General Howard, receiving this message at the head of his column on the Emmitsburg Road, ordered his corps to speed up its march and then hurried ahead himself to Gettysburg. His first act, in obedience to Reynolds’s order, was to reconnoiter Cemetery Hill. “This, Colonel, seems to be the military position,” he told his chief of staff, Charles Asmussen. “Yes, General,” Asmussen observed, “this is the only position.” Both Buford and Reynolds had earlier recognized that fact; now Howard was committed to holding the high ground with the Eleventh Corps.
