Battle of Gettysburg : The Trostle Farm and Plum Run

The Abraham Trostle Farm House
Gettysburg NMP

Just west of a narrow, slow moving stream called Plum Run is the Abraham Trostle Farm, one of the larger and more prosperous farms on the battlefield. Trostle owned most of the land bordering Plum Run to the east, the Emmitsburg Road to the west, and Wheatfield Road to the south, the two roads along which General Sickles had formed his Third Corps on the afternoon of July 2, 1863. Prosperity of Trostle's farm was reflected in the buildings he owned which included a large Pennsylvania-style bank barn with a wagon shed addition, and a new, wood frame house. In the summer of 1863, Trostle was busy dismantling an earlier log house and constructing a large brick summer kitchen. An expansive apple orchard adjacent to the house provided the family with an abundance of fruit and Trostle's rich fields yielded an excellent harvest of corn, rye and wheat. Like most battlefield families, the Trostle's lives were forever changed by the battle and most of their property was lost or destroyed.

Gen. Sickles
National Archives

Warned by Union staff officers of the impending danger right at their doorstep, the family abandoned their home on July 2. After moving a part of his Third Corps out to the Peach Orchard from Cemetery Ridge, General Sickles established his headquarters in the yard of the house and waited for the arrival of General Meade while his staff officers helped themselves to the remains of the noon day meal left behind on the dining room table. General Sickles' advanced battle line stretched from Devil's Den to the Peach Orchard, and then northward on the Emmitsburg Road- a very wide area to cover and Sickles barely had enough troops to do so. Once the Confederate attack had begun at 4 o'clock and Meade ordered Sickles to keep his troops where they were so that they could be reenforced, the general remained in the Trostle yard where he passed orders to shore up the weaker parts of his line and hurry forward reinforcements from other commands as they arrived on the field. Confederate artillery zeroed in on Sickles' line and shots that missed the front fell around the headquarters group. Iron fragments from shell bursts clipped branches from the trees and rattled against the stone walls of the nearby barn as orderlies rushed to and fro. At the height of the battle, Sickles was mounted on his horse watching the battle when he seriously wounded by a Confederate shell. Pale and in shock, the general was helped down from his horse by aides who saw that one of Sickles' legs had been crushed by the shell. Placed on a stretcher and carried back to the Union rear in terrible pain, the daunting officer was not to be outdone. Sickles ordered his bearers to halt while he gathered his wits, propped himself up on his stretcher and asked one of his orderlies to light a cigar for him. Countless Union soldiers marching toward the sound of battle encountered the general on his stretcher, calmly smoking his cigar and saluting them with a wave of his hat as he was carried along the Baltimore Pike- an inspiring sight to those who about to go into battle. The shattered leg was removed by an army surgeon later that evening and General Sickles' career as a corps commander was over.

Unaware of the impending crisis at the Peach Orchard, Major General David Birney was seeing to his battered units near the Wheatfield when a staff officer informed him that he was now the commander of the Third Corps. By this time, the Union line was in great disarray and under attack all along its front. As the Confederate pressure mounted and the position at the Peach Orchard collapsed, retreating Union troops streamed through the Trostle farm toward Cemetery Ridge.

Capt. Bigelow
USAMHI

A narrow farm lane that ran east to west beside the Trostle buildings was used by Union artillery to reach positions near the Peach Orchard, and retreating artillerymen galloped their horses and guns back down the same lane to make their way toward Cemetery Ridge. Most of the Union batteries made it except for the rookie 9th Massachusetts Battery, commanded by Captain John Bigelow. Bigelow's soldiers were in the first real battle they had ever experienced and fought throughout the afternoon like veterans. After retiring to the Trostle buildings from the Wheatfield Road, Bigelow was ordered to hold until a new artillery line could be formed on Cemetery Ridge. The men unlimbered the guns, loaded, and grimly waited for the converging ranks of southerners to get closer. "The enemy approached over the knoll," Bigelow reported, "Waiting till they were breast high, my battery discharged... double-shotted canister and solid shot. Through the smoke (I) caught a glimpse of the enemy... torn and broken, but still advancing."

The Trostle Farm from Wheatfield Road. The 9th Battery retreated over this field to the farm buildings.
Gettysburg NMP

Bigelow's gunners kept up a steady fire, keeping the Confederates at a respectful distance until orders to withdraw finally arrived. Quickly the men quickly limbered the guns. The first gun team rushed toward the single gate near the house and had almost made it through when a wheel caught one of the posts, upsetting the gun in the gateway and blocking it. Men rushed to unright the heavy gun and open the lane, but the battery was trapped, surrounded by stout fences and stone walls. Bigelow ordered his gunners to unlimber again and reload with canister. Just as the first rounds were rammed home, the 21st Mississippi Infantry broke through the dense smoke and pounced on the battery, shooting and cursing. Above the din, someone shouted, "Shoot the horses!" and the animals fell in heaps still strapped to their harnesses. The artillerymen fought back with hand spikes, rammers, pistols, and fists. "We fought with our guns until the rebs put their hands on (them)," wrote Private David Brett. "The bullets flew thick as hailstones... It is a mericle(sic) that we were not all killed." The survivors finally fled, leaving behind guns, limbers, and the wounded and dead intermingled with the dead and dying horses. The first battle experience of the 9th Massachusetts Battery had ended in a bloody disaster.

Monument to the 9th Massachusetts Battery at the Trostle Farm, site of the battery's last stand.
Gettysburg NMP

A granite replica of a limber chest marks the spot where the 9th Massachusetts Battery fought by the Trostle farm buildings on that hot afternoon. Veterans of the battery chose this particular design, which readily identifies them as an artillery unit. The five guns lost to the 21st Mississippi Infantry were later recaptured by Union troops of the 150th New York Infantry and with their recovered guns, the 9th Massachusetts Battery was back in action the following day.

The victorious Mississippians swept past the Trostle buildings toward Cemetery Ridge. As they splashed across Plum Run, an officer spied another Union battery (I, 5th US) unlimbering their guns on a knoll 100 yards ahead. With little encouragement, the soldiers rushed headlong toward it, shooting and clubbing the surprised artillerymen before they could even load the guns. The others scattered including the drivers who took the horse teams with them to deprive the southerners an easy way to remove the guns. Though the 21st Mississippi had successfully reached the now open Union center, their comrades in General Barksdale's brigade were still behind them, stalled along Plum Run, exhausted and disorganized.

Gen. Barksdale
Generals in Gray

Field north of the Trostle buildings where General Barksdale was discovered by Union soldiers after nightfall. Cemetery Ridge is in the distance.
Gettysburg NMP

If they moved quickly enough the Union line would be cut in two, but the worn out Mississippians remained in the cover of Plum Run despite pleas and threats from the fiery Barksdale. Union reinforcements soon arrived and charged into the valley, driving out those men who sought refuge along Plum Run. One soldier recalled passing Barksdale, leaning against his horse pale and weak- blood showed on his chest and left boot, torn and bloodied by a cannon shot. In the confusion that followed, the general was left behind on the battlefield.

Late that evening a detail from the 14th Vermont Infantry discovered Barksdale and carried him to a Union hospital where his wounds were pronounced mortal. "I have never regretted the steps I have taken," he told one of his rescuers. "I do not regret my steps now, although it is hard to leave friends, wife and children. I do not regret giving my life in a cause that I believe to be right. May God watch over and care for my dear wife, and oh, my boys... may God be a father to them." These sentiments for his family were his last. Curious Union soldiers stopped to gawk at the lifeless form of the famous general and politician while others stripped buttons, gold lace and collar insignia from his uniform as souvenirs. Buried at the site where he died, the general's remains were moved after the war to Greenwood Cemetery in Jackson, Mississippi, and it was not long after that Union veterans returned a number of items taken from the body to the Barksdale family, including his collar insignia.

While Barksdale attempted to reignite his charge, the Confederate brigades of General Cadmus Wilcox and Colonel Edward Perry descended into Plum Run, their attack driving toward the still open Union center manned only by a handful of artillerymen and one lone Union regiment. Cemetery Ridge, which is your next stop, was sure to fall.

The only known photographs of Union dead at Gettysburg

Some of heaviest fighting of the second day occurred on the Abraham Trostle farm. Night time brought a new horror. Scattered about the woods and fields were the helpless wounded whose pitiful groans and cries for help filled the night air, only fading away as the more seriously wounded expired. Some of those cries may have come from this group of Union dead, possibly located in a pasture north of the Trostle buildings. These men, most likely members of Colonel Brewster's "Excelsior Brigade", lie scattered on a slight elevation where Wilcox's Alabama and Barksdale's Mississippi regiments slashed into their ranks.

Gibson/Gardner photo of Union dead at Gettysburg

Union soldiers, possibly from the New York Excelsior Brigade, lie in death where they last stood in line of battle on July 2.
National Archives

O'Sullivan/Gardner view of Union dead taken at Gettysburg

The third photograph taken of the group. Other bodies can be seen scattered in the far distance, marking the battleline.
National Archives

On July 5, 1863, Alexander Gardner and his team of photographers arrived at Gettysburg and spent the following days photographing the battlefield. Spying this group on the Trostle farm, Gardner's assistants made three exposures of this group, the only known photographs of Union dead on the Gettysburg battlefield. The most knowledgeable authority on early photography at Gettysburg is historian and author William Frassanito who has produced two monumental works, Gettysburg: A Journey in Time and Early Photography at Gettysburg. Even with his meticulous research, he has confessed his inability to pinpoint the exact location of this horrid scene; but theorized that the photos were taken somewhere on the southern end of the battlefield and probably in the Trostle or Rose Farm areas. Yet to this day, the exact location on the Gettysburg battlefield where these photographs were taken is unknown. The final disposition of these bodies is unknown, but it is likely that they rest today in the New York section of the Soldiers National Cemetery at Gettysburg.