Peach Orchard - Gettysburg

Located on Emmitsburg Road about a mile and a half south of Gettysburg at the intersection with Wheatfield Road - Millerstown Road. The orchard was owned by Joseph Sherfy, whose house and barn still stand a short distance north on Emmitsburg Road. The orchard is much smaller today than in 1863, when it extended north to the Sherfy farm buildings. It was badly damaged in the fighting, but Sherfy repaired and replanted, selling canned peaches which were prominently advertised as coming from the Gettysburg battlefield.

The Peach Orchard was the salient of Union General Daniel Sickles' Third Army Corps line after his controversial advance on July 2nd. It stood on a small ridge about two-thirds of the way between Pitzer's Woods and Cemetery Ridge, and Sickles felt that it dominated the ground he had been ordered to hold. He placed four batteries there, but the extra ground he had to occupy as a result was far more than his corps could adequately cover. Longstreet's attack in the afternoon resulted in desperate fighting, and Sickles' position collapsed, resulting in near-disaster for the Union army.

This photo is taken facing south from Wheatfield Road. Emmitsburg Road can be just seen on the far right before it continues on to the center of the photograph past the monument and cannon of Battery G, 1st New York Light Artillery, and on past the monument to the 68th Pennsylvania Infantry Regiment, just visible to the right of center. Four headquarters markers are arrayed diagonally across the corner, representing the Third Army Corps, its First and Second Divisions, and its Artillery Brigade.