The Sun.
London, England, 1863-08-18 00:00:00

THE BATTLES OF GETTYSBURG,

(From the Special Correspondent of the Times.)
HEADQUARTERS OF GEN. LONGSTREET,
NEAR GETTYSBURG, July 2.
It was not till 4 in the afternoon that the battle
commenced. Upon the extreme Confederate right
advanced Gen. Hood and the Texans, who would
follow his tall form up to Gehenna's gates, and the
day's disasters commenced by a wound which he at
once received, shattering his left arm below the
elbow and forcing him from the field. His division
fell to the command of the senior Brigadier-General,
Robertson, who swiftly shared Gen. Hood's fate,
and resigned the command to Gen. Law. On Hood's
left advanced, hardly with sufficient promptitude,
the division of Gen. M'Laws. Observing some de-
lay in their advance, Gen. Longstreet threw him-
self at the head of Wofford's brigade, and led them
under such a fire as has rarely been witnessed right
up the slope. Repressing the disposition of his men
to cheer him as he took his place at their head by
the brief exclamation of " Cheer less, men, and
fight more," Gen. Longstreet, mounted upon the
same charger which he hes ridden in a score of
battlefields, without either horse or rider, both
recklessly and constantly exposed, encountering
even a scratch, plunged into the thickest of the
fight. There are in all wars undemonstrative, un-
selfish, and natural men, whose worth is chiefly
known to their soldiers, who seldom attract and care
nothing for public applause, but on whom in the
direst stress of critical battle the sternest and most
hazardous role devolves, To this order belongs
Gen. Longstreet—a man fighting not for praise, or
civil or social distinction, with a repugnance to
those self-seeking politicians (a class happily almost
unknown to England) who manipulate for their own
advancement the reputation of such generals as con-
descend to become their creatures. Few, indeed,
among the generals of Lee's army are such self-
seekers—least self-seeking of all Generals Lee
and Longstreet themselves. It was natural
that one of the Federal prisoners brought
back in this very charge by Wofford's Brigade
should, upon learning that the big man who led
the advance was none other than Gen. Longstreet,
have exclaimed, "No wonder we are thrashed upon
every field ; there is not in the whole of our army a
Lieut.-General who would have risked his life in
such a charge." Against the first position of the
Federals the advance of Longstreet's two divisions
was completely successful ; against the second and
stronger position he had not men enough to essay
seriously upon this day to prevail.
Meanwhile on the Confederate centre and left
Generals Hill and Ewell mingled in fierce conflict
with their sternly-resisting enemy. Vain indeed
would be the attempt to portray in language the
scene which the Cemetery-hill, held by the Federal
centre, and the lines of their right wing, lying im
mediately behind Gettysburg, presented to the spec-
tator. If it had not been reserved for me to listen
next day to a still more awful din, I should have
fancied that no such scene had ever before saluted
mortal eye or ear. A thick canopy of smoke, con.
stantly rent by bright darting flashes cof flame, cast
its dense pall over the struggling, bleeding thou-
sands who toiled and died in itA centre, while out
of the opaque gloom, as though from the bowels of
the earth, one deep prolonged bellowing roar never
ceased to issue. Through the deepening twilight
and on far into the night the fierce struggle c-)n-
-tinued, until, in the gloom, the dazzling parabolas
of flame, bursting into sparkling jets and corusca-
tions as the shells cracked and exploded, made a
ghastly pyrotechnic display. It:was not untill ate
in the night that it was learnt that the divisions of
Rodes and Early had at one time actually carried a
part of the Cemetery-hill, and had sent down a
peremptory entreaty for support to Generals Pinder
and Anderson of A. P. Hill's corps. But General
Pinder lay at the moment desperately wounded.
The request was, for some unknown reason, unheeded
by Gen. Anderson. Rodes and Early fell back to
their old positions, and the only advantage gained
by the Confederates consisted in the carrying by
Gen. Longstreet of the first position of the Federals
upon the extreme right of the Confederate line.
JULY 3.
Between the first and second positions originally
held by the Federal left intervened a large bare
sloping meadow, nearly a mile in width. Across
this Valley of the Shadow of Death the Confede-
rates' advance, committed this morning to the divi-
sions of Generals Pickett and Pettigrew, had no
option but to proceed, swept by the concentrated fire
of the countless Federal guns, and exposed when
nearing those guns to hailstorms of musketry bul-
lets. The distance was too great to advance at the
double; it was necessary to move slowly and deli-
berately, that, as the men approached the batteries,
there might be some dash left for the final on-
slaught. Early in the morning General Longstreet's
line stood thus :—On the extreme right the division
of General Hood, commanded by General Law;
next to him the division of M'Laws—these two divi-
sions being by General Longstreet held in hand to
launch against the Federals should success attend
the onward movement to their left. Next to M'Laws
came the spec gregis of the moment—the division of
General Pickett, supported and assisted on its left
by the far larger division of General Pettigrew,
belonging to A. P. Hill's corps, and ordinarily com-
manded by General Hetb, who received a singular
wound on the first day. He was struck in the
centre of his forehead by a Minie bullet, which laid
bare the bone, and then glided off. He attributes
his escape to the fact that he was wearing a Yankee
hat which was too large for him, and
in front of
the forehead he had inserted a thick wad of paper,
which was strong enough in its resistance to the
bullet to save the General's life. It should be
noticed that most of Pettigrew's division consisted
of men who had never been seriously engaged
before. They have recently been drawn from
IsT}, °vth Carolina, where for months and months they
race been engaged in watching the fantastic me-
-es° Generale Hunter and Foster, and others in
the neighbourhood of Newbern—menaces which
must have "mind the Federal Government untold
millions of dollars, and which have been productive
of no 'good
to them beyond the larceny of a few
negroes and the sack and pillage of sundry houses
of
non-combats
te It would have been easy to
secure the only •
material advantage sought
by the
Federals on that
and
herringSounds—b3sheriee in Pamlico and Albemarle
sloops of war. thet presence in those waters of a few
The division of Gen.
brigades, lately leftah Pickett, shorn of two of its
likely, I believe, the vicinity of Suffolk, but
ertly to join Lee's army, did not
in number much
division of Pew exceed 4,000 men. The strong
igrear . .
the Ist, against Gen. 'Reyn
coaldisn, istsusetnaginaegdemienncotno-f
incon-
siderable loss,
numbered, :with the addition of Wil-
cox's Brigade, temporarily
attached to it, about
10,000 men. It was naturally desirable before their
,attack was delivered that a heavy
cannonade from
the Confederate batteries alisuld
as possible,
exhaust and perhaps silence
some
ofu far
of Col.
Longstreet,
the Federal
t
guns. Accordingly, under the instructions ctions
Walton, Chief of Artillery to Gen,
and
Col. 'Walker, Chief of Artillery to Gen. A p Hill,
battalions of artillery, numbering A.
in all 140
guns,
were got into position, while similar arrangements
were made by Gen. _Ewell on the left, e° that in all
upon the Confederate side alone there must have
been a concert of about 200 guns. It can hardly be
doubted that their thunder was echoed back from a
a imiler number of pieces on the Federal side, and to
imagination must it be left to conceive e reader's ima
the' diapason of 400 guns. The thundering roar of
all the accumulated battler ever fought upon earth
relied into cne volume could hardly have rent the
skie s with fiercer or more unearthly resonance and
din. Far back into the mountains the reverbera-
tions rolling from hillside to hillside startled strange
and unmusical echoes. Vast cumuli of cloud, such
as would have shrouded 10,000 Homeric goddesses,
had they cared in these days of villainous saltpetre
to mingle in the melee, floated over the strife;
horses, the suffering and tortured ministers of man's
fury and wrath, lay thickly dead or horribly muti-
lated upon the ground ; constantly from out of the
white pall of vapour issued wounded and mangled
men, and rumours that this or that General was
killed. that this or that regiment was reduced to a
corporal's guard, traceable to no authentic source,
neither believed nor disbelieved by the listeners. ,

of convulsive and agonised
grief, rendering almost under every tree of burying parties, some-
timesdering the last sad offices to the fallen,
depressed every
heart ; nor was the prospect of a
with tears
darkness
should fall, calculated
spirits. All day long, while
vent so soon as
the
night march in such weather known to be immi•
to cheer or elevate
the big guns on either
11's enormous train,
swollen
Gen. E vve-
angry silence,
horses and wagons
aide frowned at each other in
.
ion into Pennsylvania he
to vast bulk
which on their first incurs
filing off behind the
had abundantly collected, was
into a
by the plunder in
the same as we
ntains (not
pass of the South Mon
Confederate centre and right,
• from Chainbersburg),
had traversed when advancing
n. Towards
and pushing
which leads obliquely to Hagerstown.
which
evening the wagon train of A. P. Hill
and it was not
occupied the centre, followed Ewell;
• fLongstreel's
till long after midnight that the train o
till
corps got under weigh. From 7 in the evening
s corps,
3 in the morning we lay silent and moody upon the
soaking muddy ground, clinging to the log fire
which the damp and chilly night made most accep-
table, deluged by frequent dashes of heavy rain,
watching Gen Longstreet as, in deep thought, he
walked ceaselessly bacKward and forward like a
sailor on his quarterdeck. Presently we were joined
by Gcn. Leo. It cannot; be pretended that the
spirits of the party, under circumstances which
would have drawn heavily on the resources of Mark
Tapley, were as radiant as usual, but even to this
night came an end at last. It was a strange scene
to witness. The thick
gloom, the heavy rain, the
all-pervading sea of glutinous slimy mud, and
through it knee deep, sometimes barefooted, some-
times with trousers turned up above the knee,
tramping file after file of men, while along the road-
side the bright camp fires, stretching for thousands
of yards, dazzled and bewildered the rider's eye-
sight, as he tried to steer his way through droves of
oxen goaded with much shouting fiercely forward,
among flocks of terrified sheep, and through the in-
terstices of mile after mile of wagons, and caissons,
and guns, and attendant camp-followers.
sth, the rain
At length, on the morning of the