Orange Blossoms Continued

A letter written by Major Thomas W. Bradley, 124th New York Volunteers, and published in the National Tribune, February 4, 1886 :

“Smith’s Battery has not received in history full credit for the heroic and valuable work done by its members at Gettysburg. I was at that time 1st sergeant of Company ” H,” I24th New York. I saw the Battery come down Rock Run Glen. The guns Were unlimbered at the foot of Rock Ridge and hauled up the steep acclivity into position amid the rocks on its crest, and the Battery was soon engaged in a hot duel with the rebel batteries on the heights beyond the ” peach orchard.” Under cover of the Confederate fire, Longstreet’s Corps, massed in battle lines eight or ten deep, moved in confident, rapid attack on our position. The Battery changed from shell to canister, and, working as I never saw gunners work before or since, tore gap after gap through the ranks of the advancing foe. All this time the men were exposed to the direct fire of Longstreet’s Sharpshooters, and his front line. Every round of ammunition had to be carried from the foot of the ridge, the Battery keeping up a well-directed fire until the enemy was at the base of the heights and the guns could no longer be depressed to reach him. Then knowing that greatly superior force would overwhelm us and capture the guns unless checked, Colonel Ellis of the 124th, after a few rapid words with Major Cromwell, ordered a charge. It was immediately responded to and as quickly repulsed. It was again made in the face of a withering fire that ‘left killed and wounded two-fifths of the regiment. Flanked at the Devil’s Den by the turning of our line at that point, we were swept from the position, and the crest and guns were for a brief time in possession of the enemy. Meanwhile Captain Smith had removed horses, caissons and ammunition, rendering the guns useless to the enemy, whose hold on the position was so short that he could not remove them. * * * Longstreet’s determined charge, now so famous in history, was so dauntlessly met by our single line of battle on the crest of Rock Ridge, his force so terribly broken by the merciless fire of Smith’s canister and the fierce grapple amid the rocks of Devil’s Den. * * * The foregoing account is my recollection of Gettysburg, July 2, 1863. It may be faulty; it was more than twenty-two years ago, and I was but nineteen years of age then. The business cares and thoughts of an active life have come in between. I was seriously wounded in the second charge and my memories of the last part of the contest are confused with the agony of wounds, of being trampled under foot, carried and placed helplessly beside a rock on the other slope between both fires, hoping as I lay there that I might live long enough to see our side win, which I did, thank God ! I recovered and returned to duty. During the last of my service I was a major and aide-de-camp on the staff of the Third Division, Second Corps. This Division was formed by the remnant of the old Third Corps left alive after Gettysburg. I managed to get ‘ plugged ‘ a couple of times after that and yet see and take part in some pretty active fighting, but I never saw such a gallant rush ‘into the jaws of Hell’ as was made by our little regiment that July day, or a Battery worked and fought with such coolness and skill, such tireless devotion, and with such terrible havoc to the enemy. * * * Without that charge and the work of Smith’s Battery, our left would have been more seriously turned; but now, in the light of after experience, as I think of it, what a mad act it was. Our regiment—a mere handful, at that—with no order back- of its Colonel, charging from its base in line of battle to lock arms with Longstreet. This good it did, it gave pluck and steadiness to the men at our left, who were needing it and who fought like heroes, as the slaughterhouse in the Den abundantly attested.”

Bio Link Source: BRADLEY, Thomas Wilson, a Representative from New York; born in Yorkshire, England, April 6, 1844; immigrated to the United States in 1846 with his parents, who settled in Walden, Orange County, N.Y.; attended school until nine years of age; during the Civil War entered the Union Army as a private; promoted to captain in the One Hundred and Twenty-fourth Regiment, New York Volunteer Infantry; was aide-de-camp to Major General Mott, Third Division, Second Army Corps; awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor “for gallantry at Chancellorsville”; was brevetted major of United States Volunteers; member of the State house of assembly in 1876; delegate to the Republican National Conventions in 1892, 1896, and 1900; elected as a Republican to the Fifty-eighth and to the four succeeding Congresses (March 4, 1903-March 3, 1913); was not a candidate for renomination in 1912; engaged in banking; president and treasurer of the New York Knife Co.; died in Walden, N.Y., May 30, 1920; interment in Wallkill Valley Cemetery.