On the right of Hill's corps and the left of Longstreet, being joined on to Barksdale's brigade of McLaws's division, was Wilcox's brigade, then Perry's, Wright's, Posey's, Mahone's. At half-past five o'clock Longstreet began the attack, and Wilcox followed it up by promptly moving forward; Perry's brigade quickly followed, and Wright moved simultaneously with him. The two divisions of Longstreet's corps soon encountered the enemy, posted a little in rear of the Emmetsburg turnpike, which winds along the slope of the range upon which the enemy's main force was concentrated. After a short but spirited engagement the enemy was driven back upon the main line upon the crest of the hill. McLaws's and Hood's divisions made a desperate assault upon the main line, but, owing to the precipitate and rugged character of the slope, were unable to reach the summit.
After Barksdale's brigade, of McLaws's division, had been engaged for some time, Wilcox, Wright, and Perry were ordered forward, encountering a line of the enemy and soon putting them to rout. Still pressing forward, these three brigades met with another and stronger line of the enemy, backed by twelve pieces of artillery. No pause was made. The line moved rapidly forward and captured the artillery.
Another fresh line of battle was thrown forward by the enemy. Wright had swept over the valley under a terrific fire from the batteries posted upon the heights, had encountered the enemy's advance line, and had driven it across the Emmetsburg pike, to a position behind a stone wall or fence which runs parallel with the pike and sixty or eighty yards in front of the batteries on the heights and immediately under them. Here the enemy made a desperate attempt to retrieve his fortunes. The engagement lasted fifteen or twenty minutes. Charging up the steep sides of the mountains, the Confederates succeeded in driving the enemy from behind the wall at the point of the bayonet. Rushing forward with a shout, they gained the summit of the heights, driving the enemy's infantry in disorder and confusion into the woods beyond.
The key of the enemy's position was for a moment in our hands. But the condition of the brave troops who had wrested it by desperate valor had become critical in the extreme. Wilcox, Perry, and Wright had charged most gallantly over a distance of more than three-quarters of a mile, breaking two or three of the enemy's lines of battle and capturing two or three batteries of artillery. Of course our lines were greatly thinned, and our troops much exhausted. No reinforcements were sent to this column by the lieutenant-general commanding. The extent of the success was not instantly appreciated. A decisive moment was lost.
Wright's little brigade of Georgians had actually got into the enemy's intrenchments upon the heights. Perceiving, after getting possession of the enemy's works, that they were isolated - more than a mile from support - that no advance had been made on their left, and just then seeing the enemy's flanking column on their right and left flanks rapidly converging in their rear, these noble Georgians faced about, abandoning all the guns they had captured, and cut their way back to our main lines, through the enemy, who had now almost entirely surrounded them.
The results of the day were unfortunate enough. Our troops had been repulsed at all points save where Brigadier-General Steuart held his ground. A second day of desperate fighting and correspondingly frightful carnage was ended. But General Lee still believed himself and his brave army capable of taking these commanding heights, and thus able to dictate a peace on the soil of the free States.
The third day's battle was again to be begun by the Confederates. At midnight a council of war had been held by the enemy, at which it was determined that the Confederates would probably renew the attack at daylight on the following morning, and that for that day the Federals had better act purely on the defensive.
“For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self–discipline.”
– 2 Timothy 1:7