12,500 Confederate soldiers marched nearly a mile across open ground into massed Union artillery and rifles — the 'high-water mark of the Confederacy,' and the moment the South's fate was sealed.
On July 3, 1863 — the final day of Gettysburg — Lee ordered a massive frontal assault against the center of the Union line on Cemetery Ridge. General Longstreet, who had to personally order the assault because he couldn't bring himself to speak the words, believed the attack was suicidal.
Roughly 12,500 Confederate soldiers stepped out of the tree line and marched nearly a mile across open Pennsylvania farmland toward the Union position. There was nowhere to hide, no cover — just men in formation walking steadily into the mouths of dozens of Union cannons.
The Confederate artillery bombardment that preceded the charge had overshot the Union line and done little damage to the infantry waiting behind the ridge. When the Confederates emerged from the smoke, the Union gunners had their ammunition intact and their crews ready.
A small number of Confederates under General Lewis Armistead actually breached the Union line at a spot called 'the Angle' — a moment remembered as the 'High Water Mark of the Confederacy.' Armistead crossed the stone wall with his hat on his sword, then was mortally wounded within minutes.
Confederate casualties exceeded 50%: over 6,500 killed, wounded, or captured out of 12,500 engaged. All three of Pickett's brigade commanders fell — Armistead mortally wounded, Garnett killed, Kemper severely wounded. Pickett's division was effectively destroyed as a fighting force.
When the shattered survivors streamed back to Confederate lines, Lee rode out to meet them and said 'It was all my fault.' The charge's failure, combined with Vicksburg falling the next day, marked the point beyond which the Confederacy could never again hope to win the war outright.