Pickett's Charge

Before the men walked, the guns fired. At about one in the afternoon on July 3, 1863, roughly 150 Confederate cannon opened on Cemetery Ridge in what was meant to wreck the Union artillery before the infantry stepped off. Union guns answered. People heard it in Pittsburgh, and reportedly as far as Philadelphia.

It was also largely wasted. Smoke blinded the Confederate gunners within minutes and their fire crept long, so most of the shells passed over the ridge and landed among the rear areas — hard on the wagon trains and the hospitals, easy on the infantry lying flat behind the wall. The Union artillery chief then stopped firing, partly to save ammunition and partly to suggest his batteries had been destroyed. From the Confederate side it looked like the bombardment had worked.

So the guns fell silent, and about 12,500 men came out of the treeline on Seminary Ridge and started across a mile of open Pennsylvania farmland in close order, in July heat, in full view. Longstreet had argued against it and could not bring himself to give the order aloud; he nodded.