Dichoto(Me)

F6F Hellcat on the flight deck of Enterprise, 2 July 1943.

July 2nd, 1863: Battle of Gettysburg - As Sickles’s line collapsed under Confederate attack, it became apparent that the situation was dire. If the enemy managed to get through the gap, they would be able to roll up the Union forces, devastating the Union Army and likely ending the war. Gray uniforms arrived in magnificent waves, hurling death and destruction from rifles and batteries. Union General Winfield S. Hancock had sent for reinforcements but they would not arrive for at least five minutes. All he had to plug the gap stood before him. He looked at the regiment and said “My God, are these all the men we have?” They were. “What regiment is this?” Hancock asked. “The 1st Minnesota,” commanding officer Colonel William Colvill replied. “Charge those lines,” ordered Hancock.

The 1st Minnesota was outnumbered at least 6 to 1. The regiment was to be sacrificed for an uncertainty. Colonel Colvill turned to his men and ordered them to fix bayonets and “forward, double quick.” Not a single man disobeyed the order. At first they began moving in two lines, which they held as long as possible under punishing fire before driving straight into the center of the enemy. Their flag fell five times, and each time was picked up again. By the time they reached the enemy the 1st Minnesota was spread out fighting individually or in small groups. Still, they held their line and prevented the Confederates from pushing any further forward.

Hancock had asked them for five minutes. The 1st Minnesota gave him fifteen. They lost 215 men, 82% of the regiment, which remains the largest loss of life by any U.S. regiment in a single day of battle. The General would later say that “No soldiers on any field, in this or any other country, ever displayed grander heroism.” What remained of the 1st Minnesota was plugged into other units and found themselves at the focal point of Pickett’s Charge where they performed admirably again. Historians believe that the 1st Minnesota’s charge saved the Union at Gettysburg, and as a result was one of the essential moments in winning the Civil War. (x)

“Lions of Little Round Top, July 2nd 1863″

Late in the afternoon of July 2, 1863, on a boulder-strewn hillside in southern Pennsylvania, Union Colonel Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain dashed headlong into history, leading his 20th Maine Regiment in perhaps the most famous counterattack of the Civil War.

The regiment’s sudden, desperate bayonet charge blunted the Confederate assault on Little Round Top and has been credited with saving Major General George Gordon Meade’s Army of the Potomac, winning the Battle of Gettysburg and setting the South on a long, irreversible path to defeat.

On July 2, 1863, Colonel Joshua Chamberlain lead his men of the 20th Maine on a bayonet charge down the slopes of little round top, during the battle of Gettysburg. He would later be awarded the Medal of Honor for his actions that day.

Eric Schwab

Milk bar on Broadway

John Newton Howitt, Aug 1941