First Army Corps

On September 17, 1862, Brigadier General John Gibbon's Brigade of Doubleday's Division, First Army Corps, consisting of the 2nd, 6th and 7th Wisconsin and 19th Indiana Infantry and known as the Iron Brigade, advanced in the morning toward the Dunker Church with its right on the Hagerstown Pike. When 135 yards north of this point, Confederates under cover of the ledge and woods west of the pike attacked its flank. The 19th Indiana and 7th Wisconsin deployed on the open plateau and in the woods west of the pike, and the 2nd and 6th Wisconsin in the cornfield east of it. Company B, 4th U.S. Artillery, went into position west of the pike and a few yards south of Miller's barn. Supported by Patrick's Brigade and battery on the right and Phelps' Brigade on the left, Gibbon's Brigade advanced south of this point but was forced back. Charge and counter charge of the most deadly character followed across the open plateau west of, and in the cornfield and ground south of it, east of the pike, and the Iron Brigade was compelled to retire to the field north of D.R. Miller's and then to the cover of the high ground, north and east of Joseph Poffenberger's.

Shepherdstown, Maryland · United States