Battlefield Landmarks - West and North

From the Union position on Cemetery Ridge, the ground to the west and slightly north stretched toward the Confederate position on Seminary Ridge, across which Pettigrew and Trimble's Confederate infantry attacked on the afternoon of July 3. When the attack failed, the Southerners who were not killed, wounded, or captured streamed back across the fields to Seminary Ridge. In 1863, Emmitsburg Road was a sunken dirt road bordered by post-and-rail fences, and attacking Confederates had to tear the fences down or climb over them, exposing themselves to heavy Union musketry and artillery fire. The Angle, where two stone walls joined to form a 90-degree angle, saw desperate hand-to-hand fighting on July 3; some Confederates crossed the wall there but could not prevail, and veterans remembered it as the Bloody Angle. On July 2, the house and farm of William Bliss sheltered Confederate sharpshooters who fired on Union troops, and on the morning of July 3 Federal troops assaulted the farm buildings and burned them, leaving Bliss with nothing. The Virginia Memorial was erected in 1917 to honor all Virginians who fought at Gettysburg; above its granite base stands a bronze figure of General Robert E. Lee on his horse Traveler, and from nearby Lee watched the attack and later consoled his defeated men, telling them, "It is all my fault."

Gettysburg, Pennsylvania · United States