Little Round Top is the smaller of two rocky hills south of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania—the companion to the adjacent, taller hill named Big Round Top. It was the site of an unsuccessful assault by Confederate troops against the Union left flank on July 2, 1863, the second day of the Battle of Gettysburg, during the American Civil War. Little Round Top was successfully defended by a brigade under Colonel Strong Vincent, who was mortally wounded during the fighting and died five days later. The 20th Maine Volunteer Infantry Regiment, commanded by Colonel Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, fought its most famous engagement there, culminating in a dramatic downhill bayonet charge. The battle at Little Round Top subsequently became one of the most well-known actions at Gettysburg, and of the entire war. Geography Little Round Top is a large diabase spur of Big Round Top with an oval crest (despite its name) that forms a short ridgeline with a summit of prominence above the saddle point to Big Round Top to the south. It is located in Cumberland Township, approximately two miles (3 km) south of Gettysburg, with a rugged, steep slope rising above nearby Plum Run to the west and strewn with large boulders. The summit is a total of above sea level. Historically, the western slope was generally free of vegetation, while the summit and eastern and southern slopes were lightly wooded. Directly to the south is Big Round Top, higher and densely wooded. 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. There is no evidence that the name "Little Round Top" was used by soldiers or civilians during the battle, although Col. Franklin A. Haskell, writing to his brother on July 16, 1863, calls it so. 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 Brigadier General Stephen H. Weed, who was mortally wounded on Little Round Top. Bachelder abandoned