Battle of Gettysburg

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Just before 3 o’clock on the morning of July 3, 1863, Robert E. Lee rose by starlight, ate a spartan breakfast with his staff, and mounted his famous gray horse, Traveller, for the ride up Seminary Ridge at Gettysburg. He went in search of his ‘Old War Horse,’ Lieutenant General James Longstreet, commander of I Corps, Army of Northern Virginia. After two days of fighting in the summer-lush Pennsylvania countryside, the largest battle of the Civil War still hung in the balance. With Longstreet’s help, Lee intended to tip the scales.

As Traveller carried the hope of the Confederacy eastward on his broad, strong back, the pre-dawn stillness was shattered by the boom of cannon fire. Lee halted, looked to the northeast, and saw muzzle flashes dance across the horizon. He had no way of knowing if the staff officer he had sent in search of Lt. Gen. Richard Ewell had reached the II Corps commander with Lee’s instructions to renew the attack on the Confederate left, or if — instead — the Federal Army was assaulting his lines.

Either way, Lee’s carefully worked out plan for a synchronized attack along both flanks had already gone awry. Whatever happened today, the Southern assaults would be ‘isolated affairs.’ It was not an auspicious start to the most important day of the war.

After two bloody but indecisive days of fighting around the obscure crossroads village of Gettysburg, Robert E. Lee had awakened with the knowledge that, one way or another, the third day of battle would be pivotal. He had made his plans accordingly. Major General George Pickett’s division, 4,500 men strong, had arrived late in the afternoon on July 2. Rather than rushing him into battle, Lee had ordered Pickett to stay where he was. His fresh division would spearhead the next day’s assault on the Union left, while Ewell stove in the Union right. That at any rate, was Lee’s plan.

Now, as fighting flared at the north end of his line, a determined Lee pondered a change in those plans. Meanwhile, across the way on Cemetery Ridge, the men in Union Maj. Gen. Winfield Scott Hancock’s II Corps solemnly ate their hardtack and watched as Confederate artillery moved southward in a seemingly unending procession along Seminary Ridge. Whether by prescience or sheer hard experience, the II Corps veterans knew that whatever Lee had in mind for the Army of the Potomac, it would be directed at their position. A purposeful silence filled the air.

Shortly before dawn, Lee found Longstreet encamped west of the hilly mass of rocks known as Devil’s Den, which battle-hardened Confederates had wrested from the enemy the day before. The Georgia-born Longstreet again tried to persuade Lee, as he had done two days before, to swing south around the Union left and get between the Yankees and Washington. Then, on ground of Lee’s own choosing, they could meet the inevitable enemy counterattack. Again, Lee demurred. ‘The enemy is there,’ he said, pointing in the direction of Cemetery Hill, ‘and I am going to attack him there.’ He ignored Longstreet’s repeated suggestion and informed him that I Corps would be assaulting the Union left as soon as Pickett’s division marched down Seminary Ridge and got into position.

‘General,’ said Longstreet, ‘I have been a soldier all my life. I have been with soldiers engaged in fights by couples, by squads, companies, regiments, divisions, and armies, and should know as well as anyone what soldiers can do. It is my opinion that no 15,000 men ever arrayed for battle can take that position.’ Unconvinced, Lee told him to summon Pickett.

Because of a change in the units that were to participate in the planned attack, Lee decided to switch the point of assault northward. The target now was a small clump of trees just under a mile away on Cemetery Ridge. Lee’s plan remained simple: a tremendous bombardment by all available Confederate artillery was to sweep the Union line around the trees, while Southern infantry would remain behind Seminary Ridge, out of sight of the enemy. As soon as the artillery was finished, the infantry would march down the hill, across the valley and break the Federal line, splitting the Army of the Potomac in half.

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Tags: 19th Century, America's Civil War, American Civil War, Historical Conflicts

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