Today in History:

442 Series I Volume XXVII-I Serial 43 - Gettysburg Campaign Part I

Page 442 N. C., VA., W. VA., MD., PA., ETC. Chapter XXXIX.

I have receipts from General Harrow, commanding division, and they are named as received in the printed paper I saw in Washington. Will you have the goodness to cause the six named to be marked and credited to the men and regiments by whom they were captured? The regiments are all of the Third Brigade, Second Division, Second Corps, which I have had the honor to command till a week or two ago.

Very respectfully,

NORMAN J. HALL,

Colonel 7th Michigan Vols., and 1st Lieutenant 5th U. S. Artillery.

Colonel E. D. TOWNSEND,

Assistant Adjutant-General, U. S. Army.


Numbers 110. Report of Colonel Arthur F. Devereux, Nineteenth Massachusetts Infantry.

TANEYTOWN, MD.,

July 7, 1863.

SIR: I have the honor to submit the following report of the part which my regiment took in the late engagement near Gettysburg: On the evening of July 1, the corps was halted about 2 miles from the battle-ground. At daybreak of the 2d, were marched to the front, this division forming in columns of regiments by brigade on the right of the road, with its front toward the right of the position held by our army. Remaining there perhaps an hour, it crossed the road, and, by a counter march of regiments, assumed a front in an opposite direction, the Second Brigade on the right, the Third Brigade on the left, and the First Brigade in the rear as reserve, two regiments, each of the Second and Third Brigades, being thrown in advance of the column in position behind some fences. The division rested there during the day. About 5 p. m., some time after the Third Corps had been engaged on our left, Colonel Mallon, commanding Forty-second New York, and myself were ordered by the brigade commander to follow a staff officer, whom he pointed out, but whose name and rank I do not know, which was done, my regiment leading. Just before this, our attacking columns of the Third Corps, which had at first advanced, had begun to give way, and when we reached the rear of their position, a distance of perhaps an eighth of a mile from where we started, were completely broken, and running to the rear in great confusion. I asked the officer leading us what was the object intended for us to accomplish and what position to take up. He answered, "In support of Humphreys' division. " I pointed out to him how useless to attempt to form a support for a division in the open field with two small regiments, numbering but 290 men together, and when that division was so much broken and fleeing in such confusion. He gave me no satisfactory answer, and at that moment galloped off. Left to ourselves, I suggested to Colonel Mallon that the two regiments be formed behind the crest of a short knoll some distance in our front, there to lie down, wait until our retreating line, which was right upon us then, had passed, deliver a volley by the rear and front


Page 442 N. C., VA., W. VA., MD., PA., ETC. Chapter XXXIX.