With the players in motion, the cannonade began at around 1:00 PM. Shorty thereafter, the Union cannon, about one hundred and three in total, responded to the Confederate’s one hundred and forty thee. While the Greybacks may have had more cannon, they did not have enough ammunition to sustain their bombardment of the enemy line. The batteries that Colonel Long said would be able to suppress the enemies’ attack were running short of fire power. By the time Longstreet returned to Alexander from patrolling the line, he it was found that their ammunition was depleted. Alexander realized, “that our supply of ammunition was so short that the batteries could not reopen. The order for this attack, which I could not favor under better auspices, would have been revoked had I felt that I had that privilege.”(Smith, “‘Never Was I so Depressed’”)  But as it stood, the marching confederates would have to make do with less cannon than had been previously anticipated. The option of returning to the supply train for more ammunition had crossed the minds of those in charge, but the notion of sending off cassion to return restocked, while under the counter attack from the Union lines it was not advisable.

     From the very outset there was a gap about a quarter of a mile wide between Pickett’s and Pettigrew’s men. To close the gap to prevent total catastrophe upon reaching the Union line, Pickett had his men march at an angle to the Union lines so that they were getting closer to both their fellow soldiers and to the enemy. Marching in the left oblique as it was called allowed the cannons perched on Cemetery ridge and the round tops more time to rain shells down on them, each shot taking out as many as ten men. Casualties abounded. Messages sent during the siege never made it the men who needed to read them (horses make awfully large targets for cannon bust) and orders were never carried out that would have aided Pickett’s crumbling line. The men lead by Brig. General Cadmus Wilcox and Colonel David Lang were never even used in the full assault, and when they did receive orders it was far too late in the game for them to be of much use, and so the men were spared. The rest of the forces continued to march across the seven-eighths of a mile, through a shallow valley, across Emmitsburg Road, over two fences, and finally up a slope towards the Union line, all while taking heavy fire from both short range cannon and Federal skirmishers. When the Confederate forces finally did hit the low stone wall they were only able to sustain the fight for a brief time before being repulsed. Certain divisions from under Pickett and Pettigrew were able to break through those of Gibbon and Hays, but Doubleday was able to flank the Confederate right. On the left, William Mayo’s troops were also beginning to flee along with the new recruits from under Joseph R. Davis. At this point, while the battle still wagered on, Longstreet remarked to a cheery Arthur Fremantle, a Lieutenant Colonel from England, that “the charge is over.”(Foote, Stars in their Courses, 225)

     After the cannons had stopped and the men had retreated to the safety of their previous positions, the dead covered the field. Between the Pickett, Pettigrew and Trimble forces there were over a thousand killed, over four thousand wounded, and almost eight hundred prisoners. Because overall figures for the advance itself range anywhere from eleven thousand to fifteen thousand, the percentage of casualties will range as well, but no matter the initial number, the amount of death is still tragic. On the Union side losses on the day were much less heavy, numbering in the range of only fifteen hundred making for a ratio of about five to one. One confederate remarked at the outset of the charge that “it seemed that death was in every foot of space” may not have been too much of an exaggeration.