Where is it Wednesday, Gettysburg?

Congrats! location is on Oak Ridge part of the John Forney farm. Part of Rodes incommand of Alfred Iverson (hence the nickname for the area being Iverson's Pits). Thank you for the photos of Mr. Forney's home and barn!

They lay prone behind one of the low walls the thrifty Pennsylvania Dutch farmers had erected over the seasons with the stones unearthed by their tillers to border the fields. Flagstaffs were lowered out of sight and the striped banners allowed by the exigency to mat the ground. Through occasional gaps in the rock formation, the Union soldiers glimpsed the advancing Rebel line, one far straighter than most they had seen. Well-drilled troops, for sure. But, curiously, the enemy was not approaching their concealing wall directly, but moving diagonally towards it, almost as if their leaders believed the Federal position did not extend as far as it did and that they were descending on its flank. The Yankees could count four flags out in front of the gray line-that meant four regiments, a brigade, maybe fourteen-hundred or fifteen-hundred men coming through the grassy field, unobstructed by as much as a bush or sapling. In the distance, behind them, near where the Rebels had formed on the Mummasburg Road, stood the John S. Forney house. If he had not abandoned his property, the farmer was no doubt feeling some concern over the way his fields were being trampled. A matrixed wooden fence that ran the length of his land had been the advancing force's only hindrance and Forney probably soured to see the rails being scattered as the lean Rebels scrambled over the obstacle.
One-hundred yards now, at most, the Southerners on the right, even closer, close enough for the hidden Union troops to see the names of their battles stitched on their red banners-the Seven Days, Sharpsburg, South Mountain, Chancellorsville - a veteran unit for certain. Those troops on the left, they observed, seemed to be drifting somewhat away from the other three regiments. If there was anyone in overall charge of the brigade to correct the alignment, it was not apparent.

At eighty yards came the shouts, "Fire, fire, fire"' The Union soldiers sprang to their feet in front of the startled Rebs who-with no skirmish line in front of them to detect the hidden force-stopped in their tracks, suddenly aware of their utter defenselessness in the open field.

The first volleys from the Yankees in front of them and, even more devastating, from those enfilading their exposed left flank where the stone wall abruptly turned to follow the road, killed or wounded nearly five-hundred men, dropping them in an even, seemingly endless row. Those not hit, hugged the ground, crawling into a muddy recess in the field that afforded no other protection from the Union riflemen.

In just a few minutes on this first day at Gettysburg, Iverson's Brigade, Robert E. Rodes' Division, Second Corps, Army of Northern Virginia, would be virtually annihilated, the remnants signalling surrender by slowly waving their slouched hats, or dangling pieces of their shirts that they had ripped away. Only five of Gen. Robert E. Lee's thirty-seven infantry brigades would return from the disastrous Pennsylvania campaign with longer casualty lists. What had happened? How could one of the most battle- seasoned units in the army have been caught in such a trap? Who was responsible? The answers form a tragic story of one of the most flagrant cases of irresponsibility and bungling, if not outright cowardice, by a commander to which any unit, blue or gray, was subjected during the war.
Exerpted from and Read more at...http://www.gdg.org/Gettysburg%20Magazine/iverson.html
 
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