"In the Bloody Railroad Cut at Gettysburg: The 6th Wisconsin " Topic

…of the Iron Brigade and its Famous Charge.

"The storied Iron Brigade carved out a unique reputation during the Civil War. Its men fought on many hard fields, but they performed their most legendary exploits just outside a small Pennsylvania town called Gettysburg on the first day of July in 1863. There were many heroic actions that morning and afternoon, but the fight along an unfinished deep scar in the ground north of the Chambersburg Pike was one never forgotten, and is the subject of Lance J. Herdegen's and William J. K. Beaudot's award-winning (and long out of print) In the Bloody Railroad Cut at Gettysburg: The 6th Wisconsin of the Iron Brigade and its Famous Charge. The railroad cut fighting was led mainly by the "Calico Boys" of the 6th Wisconsin Volunteers. Detached from the balance of the Iron Brigade, the Badgers of the 6th charged nearly 200 yards to meet a Confederate brigade that had swung into what looked like an ideal defensive position along an unfinished railroad cut northwest of town. The fighting was close, brutal, personal, and bloody¯and it played a key role in the final Union victory. The Wisconsin men always remembered that moment when they stood under "a galling fire" in an open field just north of the pike. Using hundreds of firsthand accounts, many previously unpublished, Herdegen and Beaudot carry their readers into the very thick of the fighting. The air seemed "full of bullets," one private recalled, the men around him dropping "at a fearful rate." Pvt. Amos Lefler was on his hands and knees spitting blood and teeth with Capt. Johnny Ticknor of Company K down and dying just a handful of yards away. Pvt. James P. Sullivan felt defenseless, unable as he was to get his rifle-musket to fire because of bad percussion caps. Rebel buckshot, meanwhile, smashed the canteen and slashed the hip of Sgt. George Fairfield. Behind the Wisconsin men, Lt. Col. Rufus Dawes watched a "fearful" and "destructive" Confederate fire crashing with "an unbroken roar before us. Men were being shot by twenties and thirties." While frantically loading and shooting, the Badgers leaned into the storm of bullets coming from the cut 175 yards away. The Westerners pushed slowly into the field and¯at that very instant when victory or defeat teetered undecided¯the "Jayhawkers" in the Prairie du Chien Company began shouting "Charge! Charge! Charge!" And so they did. Young Dawes lifted his sword and shouted "Forward! Forward Charge! Align on the Colors!" It was at that moment, remembered Cpl. Frank Wallar, a farmer-turned-soldier who would soon make his name known to history by capturing the flag of the 2nd Mississippi, "there was a general rush and yells enough to almost awaken the dead." Out of print for nearly two decades, this facsimile reprint and its new Introduction share with yet another generation of readers the story of the 6th Wisconsin's magnificent charge. Indeed it is their story, and how they remembered it. And it is one you will never forget."

See here
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Amicalement
Armand

archers brigade was on the opposite side of the pike. what book was the reviewer reading?

I wrote a report on the Iron Brigade at Gettysburg, and I took my information straight from the commanding officers' reports. It was the 2nd Mississippi Volunteers that the 6th Wisconsin faced; however, they certainly didn't charge alone, but according to Dawes with the 95th New York and 14th Brooklyn. And Archer's Brigade was opposite the 2nd Wisconsin, hiding in what is described by Major John Mansfield as a "deep excavation."

you are way wrong. jj archers brigade was fighting in Herbst(very offten misnamed McPherson's)wood lot.
if you don't know that,well, i just don't know what to say other than you're off to a poor start.

and i understand you may not have studied the battle as long as i have(very nearly 40 years), but crack ANY book on the first days fighting, and its there for any to see.
mean to say, i can't remember anyone putting jj archers brigade on the left side of the pike.

I'll give you your forty years of experience, and I am very glad to have this discussion with you. However, the information I gathered in my sources (which I will provide a link for you to examine), clearly states that Dawes and the 6th were opposite the 2nd Mississippi. While Mansfield, commanding the 2nd Wisconsin, states that he captured Archer along with much of his brigade. Here is Dawes's report: link which was written a few weeks after the battle. And Mansfield's account, written a few months after the battle: link

While writing my report, I was initially confused over the names for the woods. However, Archer was pushed out of the wood and forced to retire to a different position, one described by Mansfield as a "deep excavation," and shown on some maps of the battlefield as a "quarry," I believe. Mansfield ordered "a charge upon this last position of the enemy, which was gallantly made at the doublequick, the enemy breaking in confusion to the rear… we captured a large number of prisoners, including several officers, among them General Archer, who was taken by Private Patrick Maloney," (Dawes, link

ok. now i get what you mean.
the "quarry" is just below the McPherson buildings. i think thats what you mean. but its still not on the left side of the pike.
and for the record(well, every document i've looked at) states that gen. archer was captured in a stand of trees on the near side(that is the west side) of the run.
its a myth that the iron brigade captured "most of archers brigade". modern research shows that only about 75 of archers men were captured, mostly from the 7th tenn.

Actually that 75 captured was from an old source – Colonel Shepard of the 7th Tennessee. From David Martin's book on July 1st:

Casualties in Archer's brigade are difficult to determine because of incomplete reports and the heavy losses sustained in the assault of 3 July. Historians Marc and Beth Storch have analyzed the brigade's losses during the battle and estimate the following casualties for units. The brigade's largest unit, the 13th Alabama lost 168 of its 308 men, principally because it bore the brunt of the attack of the Iron Brigade's left wing. The 1st Tennessee, which was also on Archer's right, experienced heavy losses, 109 out of 281 engaged. The 7th and 14th Tennessee lost less heavily because they enjoyed the protection of Herbst Woods, and were not initially outflanked by the Iron Brigade's attack. The 14th lost 62 of its 220 men, and the 7th lost 30 of its 249. The brigade's lightest casualties were in the 5th Alabama Battalion, which apparently lost only 4 of its 135 men due to the fact that it was engaged mostly as skirmishers against Buford's cavalry; these figures suggest that the battalion was probably not with Archer's main line when the Iron Brigade attack struck. Likewise Companies B and G of the 13th only lost one man on July 1st, because they also were principally engaged on the skirmish line. The number of Archer's men who were captured cannot be precisely determined. Lieutenant Colonel S.G. Shepard of the 7th Tennessee claims that only about 75 were lost as prisoners, while General Doubleday claims it was as many as 1000. The actual number lost clearly lies somewhere in between these two extremes. Historian Robert K. Krick has determined that the brigade lost 432 prisoners and missing during the entire battle. If the brgade's losses were approximately equal on each day, as Marc and Beth Storch suggest, the brigade may have lost about 216 men prisoners and missing on 1 July.