Southern Historical Society Papers, Volume 24.
Reverend J. William Jones, Ed.

---

‘ [17] but, as they fell into the enemy's hands, they were not included in the hospital report. This loss occurred mostly in the first day's fight, where the regiment encountered the 151st Pennsylvania¹ and Cooper's Battery of Rowley's Brigade, Doubleday's Division. The quartermaster of the 26th who made the official report on July 4th, states that there were only 216 left for duty after the fight on the 1st inst. The regiment then participated in Pickett's charge on the third day of the battle, in which it attacked the position held by Smyth's Brigade, Hoyt's Division, Second Corps. On the following day it mustered only 80 men for duty, the missing ones having fallen in the final and unsuccessful charge. In the battle of the first day, Captain Tuttle's company, [F.] went into action with three officers and eighty-four men; all of the officers and eighty-three of the men were killed or wounded. On the same day, and in the same brigade, (Pettigrew's), company C, of the 11th North Carolina lost two officers killed, and 34 out of 38 men, killed or wounded; Captain Bird, of this company, with the four remaining men, participated in the charge on the third of July, and of these the flag-bearer was shot, and the captain brought out the flag himself. This loss of the 26th North Carolina at Gettysburg, was the severest regimental loss during the war.’ The total loss of the regiment on the first day alone, based on the figures of Col. Fox, was in killed, wounded and missing, eighty-six and three-tenths per cent.² This loss exceeded by four per cent. the loss of the 1st Minnesota at Gettysburg, which amounted to eighty-two per cent. The 141st Pennsylvania comes second, with seventy-five and seven-tenths per cent. In the Franco-Prussian war, the heaviest loss was forty-nine per cent, sustained by the 16th German Infantry (3rd Westphalian) at Mars-la-Tour. In the charge of the Light Brigade, the loss was but thirty-six and seven-tenths per cent. Oh that the 26th North Carolina had a Tennyson to sing of its charge when no one had blundered! But this same brigade of Pettigrew, shattered as it was by the three days fighting, was one of