To their left, Sheffield extended a line of his Alabamians at a right angle to confront the Federals in Bushman’s woods. When Farnsworth’s men got close enough, those Texans and Alabamians opened up with rifle fire.

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Brigadier General George T. Anderson’s brigade of five Georgia regiments–the 7th, 8th, 9th, 11th and 59th–followed the Texans, filing across the Emmitsburg Road as support for Black’s South Carolina troopers and Hart’s cannoneers. The Georgians numbered about 1,200 officers and men and, like the Texans and Alabamians, were veteran infantrymen. As they moved into position, Merritt’s Union troopers had dismounted and were advancing on foot.

The contest that had been simmering for nearly two hours came to a boil as Kilpatrick ordered an attack by Merritt and Farnsworth. Merritt’s men went in first in a heavy line of dismounted skirmishers. Hart’s Confederate gunners responded with cannon fire. The Federals pressed ahead into the crescent-shaped Rebel line west of the Emmitsburg Road, but when some of the Georgians rose from the ground in a wheat field and blasted the Yankees, Merritt’s line stalled.

The 11th and 59th Georgia enfiladed the left flank of the Northerners. ‘Though every one fought like a tiger,’ claimed a Union sergeant, ‘we had to fall back.’ A Georgia major wrote that the Southerners’soon gave them a good whipping. They ran after a hotly contested fight of about fifteen minutes.’ Merritt’s effort had ended almost as soon as it had begun.

As Merritt’s men were stepping out for their dismounted attack, Farnsworth’s troopers prepared for a mounted charge. When Farnsworth received the order for an assault on horseback, he must have been stunned. To go in on foot would have been tough enough, and the enemy position was, in the words of one of his officers, ‘one that above all others is the worst for a cavalry charge–that is, behind stone fences so high as to preclude the possibility of gaining the opposite side without dismounting and throwing them down.’

Pleasonton had only promoted Merritt, Custer and Farnsworth from captain to brigadier general on June 29, so all three men were new to brigade command. Twenty-six years old, Farnsworth was a Michigander who had entered the Army in the fall of 1861 as an adjutant to his uncle, Colonel John Farnsworth of the 8th Illinois Cavalry. Elon Farnsworth commanded the regiment during part of the fighting at Brandy Station on June 9, 1863, prompting Pleasonton to appoint him to the general’s staff. Though inexperienced at leading more than one regiment, Farnsworth had seen enough of combat to know that Kilpatrick’s order meant heavy losses.

The recently appointed brigadier apparently conferred with a number of his subordinates. When they questioned the wisdom of a mounted charge, he protested the order personally to Kilpatrick. There are various accounts given of the exchange between the two young generals. All witnesses agree, however, that it was heated.

According to one version, when Farnsworth objected to the order, Kilpatrick told him that he had a report that the enemy was retreating. ‘No successful charge can be made against the enemy in my front,’ asserted Farnsworth. Kilpatrick seemed ‘annoyed, not to say angered.’

‘So you refuse to obey my orders? If you are afraid to lead this charge, I will lead it,’ Kilpatrick replied. Rising in his stirrups, Farnsworth answered, ‘Take that back!’ Although Kilpatrick rose ‘defiantly’ from his saddle, he responded, ‘I did not mean it; forget it.’

‘General,’ said Farnsworth, ‘if you order the charge I will lead it, but you must take the awful responsibility.’ He then turned and rode away to convey the instructions to his regimental commanders.

Colonel Nathaniel P. Richmond’s 1st West Virginia Cavalry led the charge, clearing the trees of Bushman’s woods. The skirmishers of the 1st Texas fired at the Federals and then scattered. ‘The ground trembl[ed] as they came,’ wrote a Texan. When Richmond’s cavalrymen closed to within 60 yards, ‘our Boys rose and pitched into them,’ added the soldier. The volley from the Confederates’ Enfield rifles tore into the ranks of the blue-jacketed men, knocking numbers of them from their horses.

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