The First Corps

At Gettysburg, in the battle of the first day, this corps did some of the best fighting of the war. The division commanders on that field were Wadsworth, Robinson and Doubleday; General Reynolds, who was still in command of the corps, was killed just as he rode on the field, and before his troops were fairly engaged. General Doubleday succeeded to the command, and handled the corps during that action in a remarkably able manner. A noteworthy feature of that day was that the corps, although finally driven from the field by a superior force, succeeded in capturing, at different times and at different points on the field, parts of three brigades of the enemy, --Archer's, Davis', and Iverson's--taking them in open field fighting, where there were none of the usual accessories of breastworks, entrenchments, or protection of any kind other than that which the field afforded. The First Corps fought that day with no other protection than the flannel blouses that covered their stout hearts. It contained 34 regiments of infantry, and 5 batteries of light artillery, numbering 9,403 infantry "present for duty, equipped ;" loss, 593 killed, 3,209 wounded and 2,222 missing; total 6,024, out of less than 9,000 in action. Of the missing, a large proportion were killed or wounded.