On June 28, 1863, the Army of the Potomac was reorganized. When Major General George G. Meade assumed over-all command, Kilpatrick was assigned a division in the Cavalry Corps. The unit consisted of two brigades under newly appointed generals, George Custer and Elon J. Farnsworth. Kilpatrick led his new command in its task of covering the army’s center, as the Federals followed Robert E. Lee into Pennsylvania.

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On the last day of June Kilpatrick encountered Stuart’s cavalry division in Hanover, Pennsylvania. The Federals were drawn up in the streets of the town, resting, when Stuart’s leading brigade battered and nearly routed Farnsworth’s command. Farnsworth and Kilpatrick rushed up to re-form and steady their line, and they directed a vigorous counterattack that dispersed the Gray horsemen and nearly resulted in the capture of Stuart himself.

After the Confederates rode off, Kilpatrick took Farnsworth’s brigade toward Gettysburg. After a sharp skirmish against Hampton on July 2, the cavalry reached the rear of the Army of the Potomac. On the morning of July 3 Kilpatrick’s command took position on the left of the Union line, across the Emmitsburg Road.

July 3, 1863, marked the beginning of Kilpatrick’s decline as a soldier. To that date his career had been promising and distinguished; great things had been expected of him. But on July 3 he made an unwise decision that resulted in the shattering part of Farnsworth’s brigade and the death of its young commander.

Following Pickett’s Charge, Kilpatrick directed Farnsworth to attack the extreme right of Rebel line. This was ordered, ostensibly, to exert such pressure on that vital defense point that the Confederates would be thrown back and their line opened up to a crushing assault by divisions of Union infantry. But it is also clear that Kilpatrick ordered the charge in frustration at having been kept out most of the day’s fighting. He realized that only an energetic officer who committed his troops to battle would win glory on this field.

But he asked the impossible of Farnsworth. The brigade commander was required to attack strongly positioned infantry over rough, boulder-strewn ground, despite being outnumbered. In point of fact, Farnsworth had tried that very thing a short while before and had failed signally. Naturally, he was stunned by the order. “General, do you mean it?” he asked. “Shall I throw my handful of men over rough ground, through timber, against a brigade of infantry? The 1st Vermont has already been fought half to peices; these are too good men to kill!”

Kilpatrick was enraged that Farnsworth should question his command. “Do you refuse to obey my orders? If you are afraid to lead this charge, I will lead it.”

A witness to the confrontation later recalled the General Farnsworth “rose in his stirrups–he looked magnificent in his passion, and cried, ‘Take that back!’” Kilpatrick hesistated a moment and backed down, but would not withdraw his order. For some seconds there was silence between them, until Farnsworth said quietly, “General, if you order the charge, I will lead it, but you must take the responsibility.”

His troopers made the charge, were as successful as the Light Brigade at Balaklava, and the responsibility indeed rested on Kilpatrick’s shoulders. In his official report of the battle, however, he tried to cover up his mistake with bombastic words about the infantry’s failure to exploit the “confusion” into which Farnsworth had thrown the Rebel right.

In the same report Kilpatrick praised the young general whose courage he had openly questioned a short time before: “…he baptized his star in blood, and…for the honor of his young brigade and the glory of his corps, he yielded up his noble life.”

“Kilcavalry” truly earned his sobriquet that day, but he tried to make amends by vigorously pursuing Lee into Maryland. In the days immediately following the battle he captured some of Lee’s wagons, and at such places as Hagerstown, Falling Waters, Williamsport, and Boonsborough, achieved varying degrees of success in combat against Confederate infantry and cavalry. In reporting these engagements, however, Kilpatrick indulged a perennial weakness for exaggerating the number of prisoners taken and hte number of casualties inflicted upon the enemy.

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