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At about 4:30 p.m., as the Union line began to break, Lee and Hill stood atop Seminary Ridge and watched the Federals retreating through Gettysburg and up Cemetery Hill. While they were thrilled by the Rebel success, they were also stunned by the cost of that victory. Hill had thrown seven brigades into the battle and suffered terrible losses. Archer and Davis, who opened the fray, had taken about 1,400 casualties, one-third of their original number. Their troops lay exhausted on Herr Ridge. Brockenbrough and Pettigrew had lost 648 men, 20 percent of the force that had charged the Union troops on McPherson's Ridge. Their brigades were strewn along the dearly bought ground. Brigadier Generals Abner Perrin, James H. Lane and Alfred Scales, who had pushed the attack against the Federals on Seminary Ridge, had seen more than 1,000 of their men, one-fourth of their commands, fall in the fight. Only Perrin had continued the pursuit of the enemy troops into Gettysburg.
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