Gettysburg

GETTYSBURG SENTINEL

The ordnance rifle has a three-inch bore and could fire a 10-pound projectile just over a mile.

DEVIL'S DEN

This hill of giant boulders is below Little Round Top. On the 2nd day of the Battle of Gettysburg, troops from both sides took turns occupying it. It proved impractical for artillery but was effective cover for infantry, especially snipers.

LITTLE ROUND TOP

As seen from the boulders at Devil's Den.

NEAR & FAR

Devil's Den in the foreground, Little Round Top beyond.

DEVIL'S DEN

THE WHEATFIELD

It was scene of heavy and close fighting on July 2, 1863, the second day of the battle at Gettysburg. Thousands of soldiers were killed and wounded, making it one of the bloodiest sites of the three-day conflict.

MUZZLE LOADER

Thi is a 10-pound iron Parrott Rifle, named for designer Robert Parrott of the West Point Foundry. It featured a reinforcing band around the breech and was manufactured in different sizes, with bores of 2.9 or 3.0 inches. It was used by both sides in the Civil War, with a range up to 2,000 yards.

UNION HERO

A statue of Gen. Gouverneur K. Warren on Little Round Top. He arranged the hasty defense of Little Round Top on the second day of the three-day Battle of Gettysburg. Seven Federal soldiers were killed around the rock on which the statue rises.

PATINA

Time has turned the bronze barrel of this Napoleon cannon green on the field at Gettysburg. The trees in the distance are on Cemetery Ridge, which was held by Federal troops as Confederates attacked across the fields in Pickett's Charge on July 3, 1863.

THE WHEATFIELD

it was the scene of hand-to-hand fighting by Union and Confederate troops below Little Round Top. Parts of the 20 acres were so covered by the dead that it was said you could walk across the field without touching ground.

FAMOUS VIEW

This spot in Devil's Den was famously portrayed by photographer Alexander Gardner just days after the battle ended. In his "Home of a Rebel Sharpshooter" he included the body of a Confederate he described as a sniper, but experts say the dead man was probably just an infantryman and that Gardner and his assistants moved the body there for dramatic purposes.

NAPOLEON ON GUARD

A bronze Union cannon at Trostle Farm, south of Gettysburg. Confederate troops overran the Federal artillery position here on day two of the battle. The black spot you see on the end of the barn is the hole of a cannon shot.

SACHS COVERED BRIDGE

This 100-foot long span, built over Marsh Creek in 1854, was used by Union and Confederate troops before, during and after the battle of Gettysburg. Retreating Confederates crossed it for a final time on the rainy night of July 4, 1863, when they made their way back to Maryland and Virginia following the Civil War's most terrible battle. The bridge was put on the National Register of Historic Places in 1980.

SACHS COVERED BRIDGE

Note the distinctive truss framework. Retreating Confederates hanged three soldiers at the bridge as spies for the Union.

MARSH CREEK

Seen from Sachs Bridge at dusk. Confederates retreated over the bridge during the rainy night after the end of the battle.

AIMING POINT

The oak trees are descendants of the famous "Clump" that Gen. Robert E. Lee ordered the men of Brig. Gen. James Longstreet's command to aim for in what became known as Pickett's Charge, the Confederacy's failed and costly assault on the center of the Union line along Cemetery Ridge. It happened on the 3rd and final day of the Battle of Gettysburg

CIVIL WAR FARE

It is a plate of fried and boiled onions and apples with salt pork, accompanied by johnny cakes, made of cornmeal, milk and salt. The stainless steel plate copies the tinware that soldiers used. The foldable fork and spoon pair with a knife is a reproduction of a detachable set, the sort that some soldiers carried.

REBEL VIEW

Little Round Top, seen from the boulders of Devil's Den. Most Confederates knew it simply as the Rocky Hill.

PHOTOGRAPHIC HISTORY

This spot at Devil's Den is much as Alexander Gardner saw it just days after the fighting ended in July of 1863. What's missing here is the body of a Confederate soldier that Gardner and his assistants dragged and positioned to portray a supposed sniper who had been killed at his perch.

SENTINEL

Union cannon on Cemetery Ridge points to Seminary Ridge, where 12,000 Rebel troops assembled in a mile-long formation on July 3, 1863, the third and final day of the battle The assault on the center of the Federal line became known as Pickett's Charge. It failed, and Gen. Robert E. Lee withdrew his forces in defeat the next day.

SLAUGHTER PEN

That is how this part of the Gettysburg battlefield became known. It extends along a creek called Plum Run, below Round Top and adjacent to Devil's Den.

UNION CANNON

This one on Cemetery Ridge, which Union forces held throughout the three days of fighting.

COMMANDER'S MONUMENT

Gen. George Meade took charge of the Army of the Potomac three days before the fighting began at Gettysburg. His statue is on Cemetery Ridge near the farthest reach of Pickett's Charge at the Union Line. It shows him astride Old Baldy, who was wounded on day two of the battle. Both survived the war, and Old Baldy was the riderless horse in the general's 1872 funeral procession.

MIGHTY MUZZLE

This is a 3-inch ordinance rifle. It fired projectiles weighing about 10 pounds and had an effective range of just over a mile.

UNION BASE

The two-room farmhouse of Lydia Leister, close behind the Federal line on Cemetery Ridge, became Gen. George Meade's headquarters during the battle. On the night after the second day of fighting, he had a war council with his top commanders in the room on the right. The decision they reached was to stay and fight.

THE ANGLE

This spot on Cemetery Ridge was the farthest that rebels got into the Union line during Pickett's Charge on the 3rd and final day of the battle.

BREAKTHROUGH POINT

It is called the Angle, and was the one spot along Cemetery Ridge where rebel troops penetrated the Union line during the climax oof Pickett's Charge

RAILWAY CUT

It was an unfinished project in July of 1863, when on day one of the Gettysburg battle Federal troops captured scores of Confederates caught at the bottom of the steep walls.

RAILWAY CUT

It was an unfinished project in July of 1863, when on day one of the Gettysburg battle Federal troops captured some 200 Mississippians trapped in the trough.

CEMETERY HILL VIEW

A Union cannon overlooks the farmland across which 12,000 Confederate troops advanced from the trees along Seminary Ridge, almost a mile away. It happened on the third and final day of the battle of Gettysburg and became known as Pickett's Charge. And it was a disastrous failure for Gen. Robert E. Lee and his Army of Northern Virginia.

DEVIL'S DEN

This array of large boulders got its nickname well before the battle, supposedly for a large black snake that lived in the rocks.

CHANGING HANDS

Union forces occupied Devil's Den on day one of the battle. Confederates from Texas, Alabama and Georgia drove them away by evening, and thereafter used the boulders as cover for sharpshooters taking aim at Federal troops on Little Round Top.

ROCK STAR

One of the more distinctive and most photographed boulders at Devil's Den.

DEFENSE LINE

Stones piled along Little Round Top's southern end mark the area where Union soldiers led by Col. Joshua Chamberlain repulsed waves of Confederate attacks over two hours on the second day of the battle. Their success saved the Union line.

HIGH WATER MARK

The stone wall provided cover for Union troops, on the right, as Confederates approached across nearly a mile of open farmland to the left in Pickett's Charge on July 3, 1863. The area was scene of wild, close quarters combat that ended in a Union victory.

STONE WALL

Union soldiers gathered these rocks into defensive barricades on Little Round Top after repulsing repeated Rebel attacks up the slopes on July 2nd. That day, their protection was hastily assembled piles of tree trunks and branches. The Union soldiers upgraded to rocks in expectation of further Confederate assaults the following day. That never happened. The Rebs were instead busy attacking the center of the Federal line to the north in the disastrous Pickett's Charge.

UNION VIEW

Holding the high ground has its perks. This is how the Yankees viewed the Rebs from Little Round Top. Those big rocks left of center are Devil's Den. The roads are modern.

HIGH WATER MARK

Such is the name of this part of the Gettysburg battlefield. The area on the near side of the stone wall was the scene of hand-to-hand fighting as Pickett's Charge ran out of steam on Cemetery Ridge. The failure of Gen. Lee's attempt to break the center of the Union line led to the Confederate retreat the following day. The South would never again mount an offensive in the North.

DEVIL'S DEN

The name has nothing to do with the Battle of Gettysburg, but everything to do with a very large black snake that lived in the rocks.

BATTLE CLIMAX

Union troops had cover this side of the low stone wall as three divisions of Rebels advanced across nearly a mile of open farmland in Pickett's Charge on July 3, 1863. Lee's attempt to break the center of the federal line failed, and the Confederates who made it as far as this side of the wall were routed.