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>> The Battle line of the Union Army of the Potomac at Gettysburg on July 2nd and 3rd,
1863 is often described or referred to as resembling a giant fishhook.
So, the eye of the hook rests at Little and Big Round Top.
The shaft of the hook runs down the length of Cemetery Ridge.
The curve of the hook rests at Cemetery Hill.
And the point of the hook, or the barb of the hook rests here on the slopes of Culp's Hill.
Culp's Hill, wooded today, as it was in 1863, was first occupied by Union troops
of the 7th Indiana in the evening hours of July 1st, 1863.
And through the next day, July 2nd, the position here on Culp's Hill would be strengthened
by Union troops belonging to the Twelfth Army Corps.
The Twelfth Army Corps created breastworks entrenchments on the hill.
They stacked up rocks, earth, to provide protection and to fortify their position,
so that by the afternoon of July 2nd, 1863, the Union position here
at Culp's Hill was, was incredibly strong.
However, by the time the Confederates attacked the evening
of July 2nd, the hill was undermanned.
Most of the Union Army's Twelfth Corps was sent to the vicinity of Little Round Top,
Cemetery Ridge, where the attack of General James Longstreet was driving back elements
of the Union Army of the Potomac.
The only Union defenders left behind on Culp's Hill were about 1,400 men, all from New York,
commanded by one of the oldest Union generals on the battlefield, George Sears Greene.
And throughout the evening hours of July 2nd, 1863, George Greene
and his heavily outnumbered men somehow managed to repel these Confederate attacks.
The main summit of the hill, Culp's Hill, remained in Union hands that night.
But the lower summit of the hill, close to where we're standing right now,
was actually captured by Confederate troops.
So, they gained a little lodgment down here.
Union troops the next morning, the morning of July 3rd, 1863,
were determined to drive them off.
Around 4:30 in the morning, Union artillery crashed forward from its position
from the artillery platform on Power's Hill.
Confederate troops then attacked Union troops.
And what would occur over the next four to five hours were some
of the most sustained fighting of the entire Battle of Gettysburg.
And at the end of that fighting, Confederates were driven back,
and Union troops regained control of the lower summit of Culp's Hill,
essentially ending the fighting on this often forgotten, but incredibly important,
piece of the Gettysburg battlefield.