Battle
of Gettysburg 
Battle
of Gettysburg
One of the two major battles of the American Civil War was fought at the crossroads town of Gettysburg, Pa., from July 1 to 3, 1863. The Battle of Gettysburg, one of the most important battles of the U.S. Civil War. The defeat of the South at Gettysburg and its surrender of Vicksburg the next day foreshadowed Gen. Robert E. Lee's eventual surrender at Appomattox Courthouse. The Union armies threw back the Confederate forces at Gettysburg. This was the only battle on Northern soil.
Lee's Army of Northern Virginia had crossed the Potomac and marched into Pennsylvania. It threatened Harrisburg, the state capital, as well as Philadelphia and Baltimore. Government leaders were even fearful that Washington itself might be taken.
Lee's invasion had two strategic purposes. The Confederacy hoped that it would stir the people of the North to demand peace at any cost and would persuade Great Britain and other European nations to recognize the new government in the South. Gen. Robert E. Lee invaded Pennsylvania for strategical and logistical reasons. His army of about 75,000 encountered the Union Army of the Potomac, about 90,000 strong, under Gen. George G. Meade on the outskirts of Gettysburg.
Lee's army was made up of three corps: I Corps, under Gen. James Longstreet; II Corps, under Gen. R.S. Ewell; and III Corps, under Gen. A.P. Hill. Ewell's corps had threatened Harrisburg, Philadelphia, and Baltimore. On June 30 it lay north of Gettysburg. Hill's corps bivouacked at Cashtown, between Chambersburg and Gettysburg. Longstreet's corps camped at Chambersburg. General J.E.B. Stuart, Lee's chief of cavalry, was raiding east of Gettysburg and was out of touch with the Confederate infantry.
The Union Army was made up of seven corps, each about half the size of a Confederate corps, plus cavalry. Under a new commander, Gen. George G. Meade, the army marched northward to intercept Lee, its movements limited by the need to protect Washington. On June 30 a brigade of Hill's corps, intent on raiding stores at Gettysburg, observed Union cavalry in its way and retired with the news to Cashtown.
On July 1 Lee sent one of Hill's divisions toward Gettysburg. It clashed with Union cavalry and infantry at Willoughby Run. The fighting was severe, and Hill's men were at first repulsed. Then units of Ewell's corps, coming from the north, turned the Union's north flank. The Union army was driven eastward and southward over Seminary Ridge and through the town. It took refuge on Cemetery Hill, a half mile south of town. Ewell, though commanded to take the hill "if possible," failed to drive forward. The Union army gathered its strength on the hill and extended defensive lines southward along Cemetery Ridge.
By nightfall the Confederates had captured some 5,000 prisoners and inflicted considerable damage on the Union units. They gathered on the battlefield more swiftly and took positions on Seminary Ridge and immediately south and east of town. The battle line shaped up in the form of a fishhook, with the shank extending southward along Cemetery Ridge and the curved hook bending eastward from Cemetery Hill to Culp's Hill. Lee, still without cavalry, was hampered by lack of knowledge of Union movements and strength. Nevertheless, he ordered Gen. James Longstreet to attack on the morning of July 2. Longstreet was slow in attacking. Meanwhile the Union army steadily built strength along Cemetery Ridge and fortified the Peach Orchard, a gentle rise west of the Ridge.
Longstreet attacked at 4 o'clock in the afternoon. He was driven back at Little Round Top but took the Peach Orchard. One unit reached Cemetery Ridge but had to withdraw. To the north and east the Confederates maintained a cannonade until 6:00 P.M. Then Ewell made unsuccessful attacks on Cemetery Hill and Culp's Hill.
In spite of these repulses, Lee decided to attack again the next day. He ordered Longstreet to throw Pickett's division at the center of the fishhook's shank and to support the drive with other units from his corps and from Hill's. Late in the day of July 2 Stuart's cavalry joined Lee. The Union forces continued to build their strength along Cemetery Ridge.
Again the next day the start of battle was delayed. It was not until 1:00 P.M. that the Confederate cannon began to throw shells at Cemetery Ridge. Union guns answered fiercely, and soon the battleground was overlaid with heavy clouds of smoke and dust. After a time Meade slowed the Union fire to save ammunition. The Confederates thought that they had destroyed many of the Union guns.
At 2:00 P.M. their attacking force, 15,000 men in fine alignment, began the advance. Union grapeshot and canister tore great holes in the advancing line, but the Confederates closed the gaps and marched on.
Union skirmishers retreated behind the stone wall on Cemetery Ridge, and Union rifles began to take toll. Nevertheless, the Confederates came on. They halted once--to fire their rifles--and then lowered their bayonets, screamed the rebel yell, and came on at a run. The Union forces retreated from the sheltering stone wall before this furious attack. From either flank Union cannon and rifle fire raked the Confederates. It was too punishing, and the Confederates withdrew. Only 5,000 of his original force of 15,000 survived the repulse. Gen. George Pickett's charge is perhaps the most famous charge in American military history against the Union center. Although the attack was repulsed, it has been called the Confederacy's high-water mark. (The Bettmann Archive)
After this repulse Lee could not hope to keep his defeated army operating in enemy territory. Lee watched the survivors return and confessed, "It is all my fault." Gettysburg, was a military and logistical disaster for the South. During the night of July 3 and the morning of July 4, the Confederate wounded were loaded aboard ambulances and wagons. These and supply wagons began the journey to the west beyond the mountain curtain and to the south. Rain impeded the disengagement. Lee prepared his line on Seminary Ridge against Union attacks, but none came. On the morning of July 5, he finished his withdrawal.
Lee's Army of Northern Virginia totaled about 75,000 officers and men; Meade's Army of the Potomac, about 88,000. The Confederate loss in dead, wounded, and missing was about 28,000; the Union loss, about 23,000.
Meade was severely criticized for his failure to pursue Lee's army closely. He claimed that his army too had been badly hurt. Historians can only guess that the Civil War could have ended by a vigorous pursuit of the defeated Confederates.
The battle had considerable psychological effect on both North and South, calling forth President Lincoln's Gettysburg Address. Occurring in the same week that Vicksburg fell to Gen. Ulysses S. Grant, Gettysburg put the Confederates on the defensive in the east.
Today the town of Gettysburg stands amid many memorials of the battle. At the dedication on Nov. 19, 1863, of a national cemetery on top of Cemetery Hill, President Abraham Lincoln delivered his famed Gettysburg Address . In 1895 the battlefield became a national military park; on it have been erected more than 2,000 memorials of various kinds and sizes.
In 1938 the Eternal Light peace memorial was lighted. Its gas flame burns endlessly in memory of the fallen Blue and Gray soldiers.
Bibliography: Catton, Bruce, The Final Fury (1974); Coddington, Edwin B., The Gettysburg Campaign (1968; repr. 1984); Dowdey, Clifford, Death of a Nation (1958; repr. 1988); Frassanito, W. A., Gettysburg (1976); Gallagher, G. W., ed., The Third Day at Gettysburg and Beyond (1994); Pfanz, H. W., Gettysburg: Culp's Hill and Cemetery Hill (1993) and Gettysburg--The Second Day (1987); Wheeler, Richard, Witness to Gettysburg (1987; repr. 1989). Excerpts from Compton's Living Encyclopedia and Grolier's Encyclopedia.
Frank E. Vandiver Bibliography: Catton, Bruce, The Final Fury (1974); Coddington, Edwin B., The Gettysburg Campaign (1968; repr. 1984); Dowdey, Clifford, Death of a Nation (1958; repr. 1988); Frassanito, W. A., Gettysburg (1976); Gallagher, G. W., ed., The Third Day at Gettysburg and Beyond (1994); Pfanz, H. W., Gettysburg: Culp's Hill and Cemetery Hill (1993) and Gettysburg--The Second Day (1987); Wheeler, Richard, Witness to Gettysburg (1987; repr. 1989). Excerpts from Compton's Living Encyclopedia and Grolier's Encyclopedia.
Robert E. Lee
Robert E. Lee (1807-70), the brilliant commander of Confederate forces during the U.S. Civil War, who surrendered to Grant at Appomattox Court House in 1865.
Robert E. Lee, the brilliant commander of Confederate forces during the U.S. Civil War, was one of the most famous and respected soldiers in American history. After the defeat of the South, he served as a symbol of courage in defeat, embodying the finest elements of the Southern heritage.
Early Life and Career: Robert Edward Lee was born on Jan. 19, 1807, at his family's home, "Stratford," in Westmoreland County, Va. His father, Henry "Light Horse Harry" Lee , had been a cavalry officer during the American Revolution and a close friend of George Washington. Henry Lee, a compulsive gambler, lost much of the family wealth in land speculation prior to his death in 1818. Robert grew up in genteel poverty in Alexandria, Va. Appointed to West Point in 1825, he graduated (1829) after compiling an enviable academic record. In 1831, Lee married Mary Ann Randolph Custis, great-granddaughter of Martha Washington by her first marriage.
During the next 30 years he often lived at Arlington, the Custis mansion near Washington, D.C. Commissioned in the Corps of Engineers in 1829, Lee held a variety of assignments, helping with construction work at several military posts and with river and harbor improvements at St. Louis. Promotion was slow, however, and it was not until 1838 that he was made a captain. In the Mexican War, Lee was an engineering officer with Winfield Scott's force that fought its way to Mexico City. Lee's outstanding work won for him praise and a brilliant reputation.
From 1852 to 1855 he was superintendent at West Point. In 1855 he was made lieutenant colonel of the Second Cavalry, and in 1859 he commanded the force that suppressed the John Brown raid on Harpers Ferry. Role in Civil War A moderate, Lee was dismayed by the extremists on both sides of the North-South controversy in the 1850s. Nevertheless, believing that he owed his first loyalty to his own state, he declined an offer to command the Federal army, resigned his commission in the U.S. Army, and offered his services to Virginia when it seceded in April 1861. Confederate president Jefferson Davis appointed Lee a general in the Southern army. After an unsuccessful effort to repel an invasion of western Virginia, Lee was sent to prepare Atlantic coastal defenses. In March 1862 he returned to Virginia as an advisor to Davis. After Joseph E. Johnston was wounded in May 1862 during the Peninsular Campaign, Lee became commander of the main Confederate army in Virginia--a force that he soon named the Army of Northern Virginia.
When Lee took command, the outlook appeared dim for the Confederacy. Federal troops were slowly gaining control of the Mississippi Valley, and a large enemy army was within sight of Richmond. In late June, Lee struck at the Unionists near Richmond and in the Seven Days' Battles drove them away from the capital. In August he defeated a Northern army in the second Battle of Bull Run and chased it into the defenses of Washington, D.C. Lee followed up this victory by invading Maryland. During the Battle of Antietam (Sept. 17, 1862) he fought a drawn battle with the Federals. Lee then withdrew to Virginia where he inflicted a costly defeat on his opponents at Fredericksburg in December. At Chancellorsville (May 1863), Lee won his greatest victory and suffered his greatest loss. Boldly dividing his army into three parts, Lee assailed a larger Federal force. The Unionists were thoroughly befuddled and driven back with heavy casualties. Southern losses were also high, and among them was Lee's greatest general, Stonewall Jackson, who died after the battle. Lee never again achieved the degree of success he had won with the cooperation of Jackson.
In the summer of 1863, Lee launched another invasion of the North. In early July he attacked a Federal army at Gettysburg, Pa., and was defeated in the greatest battle of the war (see Gettysburg, Battle of). The Confederates fell back into Virginia, and there, in 1864, Lee led them into a series of bloody battles against the Northern army, now commanded by Ulysses S. Grant. Hampered by the loss of many good officers, such as James Longstreet (wounded May 6) and J.E.B. Stuart (mortally wounded May 11), Lee maneuvered brilliantly against Grant and inflicted heavy losses on the Federals. Unable to seize the offensive, he was pushed back to Richmond and Petersburg and forced to defend those cities against a semisiege. Grant finally broke through the Southern lines in April 1865. Lee tried to escape with his army to join other Confederate forces in North Carolina, but Grant trapped him at Appomattox Court House and forced him to surrender on April 9. By then Lee had become the symbol of the Confederacy (and he had finally been appointed general in chief of all Confederate armies in February); when he surrendered, other Southern armies soon ceased fighting.
Postwar Life and Reputation After the war: Lee became president of Washington College (now Washington and Lee University) in Lexington, Va. Accepting the results of the war, he devoted himself to education and to helping rebuild the South. Lee died on Oct. 12, 1870. Lee had many weaknesses as a general. He was too considerate of others, and his politeness sometimes obscured the necessity for quick, total obedience to his orders. He entrusted too much discretion to subordinates who, except for Jackson, were not capable of handling it. He may not have paid sufficient attention to logistics, and he has been accused of devoting too much attention to Virginia to the neglect of other areas. Despite these weaknesses, many historians maintain that Lee was the most capable commander of the Civil War. Robert E. Lee was a fitting symbol of the South as well as an American hero.
Richard M. McMurry Bibliography: Anderson, N. and D., The Generals (1988; repr. 1989); Connelly, T. L., The Marble Man (1977); Davis, Burke, Gray Fox (1956); Dowdey, Clifford, Death of a Nation (1988) and, as ed., The Wartime Papers of R. E. Lee (1961; repr. 1987); Flood, C. B., Lee: The Last Years (1981); Freeman, D. S., R. E. Lee: A Biography, 4 vols. (1934-35), and Lee's Lieutenants, 3 vols. (1942-44; repr. 1986); Fuller, J. F. C., Grant and Lee (1957; repr. 1982); Gallagher, G. W., ed., Lee: The Soldier (1996); Nolan, A. T., Lee Considered (1991); Smith, Gene, Lee and Grant (1984; repr. 1988); Thomas, E. M., Robert E. Lee (1995);
George Gordon Meade
George Gordon Meade (1815-72) secured his reputation as an outstanding American general by defeating a Confederate force led by Gen. Robert E. Lee at the Battle of Gettysburg (July 1-3, 1863) during the Civil War.
George Gordon Meade, b. Cadiz, Spain, Dec. 31, 1815, d. Nov. 6, 1872, was a Union general in the U.S. Civil War and the victor of the Battle at Gettysburg. A graduate of West Point (1835), he won a brevet in the Mexican War (1846-48). When the Civil War came, Meade commanded a brigade of the Pennsylvania Reserves. Although he was severely wounded in the Peninsular Campaign (1862), Meade performed well at the Second Battle of Bull Run and, as a division commander, at the battles of South Mountain, and Antietam and Fredericksburg. Promoted to corps command, Meade was not heavily engaged at the Battle of Chancellorsville (1863), although he commanded effectively.
He was named commander of the Army of the Potomac a few days before the opening of the Battle of Gettysburg. Although not intending to fight at Gettysburg, Meade showed skill in his handling of infantry, artillery, and cavalry, effectively led his unit commanders, and defeated the Confederates. He is sometimes criticized, however, for permitting Robert E. Lee and his army to escape. Meade served ably under Ulysses S. Grant until the war ended, and then he commanded several military departments.
Warren W. Hassler, Jr. Bibliography: Cleaves, Freeman, Meade of Gettysburg (1960; repr. 1991); Meade, George, The Life and Letters of George Gordon Meade, 2 vols. (1913).
James Longstreet
James Longstreet (1821-1904), like many West Point graduates, elected to serve the Confederacy at the outbreak of the Civil War and became one of Robert E. Lee's most able subordinate generals despite his reputation as an overcautious tactician. Following the war, Longstreet alienated his former comrades-at-arms by joining the Republican party, and he accepted a federal post as U.S. minister to Turkey.
After the American Civil War, James Longstreet, b. Edgefield District, S.C., Jan. 8, 1821, d. Jan. 2, 1904, became embroiled in a long controversy about his conduct as a Confederate general during the war. After graduating from West Point in 1842, Longstreet served in the U.S. Army until 1861, when he joined the Confederate Army. Commissioned a general, he led troops in most of the major battles in the Virginia theater-- including the two battles of Bull Run and the Battle of Fredericksburg--and at Chickamauga in Georgia before he was wounded (1864) in the Wilderness Campaign. When he recovered, Longstreet returned to duty and fought until the war ended in 1865. He was a solid, usually dependable subordinate, although he preferred to fight on the defensive rather than to attack. He performed poorly in independent command in Virginia and Tennessee in 1863.
After the war, Longstreet became a Republican and was appointed to several federal posts by his friend President Ulysses S. Grant and by later Republican presidents. This political connection hurt him in the eyes of ex-Confederates as did his criticism of Robert E. Lee, who had become a symbol of heroism to the South.
Longstreet was blamed (unjustly it now seems) by Gen. Jubal A. Early and others for the Southern defeat at the Battle of Gettysburg.
Richard M. McMurry Bibliography: Aston, W. G., Tarnished Lieutenant (1987); Wert, J. D., General James Longstreet (1993).
George E. Pickett
George Edward Pickett, b. Richmond, Va., Jan. 25, 1825, d. July 30, 1875, a Confederate general in the U.S. Civil War, is remembered for Pickett's charge at the Battle of Gettysburg. He graduated from West Point in 1846, served in Mexico (1848), and remained in the U.S. Army until 1861, when he resigned to join the Confederate forces.
A division commander at Gettysburg, on July 3, 1863, he led his troops as the spearhead of an attack on Cemetery Ridge that was designed to break through the center of the Union line. The desperate assault has been called the Confederacy's high-water mark. The attack was repulsed, and Pickett faded from prominence.
Richard M. McMurry Bibliography: Georg, K.R., and Busey, J.W., Nothing but Glory (1987); Stewart, George R., Pickett's Charge: A Micro-History of the Final Attack at Gettysburg, July 3, 1863 (1959).
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