I fully intend to ask Brett Gibbons about it, as he has written an excellent book about 'The English Cartridge'. In this book he describes one of the first uses in war of massed rifles against massed infantry, in this case, the British against the Russians at the Battle of Inkerman on 5 November 1854, a full nine and bit years before the Battle of Gettysburg.
As at Gettysburg, the Russian gunners were in the habit of firing a softening-up barrage prior to any attack. At Balaclava, earlier in 1854, Russian gunners trying this tactic were slaughtered as they loaded their cannon by a small group of riflemen from the Rifle Brigade, who picked them off at ranges of around 1000 yards with their spiffy new Enfield rifles. Much chastened by this, the few surviving Russians hitched up their guns and quit the field.
Shortly afterwards, the paradigm shift Battle of Inkerman took place, when Russian infantry, estimated at more than 35,000 strong, were advancing in two long columns up a slight incline in an attempt to take the ridgeline from the British Second Infantry Division, guarding the way to Sevastopol. They were bottlenecked by the topography - the most awful fate of any infantry column that might fall under the purview of opposition armed with superior weaponry. The Russians had the Tula flintlock musket, with a maximum range of about 300 yards with little or no accuracy past 80 -100 yards. The British, with their new Enfield rifles, had already demonstrated to the Russians at Balaclava that individuals a thousand yards away were in great and lethal danger from aimed fire.
The result was predictable, and as awful as you might imagine.
The British, armed with the then-new Enfield rifles musket shooting either a Pritchett or Minié bullet, in initially opened fire at 1200 yards, causing instant wholesale slaughter among the smooth-bore-using Russians, who had no way of responding to the hail of lead. The British carried on shooting all the way down to 300 yards, causing slaughter on an unprecedented scale. All three Russian commanders died during the battle, joined by over 5000 dead Russians and well over 10000 wounded, many of whom must have succumbed to their injuries. One observer noted that the British bullets were passing through two or even three of the Russians before being spent. Lord Russell noted grimly the volleys of the Minié cleft them like the hand of the Destroying Angel, and they fell like leaves before them.'
In my mind's eye, I can see Union troops on top of Cemetery Ridge, opening fire on the massed Confederate soldier of Pickett's Brigade as they left the relative safety of the tree-line, and causing similar level of slaughter all the way up to the foot of the ridge.
Except, they didn't.
As at Inkerman, the Confederates were advancing up an incline, intent on taking the ridge, preceded by artillery. They ought, by rights, to have been utterly annihilated, but were not. I've walked that same bit of ground three times in my life, and I hope to do it again some day. and even then I wondered why the Union did not use their rifled firearms with the same effect as those other soldiers, in another war, against a similarly massed enemy.
Where can I find out why the American infantry of both sides, equipped with similar weapons, did not employ the same tactics? If they had done so at Gettysburg, the doomed charge of Pickett's Brigade would have been wiped off the map less than half-way up the hill, and the Confederate artillery would, in like fashion, have succumbed to accurate long-range shooting - except, there wasn't any.
Why not?
