Pat it is just toooooo cool. Love hearing the stories behind the vignettes. Another set that got a way. I will try to creat some from my figures.Factory and homegrown.
Hi Vamp,
In appreciation for your kind feedback, I am presenting the following pictures of one of my ACW sets especially for you. This set, known simply as
The High Water Mark, was produced by Conte. The vignette depicts the dramatic conclusion of Pickett's Charge on the third day of the Battle of Gettysburg, July 3.
After two hours of the concentrated fire on the Union line by the Confederate batteries, General George E. Pickett ordered his men to form lines of battle. Brigadier General Lewis A. Armistead was to lead his regiments toward the Center of the Union line.
To quote from the materials accompanying the set:
"At forty-six, Lewis Armistead was a grizzled veteran of the Regular Army who had lost two wives diring the arduous prewar service on the western frontier. Born in North Carolina and reared in Virginia, he was heir to a proud military heritage. His uncle had commanded Fort McHenry and defended the 'Star Spangled Banner' from British naval assault in the war of 1812. Armistead walked along the line exhorting his troops to fight for their families and their native state, then led his Virginians forward"
"Soon the Yankee artillery began to tear bloody gaps in the Confederate formations, but the survivors closed ranks and pushed on across the mile-wide expanse that separated them from the low stone wall and copse of trees that marked the enemy position. As Garnett's and Kemper's men crossed the stout rail fences that lay astride the Emmitsburg Road, and filed past the brick farmhouse and wooden barn of the Codori farm, they were met with a sheet of flame - the deadly volleys of the Union 2nd Corps, commanded by Armistead's old army friend, Major General Winfield Scott Hancock."
"With the leading brigades torn and broken before him, Armistead led his men onward, jabbing his hat onto the tip of this sword and holding it aloft as a beacon on which to guide. 'They caught his fire and enthusiasm,' one officer noted, 'and then and there they resolved to follow that heroic leader until the enemy's bullets stopped them.' Armistead shoved his way through the jostling crowd of soldiers that staggered before the holocaust of flame that fringed a projecting angle of the stone wall. 'Come on boys!' he shouted, 'Give them the cold steel! Who will follow me?' and the screaming mob of gray-clad troops surged forward, to the wall."
"Armistead crossed the wall and leaped amongst the carnage-strewn wreckage of Battery A, 4th U.S. Artillery. The Federal officer in command of these guns, Lieutenant Alonzo Cushing, had been cut down with his third and fatal wound, and First Sergeant Frederick Fuger had loosed a last deadly salvo of cannister before the surviving gunners bolted for the rear. A gap opened and into it poured the gallant warriors of the Southern Confederacy, trampling over the bloodstained dead and flailing wounded. The flags of the 14th , 57th, and 53rd Virginia clustered about the intrepid Armistead, with the colors of the 28th and 56th Virginia close behind. At least one of the precious banners had fallen ten times, only to be raised again, and carried on."
"Some 150 soldiers followed General Armistead and Lieutenant Colonel Rawley Martin of the 53rd Virginia into the angle, and the 71st Pennsylvania Regiment gave way before them. The right flank of the 69th Pennsylvania was submerged in a tide of gray, and the Confederates pushed on through a cross fire from the survivors of the 69th to their right and the 72nd Pennslyvaina to their front."
"While Union Brigadier General Alexander Webb struggled to hold his Philadelphia Brigade to their duty, Federal reinforcements came rushing from elsewhere along the line to bolster the embattled Pennsylvanians."
"As Lewis Armistead placed his hand on one of Cushing's abondoned guns, he was cut down by Yankee bullets. Within minutes all who had followed the general into the angle were killed or captured. The high-water mark of the Confederacy had crested, and two thirds of Armistead's men had been left behind in its wake."
"Exhausted and bleeding beside the cannon, Armistead gave the Masonic sign of distress and was recognized by fellow members of the order, who came to his aide. Captain Henry Bingham, one of General Hancock's aides, arrived and though bleeding from a wound to his head, did what he could to succor the stricken officer. As jubilant Federal soldiers gathered the fallen banners of Armistead's brigade, the general who had given his all for a doomed cause was carried to an improvised field hospital. There, two days later, Lewis Armistead succumbed to his wounds."
I hope you enjoy viewing the set as much as I enjoy having it in my collection.
Warmest personal regards,
Pat
