Battery “K” of the 5th US Artillery was part of the 12th Corps. The unit was formed of men from Berks, Blair and Schuylkill counties in Pennsylvania. There were 86 men in the Battery within four 12 pound Napoleons. They marched hard on 1 July 1863 to reach with about a half mile of the town of Gettysburg, where the men, “lay on their arms all night.”
Battery “K” was lead by Lieutenant David Hunter Kinzie, an 1861 West Point graduate. Kinzie was born in Chicago Illinois 23 Jan 1841. On the morning of 2 Jul the Battery was ordered to move to a spot between the First and Twelfth Corps, and fill a gap. At about 5pm that evening one section was ordered to go to the top of Culp’s Hill to assist in silencing the Confederate Artillery firing from Benner’s Hill. After an hour they were sent back to the rest of the Battery at the foot of Power’s Hill.
Early in the morning of 3 Jul, Battery “K” was moved to the south side of the Baltimore Pike, just behind the center line of the 12th Corps. Firing their cannon from 4:30 am until 10 am they help to drive out the Confederates who had moved into the Culp’s Hill area during the night. They remained in this position through out the afternoon, finding them selves exposed to Confederate shelling that was over shooting Cemetery Hill. The Battery had 5 men wounded during the battle.
With thanks to the following sources
Peter C Vermilyea, "The Pipe Creek Effect; How Meade's Pipe Creek Circular Affected the Battle of Gettysburg," The Gettysburg Magazine, 42, January 2010, p 37
Edmund J Raus, Jr, "A Generation On The March; The Union Army at Gettysburg" [Gettysburg,PA, Thomas Pub., 1996], p 164 - 65.
The Historical Marker Database, Stone Sentinels for the photo.
No comments:
Post a Comment