Military
15
About 3:00 p.m. on the third day, more than 5,000 Virginians commanded by Maj. Gen. George E. Pickett emerged from the trees 3/4 mile in front of you as other Confederates under Generals Pettigrew and Trimble attacked farther to the right, forming a combined force of 12,000 in a line a mile long. They marched across the fields with flags waving and muskets glittering as exploding shells tore holes in the Southern ranks, yet as dead and wounded fell, others took their places. After the men in gray crossed the Emmitsburg Road and neared the stone wall, Union defenders decimated them with rounds of canister and volleys of musket fire, but the survivors charged ahead. Despite staggering losses, Confederate Brig. Gen. Lewis A. Armistead led several hundred men across the wall amid bitter hand-to-hand combat, where he fell mortally wounded. Exhausted, outnumbered, and low on ammunition, the Confederates could not prevail.
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Gettysburg, Pennsylvania · United States
