A Pioneer Remembers Gettysburg

Abstract

Gettysburg Magazine, no. 52 upon which our men were put into a doublequick, this gait being kept up to the battlefi eld, with only short breathing intermissions. As soon as we had passed the Round Tops, leaving them to our right or east, part of the First Corps’ fi ghting came into view due north, Gettysburg being visible northnortheast. For quite a distance we had heard the crackling fi re of the infantry, and seeing the First Corps heavily engaged, our men struck the longwinded dog trot, and went in that style through the town, emerging on the Mummasburg road. Aft er passing Pennsylvania College I saw the enemy’s infantry outfl anking the extreme right of the First Corps (the 12th Mass and 104th N.Y.) but their commanders changed their fronts from westnorthwest to due north. Aft er my Pioneers were put to work to cut down the post fences between the college and Hagy’s house to let the infantry and artillery into the fi elds north of the road, I naturally turned my attention to the terrible but indescribably fascinating scene on the east slope of Seminary Ridge. Th e rebel infantry was coming down the Mummasburg road at a run, about 600 yards from me, and taking shelter on the southwest side of the road in the ditch behind the fence, fi red into the exposed ranks of the 13th Mass and 104th N.Y., who stood in an open meadow. I could see every man fall as he was hit by the enemy (who lost hardly any in this unequal contest), until of the original line of blue was left only a thin line, with great gaps at that. My heart bounded with joy when Th e writer of this little article does not claim for it absolute correctness in the minutest details, it being penned mostly from memory, but endeavors to bring before all comrades of the Army of the Potomac, especially the First Corps, a comprehensive sketch of the fi ghting of the two divisions of the Eleventh Corps pitched against [Gen. Richard] Ewell’s (old Stonewall) Corps until enveloped in right fl ank and rear by numbers equaling two to one, according to the records of the War Department. I was an eyewitness to the unequal struggle of the Th ird and Second Divisions (I name them in this order, as we marched left in front that day, and went into action in that order) of my Corps for about two hours, being detached from my regiment to headquarters of the Th ird Division as second offi cer of the division Pioneer company. Th e Eleventh Corps camped during the night of June 30 to July 1 in and around Emmitsburg, near the line between Maryland and Pennsylvania. Breakfast was eaten before sunrise, and my Pioneer company, at the head of the corps, immediately behind Gen. C[arl] Schurz, was marching by the fi rst rays of the sun toward the most remarkably open and one of the most stubbornly contested battlefi elds of the civil war. When within six or seven miles of Gettysburg, about 10 a.m., the distant boom of cannon informed us of an engagement going on, and not long aft erward an Aid[e] of Gen. [Oliver O.] Howard brought orders to Gen. Schurz, A Pioneer Remembers Gettysburg