His bayonet charge is almost always talked about in descriptions of Gettysburg, but I've noticed it seems to get mentioned less in descriptions of the battle that were written before The Killer Angels and the movie Gettysburg came out. Did it really prevent disaster as it's often portrayed as doing? Or is it discussed mostly because it makes for a good story?
Fortunately, this was asked very, very recently!
To quote the top answer from /u/oudysseos ,
No doubt had the 15th Alabama driven the 20th Maine from their positions it would have been a hard time for the Union defenders of Little Round Top, but Union reinforcements were already on the way, and the Confederate attackers were very tired, having already done a lot of marching that day, and did not have food or water. I don't think that they would have been able to exploit a small local success into a general breakthrough into the Union rear.
As for the historiography of this specific charge, I shall defer to more informed contributors.