ringing the crest of the hilltop. Gunners, working feverishly, were not even bothering to roll the pieces back into place, simply loading and firing. Some of the crews had even stopped swabbing, running the risk of a hot bore or spark triggering a premature blast in order to save an additional ten seconds.
Shimmers of heat radiated off the guns directly in front of Hancock. Even as he watched, a loader slammed a canister round into the open bore. The rammer pushed him aside, started to drive the round in, and then was flung backward as the powder bag hit a hot spark, seven-foot ramrod staff screaming downrange, rammer writhing on the ground, right hand blown off, shoulder broken, face scorched black.
His comrades pulled him back behind the firing line, the gun sergeant screaming for a replacement ramrod, running back toward a limber wagon.
The Rebs were pushing closer, not coming on in a wild heads-down charge but advancing slowly, pouring in a fierce fire, trying to break up the batteries before pressing the final hundred yards.
Bullets sang around Hancock's ears, his staff ducking and bobbing in their saddles. He rode the length of the line, voice too hoarse to continue shouting. Henry came past, waving his hat, three limber wagons, two chests of ammunition strapped to each, bouncing behind him. He waved them into place, one wagon per battery.
The crest of the hill was crowded with limber wagons and caissons, each with six horses, all of them pressed nearly side to side. Hancock could almost pity the trace riders for the caissons. Regulations stated that when in action the mounted rider of the six-horse team had to remain in the saddle, ready to guide the caisson around if the guns needed to be moved quickly.
It was a ghastly job in the middle of a fight. A man was expected to sit with his back to the enemy, all hell breaking loose, arid just wait It was a type of courage he wondered if he could ever muster… to do nothing but wait.
He reached the south end of the battle line, where a low stone wall jutted out to the west for fifty yards, a small grove of trees behind the wall. Buford's skirmishers crouched behind the wall; Calef's hard-fought battery of mounted artillery occupied the angle, pouring shot into the enemy flank. The four Reb guns deployed on the far side of the road opened on Calef, but he ignored them, his men simply ducking as a shell screamed in, then returning to their work of laying down case shot on the road.
He focused his glasses-down the Emraitsburg Road, looking south. Something was on it, dark, serpentlike, still distant, but coming. It was Sickles, responding to his urgent plea for immediate support
'General Hancock, sir!'
He looked back. A courier, one of Howard's men, was riding up hard, waving his hat 'They're coming, sir. The Rebs east of town; they're coming!'
He looked back south. A half hour, maybe more. Damn!
He turned, following Howard's messenger, riding along the crest looking west judging the strength and determination of the Reb attack hitting his left flank. A lot of the Rebs were still wearing blanket rolls and backpacks, a sign they had maneuvered straight from the march into battle formation without taking time to form regimental depots, drop-off points for all excess baggage, before going into the fight.
Rather than lose a precious blanket and haversack of food, the men were carrying the extra weight into battle. He wondered if they had been watered before the attack or were coming in with dry canteens.
For whatever reason, their attack was slow. The artillery's concentrated fire had battered Anderson's division down, keeping them pinned along the road. But the guns had to shift if there was any hope of flinging back the new assault on the right Henry was up at the crest of the hill, frantically waving, directing the redeployment swinging guns around to face north and east
The Rebs along the fence, however, had yet to react to push forward, though they had to have seen by now that the artillery fire was slackening.
He eased his mount through a hole in the cemetery wall and weaved his way past a parked row of caissons. Passing the nearest one, he looked in as a loader pulled a round of case shot out of a storage slot and, with an awl- like punch, set the fuse at two seconds.
'How many left?' Hancock shouted
The loader looked up, startled by the presence of a corps commander gazing down at him.
'Ahh, three case shot, sir. Half a dozen canister.'
'Webster, get that damn shell up here!'
The loader, responding to the cries of his sergeant, tried to salute, gave up, and ran back up to the firing line, Hancock following.
He could hear the cry, the rebel yell. Reaching the battery, he reined in. Through holes in the smoke he saw them coming, definitely a brigade, maybe two, heading straight for the east slope of the hill, advance skirmishers already trading fire on the side of the wooded hill that flanked the cemetery.
''This is where it's going to be decided!'
Henry was by his side, eyes wide with excitement, rivers of sweat streaming down his face. 'Got one more battery still coming up!' and he pointed back down the Baltimore Pike.
Struggling up the hill came a battery of six Napoleons, horses covered with foaming sweat, more than one of the mounts all but dead, limp in their traces, oblivious to the whip blows from the drivers.
A thunderclap volley ignited from the north end of the hill. Ames's men, still dug in around Wiedrich's battery, had stood up and fired, the blow staggering the Reb advance, which slowed for a moment then continued on.
'Ammunition?' Hancock shouted, looking over at Hunt
'Unless Jesus Christ Almighty drops a' few limber wagons from the heavens, what we've got here is it. Some of the guns are out of canister; they're shooting solid shot!'
Hancock cast a glance to the western horizon. The sun was blood red, hanging low, soon to slip behind the South Mountains.
A half hour till sunset a half hour. God, it seemed like an eternity.
The Rebs pressed in, battle lines past the flank of the town, spreading out A broken line of skirmishers pressing out from the streets formed a loose screen between the two divisions.
Wiedrich's four guns fired in salvo, entire lines going down under the blasts. Stevens's battery was pouring it on, ignoring the increasing fire from long-range skirmishers pressing up the slope of the wooded hill. The six Napoleons coming up behind Henry were swinging into position, forming to face straight down toward the cemetery gate below, knocking over headstones, shattering monuments.
Once the first gun was unhooked from its caisson and positioned, Henry detailed the drivers to head down to Stewart and rum over their caisson of ammunition to the beleaguered battery. The crew assigned didn't look too pleased at leaving their own battery with orders to ride straight into an inferno, but the men lashed their teams and pushed down the slope.
A steady stream of wounded were coming back from the firing line on the west slope. No breakdown there yet. He noticed only a scattering of unwounded trying to get out. Some of the men, as they reached the crest, paused, gazing to the north and east, taking in the sight of Johnson's advance. Several of them, seeing Hancock, slowed and, in spite of their wounds, fell in on the makeshift final line.
The charge was coming on faster, pushing in. Another blast of canister, this one at point-blank range. Stewart's and Dilger's guns, no longer engaged against Anderson, had swung around, and once again were pouring in enfilade fire to support their comrades on the right
The first line of the charge disappeared, going down, piling atop the dead and wounded from the earlier charge. The second wave, less than fifty yards out slowed-rifles flashing, lowering, firing a sharp, rippling volley-and then, with bayonets lowered, came in at the charge, high wolf yip shrieks sending a corkscrew down Hancock's spine.
The swarm piled up over Wiedrich's guns, tangling in with the gunners, Ames's infantry, all of them a seething, boiling mass, cloaked in a smoky haze.
A lone caisson came out of the inferno, trying to gain the road, upended, throwing the driver as it rolled over, horses shrieking. Another caisson, down in the middle of the confusion, blew, top lid soaring a hundred feet into the air, flinging men in every direction.
The point of the salient broke, men streaming back, pouring up the road and along the flank of the knoll, followed by the charging swarm. Stewart's guns-now caught fully in flank-turned, continuing to fire, even as the breakthrough spread toward them.
The second line-a hodgepodge of regimental fragments from First and Eleventh Corps-dug in around the
