Description:

CHARLES B. BROCKWAY OF RICKETT'S BATTERY, 1ST PA. WRITES FROM TANEYTOWN, A DAY BEFORE GETTYSBURG
Fine content manuscript D.S. "C. B. Brockway " and adding subscription and rank, 3pp. legal folio, "Head Quarters Battery 'F' 1st Pa. Arty", (Taneytown en route to Gettysburg), July 1, 1863, a report to Maj. F. M. Gilvery on the actions of Capt. James Thompson's Independent Battery and Brockway's Battery F of the 1st Pennsylvania at Cedar Run and Rappahannock Ford. He notes, in part: "...[at Cedar Run]I think that to Capt. Thompson's Indpt Pa. Battery belongs the honor of silencing the rebel battery. A knoll was between Capt. Hall's battery and the enemy...As he had rifled pieces it was impossible for him to make his projectiles curve sufficiently to reach them at so short a range. Nor is there any reason to believe that the Parrot guns belonging to Capt. Thompson did any execution, but there is every reason to believe that his section of howitzers drove off the enemy. The day after...I rode over the ground and found pieces of howitzer shell scattered over the ground and imbedded in the trees but in no instance found traces of projectiles from rifled pieces except among the tops of trees...At the engagement at Rappahannock Ford...we lost one man killed, four wounded...Thompson's battery crossed over to our assistance...we crossed back again and engaged the enemy's artillery until about noon...". One fold split in a blank area of third page, else very good. The day after this report was written, Brockway's Battery F reached the field at Gettysburg and engaged the rebel batteries on Benner's Hill. At 8:00 P.M Hays' Brigade, the "Louisiana Tigers", broke the Union line and charged the battery atop Cemetery Hill. Desperate hand-to-hand fighting ensued, with Brockway actually smashing one attacker over the head with a rock. Every round of canister was exhausted before the attack was repulsed. Thompson too saw heavy combat at Gettysburg, desperately defending his battery in the Peach Orchard. A great association of brilliant Gettysburg artillery commanders.

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October 9, 2010 11:00 AM EDT
Stamford, CT, US

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