took the wrong road and started eastward; he is waiting for them to come about and form. Johnson also reported that Union infantry, coming up from the east and south, are threatening his left flank. He reports it is Twelfth Corps."

"Now! I want the attack now!" Lee shouted, cutting him off. "Anderson is committed. Johnson must press straight in with everything he has and worry about his flank later."

The roar of musketry from the hill was rising in volume.

"Both flanks of the hill attacked at the same time, so they are forced to split their fire. That is what I wanted. We can still do it."

"Sir, we've fought a long fight today," Ewell offered, "trying to coordinate an assault from both wings on the run. It's not easy, sir."

"I know it's not easy!" Lee snapped. "Victory is never easy; only defeat is easy. We have a chance to smash them, sir. Smash them! I will not let it slip out of our grasp. I am sick of wasting lives in battles that do not bring final victory. No more waste. Not this time."

His voice pitched up as he said the last words, half standing in his stirrups.

Inwardly he was furious with himself for the outburst, the dramatic display, allowing passion to take control. Jackson had been known for such moments. Longstreet was feared for his famed explosions of rage. That was never me though. I've spent a lifetime learning mastery of myself. The realization of it made him even angrier.

"You are to go directly to Johnson and order him to go in with what he has. Do it now!" Lee announced, his voice set at an icy pitch.

He hesitated for a second. "Walter, go with him."

Ewell, obviously startled by Lee's tone, and the none too subtle insult of having Lee's staff officer go along to make sure the order was carried out, simply saluted.

Ewell's driver mounted-wide-eyed in the presence of Lee and the display of temper-grabbed the reins, and swung the carriage around. Lee wanted to shout with exasperation at the sight of Ewell's carriage trying to inch its way through the mad jumble of confusion that filled the square. Wooden leg or hot, Ewell should be mounted, not riding around town in a carriage.

Walter, showing initiative, simply left him and disappeared behind a jumble of ambulances abandoned at the east end of the square.

Early was looking up at him, silent, dark eyes penetrating.

"Do you wish to say something, General?" Lee asked.

Early nodded.

"Go ahead then."

"Malvern Hill, sir."

"What?"

"That's Malvern Hill up there, sir. It might look easy from a distance, us having them on the run as we did. But they've got artillery up there, lots of it A year ago today, sir, we fought at Malvern Hill, and you saw what their artillery did to us there."

"We could have swept them off that hill an hour ago," Lee replied heatedly. "We should have done it"

"We didn't."

Early fell silent as if judging his words carefully.

"Go ahead," Lee said, trying to keep his voice calm.

"Your blood is up, sir. That's all I'll say, sir. Your blood is

up." -

Startled, Lee said nothing. Looking away, gaze fixed on that bloody hill, that damn bloody hill.

6:40 PM

CEMETERY HILL

His guidon bearer grunted from the impact of the bullet. Hancock reached out, grabbing the boy by the shoulder as he leaned drunkenly from the saddle, half falling, guidon dropping.

The guidon had to stay up. The men had to see it, but he would not let go of the boy.

"I'm sorry, sir, sorry," the boy gasped.

Someone on foot was beside him, reaching tip, grabbing the boy, easing him out of the saddle, the youth gasping, clutching his stomach.

Shot in the gut, as good as dead, Hancock thought, trying to stay detached, looking away. A staff officer dismounted, picked up the guidon, and remounted, holding it aloft

Another volley tore across the western slope of the hill, a rebel yell echoing up. They were charging again, coming up over the fences lining the Emmitsburg Road. Behind them a battery of four guns was cutting across a field, caissons bouncing, the first gun sluicing around to a stop, preparing to unlimber at murderously close range.

Henry's gunners, following orders, were ignoring it for the moment concentrating everything they had on the advancing infantry.

A blast of canister, aimed low, tore into a section of fence, which exploded for fifty feet of length into tumbling rails, splinters, and bodies. The charge pressed forward, coming up the slope into the face of forty guns ringing the crest of the hilltop. Gunners, working feverishly, were not even bothering to roll the pieces back into place, simply loading and firing. Some of the crews had even stopped swabbing, running the risk of a hot bore or spark triggering a premature blast in order to save an additional ten seconds.

Shimmers of heat radiated off the guns directly in front of Hancock. Even as he watched, a loader slammed a canister round into the open bore. The rammer pushed him aside, started to drive the round in, and then was flung backward as the powder bag hit a hot spark, seven-foot ramrod staff screaming downrange, rammer writhing on the ground, right hand blown off, shoulder broken, face scorched black.

His comrades pulled him back behind the firing line, the gun sergeant screaming for a replacement ramrod, running back toward a limber wagon.

The Rebs were pushing closer, not coming on in a wild heads-down charge but advancing slowly, pouring in a fierce fire, trying to break up the batteries before pressing the final hundred yards.

Bullets sang around Hancock's ears, his staff ducking and bobbing in their saddles. He rode the length of the line, voice too hoarse to continue shouting. Henry came past, waving his hat, three limber wagons, two chests of ammunition strapped to each, bouncing behind him. He waved them into place, one wagon per battery.

The crest of the hill was crowded with limber wagons and caissons, each with six horses, all of them pressed nearly side to side. Hancock could almost pity the trace riders for the caissons. Regulations stated that when in action the mounted rider of the six-horse team had to remain in the saddle, ready to guide the caisson around if the guns needed to be moved quickly.

It was a ghastly job in the middle of a fight. A man was expected to sit with his back to the enemy, all hell breaking loose, arid just wait It was a type of courage he wondered if he could ever muster… to do nothing but wait.

He reached the south end of the battle line, where a low stone wall jutted out to the west for fifty yards, a small grove of trees behind the wall. Buford's skirmishers crouched behind the wall; Calef's hard-fought battery of mounted artillery occupied the angle, pouring shot into the enemy flank. The four Reb guns deployed on the far side of the road opened on Calef, but he ignored them, his men simply ducking as a shell screamed in, then returning to their work of laying down case shot on the road.

He focused his glasses-down the Emraitsburg Road, looking south. Something was on it, dark, serpentlike, still distant, but coming. It was Sickles, responding to his urgent plea for immediate support

"General Hancock, sir!"

He looked back. A courier, one of Howard's men, was riding up hard, waving his hat "They're coming, sir. The Rebs east of town; they're coming!"

He looked back south. A half hour, maybe more. Damn!

He turned, following Howard's messenger, riding along the crest looking west judging the strength and determination of the Reb attack hitting his left flank. A lot of the Rebs were still wearing blanket rolls and backpacks, a sign they had maneuvered straight from the march into battle formation without taking time to form regimental depots, drop-off points for all excess baggage, before going into the fight.

Rather than lose a precious blanket and haversack of food, the men were carrying the extra weight into battle. He wondered if they had been watered before the attack or were coming in with dry canteens.

For whatever reason, their attack was slow. The artillery's concentrated fire had battered Anderson's division down, keeping them pinned along the road. But the guns had to shift if there was any hope of flinging back the new assault on the right Henry was up at the crest of the hill, frantically waving, directing the redeployment swinging guns around to face north and east

The Rebs along the fence, however, had yet to react to push forward, though they had to have seen by now that the artillery fire was slackening.

He eased his mount through a hole in the cemetery wall and weaved his way past a parked row of caissons. Passing the nearest one, he looked in as a loader pulled a round of case shot out of a storage slot and, with an awl-like punch, set the fuse at two seconds.

"How many left?" Hancock shouted

The loader looked up, startled by the presence of a corps commander gazing down at him.

"Ahh, three case shot, sir. Half a dozen canister."

"Webster, get that damn shell up here!"

The loader, responding to the cries of his sergeant, tried to salute, gave up, and ran back up to the firing line, Hancock following.

He could hear the cry, the rebel yell. Reaching the battery, he reined in. Through holes in the smoke he saw them coming, definitely a brigade, maybe two, heading straight for the east slope of the hill, advance skirmishers already trading fire on the side of the wooded hill that flanked the cemetery.

'"This is where it's going to be decided!"

Henry was by his side, eyes wide with excitement, rivers of sweat streaming down his face. "Got one more battery still coming up!" and he pointed back down the Baltimore Pike.

Struggling up the hill came a battery of six Napoleons, horses covered with foaming sweat, more than one of the mounts all but dead, limp in their traces, oblivious to the whip blows from the drivers.

A thunderclap volley ignited from the north end of the hill. Ames's men, still dug in around Wiedrich's battery, had stood up and fired, the blow staggering the Reb advance, which slowed for a moment then continued on.

"Ammunition?" Hancock shouted, looking over at Hunt

"Unless Jesus Christ Almighty drops a' few limber wagons from the heavens, what we've got here is it. Some of the guns are out of canister; they're shooting solid shot!"

Hancock cast a glance to the western horizon. The sun was blood red, hanging low, soon to slip behind the South Mountains.

A half hour till sunset a half hour. God, it seemed like an eternity.

The Rebs pressed in, battle lines past the flank of the town, spreading out A broken line of skirmishers pressing out from the streets formed a loose screen between the two divisions.

Wiedrich's four guns fired in salvo, entire lines going down under the blasts. Stevens's battery was pouring it on, ignoring the increasing fire from long-range skirmishers pressing up the slope of the wooded hill. The six Napoleons coming up behind Henry were swinging into position, forming to face straight down toward the cemetery gate below, knocking over headstones, shattering monuments.

Once the first gun was unhooked from its caisson and positioned, Henry detailed the drivers to head down to Stewart and rum over their caisson of ammunition to the beleaguered battery. The crew assigned didn't look too pleased at leaving their own battery with orders to ride straight into an inferno, but the men lashed their teams and pushed down the slope.

A steady stream of wounded were coming back from the firing line on the west slope. No breakdown there yet. He noticed only a scattering of unwounded trying to get out. Some of the men, as they reached the crest, paused, gazing to the north and east, taking in the sight of Johnson's advance. Several of them, seeing Hancock, slowed and, in spite of their wounds, fell in on the makeshift final line.

The charge was coming on faster, pushing in. Another blast of canister, this one at point-blank range. Stewart's and Dilger's guns, no longer engaged against Anderson, had swung around, and once again were pouring in enfilade fire to support their comrades on the right

The first line of the charge disappeared, going down, piling atop the dead and wounded from the earlier charge. The second wave, less than fifty yards out slowed-rifles flashing, lowering, firing a sharp, rippling volley-and then, with bayonets lowered, came in at the charge, high wolf yip shrieks sending a corkscrew down Hancock's spine.

The swarm piled up over Wiedrich's guns, tangling in with the gunners, Ames's infantry, all of them a seething, boiling mass, cloaked in a smoky haze.

A lone caisson came out of the inferno, trying to gain the road, upended, throwing the driver as it rolled over, horses shrieking. Another caisson, down in the middle of the confusion, blew, top lid soaring a hundred feet into the air, flinging men in every direction.

The point of the salient broke, men streaming back, pouring up the road and along the flank of the knoll, followed by the charging swarm. Stewart's guns-now caught fully in flank-turned, continuing to fire, even as the breakthrough spread toward them.

The second line-a hodgepodge of regimental fragments from First and Eleventh Corps-dug in around the gatehouse, stood up, trying to fire over the heads of their fleeing comrades, who, ducking low, scrambled up over the barricades for protection, more than one of them caught between the two fires, going down, struck front and back at the same instant.

Johnson's men, smelling victory, pressed forward, the slope behind them carpeted with casualties as the artillery fired with unrelenting power.

The right section of Stewart's battery was swarmed under, the remaining section retreating slowly up the slope, retiring by prolonge, gunners firing, ropes trailing to the caissons pulling the guns back a dozen yards while the crews reloaded, the last of their infantry support clinging around the pieces, bayonets poised.

The charge kept coming. Hancock caught a glimpse to his left; Anderson's men, at least the regiments closest to Johnson's charge, were up, pressing in as well, heartened by the advance to their flank.

He looked back to the west. The sun seemed motionless.

7:00 PM

GETTYSBURG

Ignoring the warnings of his headquarters staff, Lee rode down the middle of the road oblivious to the rain of bullets kicking up geysers of dust in the street, shattering windows, splintering the sides of wooden buildings, and ricocheting off the brick ones.

The head of the charge was up over the forward knoll, pressing up into the smoke that circled the hill, reminding him somehow of an old etching of Mount Sinai, wreathed in eternal storm clouds.

The men, my God, the men, he thought, his stomach knotting. Hundreds of them were down, covering the approaches to the hill. Wounded were coming back up the street, many with uniforms torn and limbs shattered by artillery fire. At the sight of him some held their wounded limbs up, bearing them proudly like holy stigmata.

The gesture was almost frightening to him, a sacrilege. He fixed his gaze on the hill, the bloody hill that seemed to fill the sky ahead.

A glare of light, then a hail of rifle fire exploded in the smoke, followed a couple of seconds later by a storm of bullets sweeping the street. One of his cavalry escorts pitched out of the saddle; another had a horse go down.

"General Lee, you must retire!"

It was Walter Taylor, back from his mission to Johnson, racing out from a side street, moving to place himself between Lee and the rifle fire.

Lee fixed him with an icy gaze. "No. I will not hide at a moment like this."

"Remember Jackson," Walter replied, still moving to take Traveler's reins.

"I do remember Jackson," Lee said fiercely. "If he had been here, this attack would have already taken that hill. Time, Walter, it is always a question of time. We are losing the light."

"Sir, your getting killed will not change any of this now."

"The charge; it looks weak. What is going on?" Lee looked over at Taylor.

'Two brigades only, sir. Johnson claims there's a Union division forming on his left, a couple of miles down the Hanover Road. He's deployed a brigade to contain them. The other brigade is still forming and trying to come up."

Lee motioned him to silence.

The rebel yell!

In the dim light he saw the banners go up over the barricades around what looked to be a gatehouse. Another caisson blew, followed almost instantly by yet another exploding alongside the first.

The yell, the spine-tingling yell. Wounded in the streets paused, looked back, some of them raising their voices, howling. Others stood riveted, watching the charge.

Lee looked around at his staff. All were gazing up at the hill, some shouting. The charge pressed forward, colors dipping, going down, coming back up, going down, then coming back up yet again, still advancing.

My men, though. Oh, God, my men. They were dropping by the scores, the hundreds. "Finish it, for God's sake, finish it" The words escaped him like a desperate prayer.

7:15 PM

CEMETERY HILL

"Fire! Fire! Fire!" Henry, screaming like a madman was on foot, in front of Hancock, in the middle of his guns.

Hancock wanted to scream for him to stop. Some of their own men were still in front, running back from the gatehouse, tangled in with the charging Rebs.

The gunners hesitated; a sergeant looked back at him. Henry shouldered the sergeant aside, drew the lanyard taut, and with a wild cry pulled it

The Napoleon, loaded with double canister, reared back.

As if the gun was a flame that leapt to the other pieces, the batteries fired.

Sickened by the impact Hancock said nothing, unable to speak as more than a thousand iron- balls, a visible blur, slammed into the ranks. A headstone, torn off. at its base, flipped high into the air, an ironic sight that frightened him almost as much as the carnage.

"Reload! Reload!" Henry was stalking down the line, clawing at the air, frantically waving his arms.

Hancock wanted to scream for him to stop, for all of them to stop, to end the madness of it Out of the smoke some of them were rising up, hunched over, pressing forward, a lone color coming back up, then another.

The Rebs were into the guns, but they were too few. The wave broke, collapsing. Some of the Rebs simply stood there in numbed shock and then woodenly dropped their weapons.

Farther down the slope, Hancock saw a column coming up over the knoll where Wiedrich's battery had been. It must be another brigade of Rebs, but they were coming in too late!

"Look, sir, look!"

Hancock turned. A column of Union infantry, coming forward at the double, was spreading out to either side of the Baltimore Pike… Twelfth Corps at last!

On his other flank he already knew that the advance regiments of Sickles's Third were coming up. It was hard to see as the shadows lengthened, but he could catch glimpses of a heavy skirmish line pushing up across the fields along the Emmitsburg Road, hooking up with Buford's men.

'Tire, pour it in, pour it in!" Henry, pacing behind his guns, pointed down the slope toward the forward knoll, where the. emerging enemy line was trying to shake out into formation. The blasts of canister swept down the hill; the hundreds of men down on the ground in front of the guns and still alive covered themselves, many screaming in terror.

The men of Twelfth Corps, coming on fast, poured down into the narrow valley that dropped down the east flank of Cemetery Hill and then rose up to the knoll where Stevens's overworked battery was still hard at it

At the sight of their approach, whatever fight was left in the Rebs melted away. Turning, they streamed back down the slopes of Cemetery Hill.

"Reload!"

Hancock edged his mount forward, the horse stepping nervously around a team of six animals, all of them dead, piled up in front of their caisson.

"Henry."

Henry's back was turned, shaking his head as a captain screamed to him that they were out of ammunition. "Solid shot, you still have solid shot! Give it to them!" "Henryr

Henry turned, looking up at him. "Cease fire," Hancock said quietly.

Henry stood there, riveted to the ground, mouth open, shoulders shaking as he gasped for breath.

Gunners around him seemed frozen, looking at the two. "We held the hill," Winfield said quiedy. Henry simply stood there.

A gunner by Henry's side staggered away, letting his rammer drop, legs shaking so badly he could barely walk. A section commander, leaning against an upturned caisson, slowly doubled over and vomited convulsively, body shaking like a leaf. The men of the battery seemed to melt, dissolve. Some simply sat down, staring vacantly. Others leaned drunkenly against their pieces. A color bearer held the national flag aloft and slowly waved it back and forth, but no cheer sounded; the only thing to be heard was the cries of the wounded.

"Henry, you held the hill."

Henry turned and slowly walked over to one of his pieces, the men around it silent, faces and uniforms blackened.

"No," Henry whispered, nodding toward his men, "they held the hill."

Hancock dismounted and went up to his side, putting a hand on Henry's shoulder.

Henry gazed at him, turned away, leaning against the wheel of a gun, his body shuddering as he broke down into silent tears.

No one spoke.

Winfield Scott Hancock looked down across the field of carnage, the cemetery piled high with the harvest of his profession, the results of his greatest victory. Lowering his head, he walked away.