Feb 08 , 2026

Alonzo Cushing’s Courage at Gettysburg’s Cemetery Ridge

Alonzo Cushing gripped his cannon’s lanyard as musket balls tore the air around him. Blood dripped from a mortal wound in his hip, yet he never ceased firing. The stars and stripes above the 4th U.S. Artillery's Battery A wouldn’t fall that day. Not while he still drew breath.

His resolve was carved in lead and iron.

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The Battle That Defined Him

July 3, 1863. The third and final day of Gettysburg—where fate hung by the barrel of a cannon. At the center of the maelstrom, Lieutenant Alonzo Cushing commanded his battery on Cemetery Ridge. The Confederate onslaught roared like hell itself.

Despite withering fire, Cushing directed artillery that shredded advancing lines during Pickett’s Charge. Twice wounded, once gravely, he refused to abandon his post. Witnesses say he knelt, bleeding and broken—and kept firing until a bullet struck his temple.

“He did not give in,” said Major General Abner Doubleday. “His courage was beyond all human understanding.”

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Background & Faith

Born in 1841, Alonzo grew up under stern counsel and deep conviction. His family given to church and honor, he graduated West Point in 1861, ready to serve a fractured nation.

His letters reveal a soldier grounded in faith and duty. Writing home, he quoted Psalm 23: “Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil.” The battlefield tested more than muscle—it revealed the measure of his soul.

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The Crucible of Combat

Battery A was little more than a redoubt on the ridge. Yet under Cushing’s command, its six cannons became instruments of defiance and destruction.

As waves of Confederate infantry surged, his gunners fell, one by one. The command passed to him amid chaos. With one leg wounded, then shot through the hip, he held his post yelling orders, adjusting fire commands.

When the Confederate line surged within fifty yards, Cushing loaded, aimed, and fired with grim persistence. His final act: raising the flag before collapse, rallying what was left of Union defense.

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Recognition and Honor

Medal of Honor came nine decades late, but the valor spoke for itself. On November 4, 2014, President Barack Obama awarded it posthumously. The citation honored “conspicuous gallantry... maintaining his artillery piece alone, and wounded three times.”

Fellow soldiers praised him for holding the line “at the cost of his life... a sacrifice that turned the tide.” The words of General Winfield Scott Hancock, who fought beside him, still echo:

“Lieutenant Cushing’s actions were among the most heroic of that terrible day.”

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Legacy & Lessons

Alonzo Cushing’s story is not of glamour but grit—blood mixed with unyielding will. His sacrifice sealed the Union’s stand at Gettysburg, a turning point in the Civil War.

We honor more than a man; we honor the decision to stand when all else crumbled. To give everything—life, limb, spirit—for a cause greater than self.

“Greater love hath no man than this,” John 15:13 teaches. Cushing lived, fought, and died those words.

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His name is etched in history and on a monument at Gettysburg, but his legacy is etched deeper—in the hearts of warriors who understand the price of courage.

In a world quick to forget, he reminds us: Bravery isn’t the absence of fear. It is duty fulfilled in spite of it.

This is the story of a soldier who bled for a nation—and in doing so found redemption beyond the battlefield.

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