<P> There is no evidence that the name "Little Round Top" was used by soldiers or civilians during the battle . Although the larger hill was known before the battle as Round Top, Round Top Mountain, and sometimes Round Hill, accounts written in 1863 referred to the smaller hill with a variety of names: Rock Hill, High Knob, Sugar Loaf Hill, Broad Top Summit, and granite spur of Round Top . Historian John B. Bachelder, who had an enormous influence on the preservation of the Gettysburg battlefield, personally favored the name "Weed's Hill," in honor of Brig. Gen. Stephen H. Weed, who was mortally wounded on Little Round Top . Bachelder abandoned that name by 1873 . One of the first public uses of "Little Round Top" was by Edward Everett in his oration at the dedication of the Soldiers' National Cemetery on November 19, 1863 . </P> <P> The igneous landform was created 200 million years ago when the "outcrop of the Gettysburg sill" intruded through the Triassic "Gettysburg plain". Subsequent periglacial frost wedging during the Pleistocene formed the hill's extensive boulders . </P> <P> About 4 p.m. on July 2, 1863, Confederate Lt. Gen. James Longstreet's First Corps began an attack ordered by General Robert E. Lee that was intended to drive northeast up the Emmitsburg Road in the direction of Cemetery Hill, rolling up the Union left flank . Maj. Gen. John Bell Hood's division was assigned to attack up the eastern side of the road, Maj. Gen. Lafayette McLaws's division the western side . Hood's division stepped off first, but instead of guiding on the road, elements began to swing directly to the east in the direction of the Round Tops . Instead of driving the entire division up the spine of Houck's Ridge (the boulder - strewn area known to the soldiers as the Devil's Den), parts of Hood's division detoured over Round Top and approached the southern slope of Little Round Top . There were four probable reasons for the deviation in the division's direction: first, regiments from the Union III Corps were unexpectedly in the Devil's Den area and they would threaten Hood's right flank if they were not dealt with; second, fire from the 2nd U.S. Sharpshooters at Slyder's farm drew the attention of lead elements of Brig. Gen. Evander M. Law's brigade, moving in pursuit and drawing his brigade to the right; third, the terrain was rough and units naturally lost their parade - ground alignments; finally, Hood's senior subordinate, General Law, was unaware that he was now in command of the division, so he could not exercise control . </P> <P> In the meantime, Little Round Top was undefended by Union troops . Maj. Gen. George Meade, commander of the Army of the Potomac, had ordered Maj. Gen. Daniel Sickles's III Corps to defend the southern end of Cemetery Ridge, which would have just included Little Round Top . But Sickles, defying Meade's orders, moved his corps a few hundred yards west to the Emmitsburg Road and the Peach Orchard, causing a large salient in the line, which was also too long to defend properly . His left flank was anchored in Devil's Den . When Meade discovered this situation, he dispatched his chief engineer, Brig. Gen. Gouverneur K. Warren, to attempt to deal with the situation south of Sickles's position . Climbing Little Round Top, Warren found only a small Signal Corps station there . He saw the glint of bayonets in the sun to the southwest and realized that a Confederate assault into the Union flank was imminent . He hurriedly sent staff officers, including Washington Roebling, to find help from any available units in the vicinity . </P>

Where was little roundtop located in the union line