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Almost, but not quite. Day Two.As can be seen from the above, Lee’s plan called for very close cooperation and coordination by all three of his corps. Unfortunately for Lee, and the Army of Northern Virginia, this was not forthcoming. Instead of the morning attack that Lee was anticipating, Longstreet dawdled in moving his troops into position and wasted precious hours marching and counter- marching his divisions to their attacking stations. During this period Mead, who had arrived on the field at midnight, was given time to deploy more troops along Cemetery Ridge. He now had XII, II and III Corps in line with the I and XI, while the V and VI were rapidly approaching. The problem with Mead’s position was that his III Corps commander, Major General Daniel Sickles had taken it upon himself to advance half a mile west of the main Union line, creating a dangerous salient.
Day 2 - July 2nd, Late Afternoon. It was not until well after 4.00 pm in the afternoon that Longstreet finally began his attack, a truly inordinate amount of time for a corps commander to take in moving troops only a few miles further along Seminary Ridge. He was also not keen to start the attack without Pickett’s division, and told Major General John Bell Hood, one of his other division commanders that he, “ never liked the idea of going into battle with one boot off” [1]. Finally Longstreet managed to get the attack going, and for three hours both sides were involved in some of the bitterest fighting of the Civil War, well remembered today for such places as, The Wheat Field, The Peach Orchard and Devil’s Den. Sickles isolated III Corps was eventually pushed back, and the Confederates even managed to get troops around and up the sides of the Round Top’s. Here, however, the attack stalled. Thanks to the prompt action of Brigadier General Gouverneur K.Warren who was with his signal station on Little Round Top. Frantic messages were sent to warn of the impending attack, while Warren himself dashed off to find troops to stem the Rebel advance [2]. Colonel Vincent Strong, commanding a brigade in the First Division of the V Corps rushed his men to the hill, with Colonel Joshua Chamberlain’s 20th Maine Regiment in the lead. The Union line stopped the Rebel advance on the rock and wood covered summit of the Little Round Top, and after a particularly fierce struggle they forced the Confederates back down the hill. To add to their discomfort the Rebels were now assailed by two guns from Hazlett’s Union battery, which had been manhandled up the slope and these, together with the fire from other regiments, including the redoubtable 140th New York, enabled the hill to be secured. 
View of Confederate gun-line at the Southern end of Seminary Ridge. The Little and Big Round Top’s can be seen in the distance. (Copyright Allen Goodall 2003) Despite their chief’s dilatory behaviour, Longsteet’s troops, together with three brigades from Hill’s corps, had almost succeeded in breaking the Union line that was held by close on six full divisions, plus elements from other brigades. The unfortunate part of it was that these events only fuelled Lee’s belief in the fact that his boys could do anything. As Longstreet’s attack was going in, Ewell’s artillery began to thunder over on the left in preparation for the attack on Culps Hill and Cemetery Hill. Contrary to popular belief, the Confederate attack on this part of the field was not, at least to the men of Ewell’s corps, a diversionary affair. The struggle here became sanguine in the extreme. Amid the boulder strewn slopes and the dense cluster of trees on Culps Hill the blue and grey troops became embroiled in a desperate seesaw battle that the Union forces just managed to contain, although they had to forfeit part of their forward entrenchments to the Rebel division under Major General Edward “Allegheny ” Johnson. On their right yet another surging attack was made by the Confederates of Major General Jubal A.Early’s division against Cemetery Hill. Early’s men crossed three lines of Union rifle pits and a stonewall routing part of Howard’s XI Corps in the process, but were eventually forced to retire, the battle sputtering to an end at around 10.00 pm amidst the cries and groans of the wounded. 
A Drawing by the war artist Edwin Forbes, supposedly made at the time. It shows the attack of Ewell’s corps on Cemetery Hill during the evening of 2nd July. (Culver Pictures, New York) The fighting on the 2nd July had cost both sides a combined total of over 16,000 men and had done nothing except convince Lee that one final push on the following day would bring him victory, however the real lesson behind all this blood-letting seems to have been overlooked by the Confederate commander. Although the Union army had been rocked on its heels by the blows delivered, it had not been broken. Its resilience and morale was undamaged, and, if anything, it was even more prepared after the events of the previous two days fighting to hold its ground and let the Rebels bite on granite. At a council of war held by General Mead at 9.00 pm that night it was decided that, even allowing for the problems of supplies, which the Union army had outrun in their rapid advance to Gettysburg, the army would hold fast on the defensive for another day. Thus, like two schoolboys trying to outstare each other, Mead had defiantly decided that he was not going to be the one who blinked first. If Lee had been able to walk amongst the Union ranks on that fateful dawn of the third day, he may have at last understood that the attitude of these troops, and their commanding generals had changed since the days of the slow moving George Brinton McClellan, and the wavering “Fighting Joe” Hooker. Because his previous victories had been brilliant, the glare dazzled Lee into thinking that whatever he asked of his men they were capable of doing. By adopting this attitude, he not only completely underestimated his enemy (a bad thing to do for any commander), but was also prepared to waste the precious manpower and resources that neither he nor the Confederacy could afford. 
Some of the Confederate dead gathered for burial on the second day. (Library of Congress)
[1]Ibid, page, 377 [2]For an account of this stage of the battle see Brevet Major General Henry J.Hunt’s description in, Battles and Leaders of the Civil War, Vol III, page, 290. Also a very detailed description is given in Edwin B.Coddington’s, The Gettysburg Campaign, A Study in Command, Page, 359
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