At one o’clock the moment seems to have arrived. Along the whole front of Hill and Longstreet, the Southern artillery all at once bursts forth. One hundred and forty-five cannon send their threatening thunder across the peaceful valley. From Cemetery Heights eighty pieces reply to them; and for more than an hour these two hundred and twenty-five cannon tear the air with their harsh roar, hurled back in crash after crash from the rocky ramparts. That thunder is the most terrible yet heard in the war. It stirs the coolest veterans. General Hancock, the composed and unexcitable soldier, is going to say of it, “Their artillery fire was most terrific...it was the most terrific cannonade I ever witnessed, and the most prolonged.... It was a most terrific and appalling cannonade, one possibly hardly ever equalled.”
For nearly two hours Lee continues this “terrific” fire. The Federal guns reply—shot and shell crossing each other; racing across the blue sky; battering the rocks; or bursting in showers of iron fragments.
Suddenly the Federal fire slackens, and then ceases. Their ammunition has run low,{1} or they are silenced by the Southern fire. Lee’s guns also cease firing. The hour has come.
{Footnote: This was the real reason.}
The Virginians, under Pickett, form in double line in the edge of the woods, where Lee’s centre is posted. These men are ragged and travel-worn, but their bayonets and gun-barrels shine like silver. From the steel hedge, as the men move, dart lightnings.
From the Cemetery Heights the enemy watch that ominous apparition—the gray line of Virginians drawn up for the charge.
At the word, they move out, shoulder to shoulder, at common time. Descending the slope, they enter on the valley, and move steadily toward the heights.
The advance of the column, with its battle-flags floating proudly, and its ranks closed up and dressed with the precision of troops on parade, is a magnificent spectacle. Old soldiers, hardened in the fires of battle, and not given to emotion, lean forward watching the advance of the Virginians with fiery eyes. You would say, from the fierce clutch of the gaunt hands on the muskets, that they wish to follow; and many wish that.
The column is midway the valley, and beginning to move more rapidly, when suddenly the Federal artillery opens. The ranks are swept by round shot, shell, and canister. Bloody gaps appear, but the line closes up, and continues to advance. The fire of the Federal artillery redoubles. All the demons of the pit seem howling, roaring, yelling, and screaming. The assaulting column is torn by a whirlwind of canister, before which men fall in heaps mangled, streaming with blood, their bosoms torn to pieces, their hands clutching the grass, their teeth biting the earth. The ranks, however, close up as before, and the Virginians continue to advance.
From common time, they have passed to quick time—now they march at the double-quick. That is to say, they run. They have reached the slope; the enemy’s breastworks are right before them; and they dash at them with wild cheers.