Reminiscences of the Civil War
By John Brown Gordon, 1832-1904
Why General Lee crossed the Potomac -- The movement into Pennsylvania -- Incidents of the march to the Susquehanna -- The first day at Gettysburg -- Union forces driven back--The key of the position -- Why the Confederates did not seize Cemetery Ridge -- A defence of General Lee's strategy -- The fight at Little Round Top -- The immortal charge of Pickett's men -- General Meade's deliberate pursuit -- Lee's request to be relieved.
FROM Gettysburg to Appomattox; from the zenith of assurance to the nadir of despair; from the compact ranks, boundless confidence, and exultant hopes of as proud and puissant an army as was ever marshalled--to the shattered remnants, withered hopes, and final surrender of that army--such is the track to be followed describing the Confederacy's declining fortunes and ultimate death. No picture can be drawn by human hand vivid enough to portray the varying hues, the spasmodic changes, the rapidly gathering shadows of the scenes embraced in the culminating period of the great struggle.
A brief analysis of the reasons for General Lee's crossing of the Potomac is now in order. In the logistics of defensive war, offensive movements are often the wisest strategy. Voltaire has somewhere remarked that "to subsist one's army at the expense of the enemy, to advance on their own ground and force them to retrace their steps--thus rendering strength useless by skill--is regarded as one of the masterpieces of military art."
It would be difficult to group together words more concisely and clearly descriptive of General Lee's purposes in crossing the Potomac, both in '62 and '63. It must be added, however, that while the movement into Maryland in 1862, and into Pennsylvania in 1863, were each defensive in design, they differed in some particulars as to the immediate object which General Lee hoped to accomplish. Each sought to force the Union army to retrace its steps; "each sought to render strength useless by skill"; but in 1862 there was not so grave a necessity for subsisting his army on Union soil as in 1863. The movement into Maryland was of course a more direct threat upon Washington. Besides, at that period there was still a prevalent belief among Southern leaders that Southern sentiment was strong in Maryland, and that an important victory within her borders might convert the Confederate camps into recruiting-stations, and add materially to the strength of Lee's army. But the Confederate graves which were dug in Maryland's soil vastly outnumbered the Confederate soldiers recruited from her citizens. It would be idle to speculate as to what might have been the effect of a decisive victory by Lee's forces at South Mountain, or Boonsboro, or Antietam (Sharpsburg). The poignancy of disappointment at the small number recruited for our army was intensified by the recognition of the splendid fighting qualities of Maryland soldiers who had previously joined us.
The movement into Pennsylvania in 1863 was also, in part at least, a recruiting expedition. We did not expect, it is true, to gather soldiers for our ranks, but beeves for our commissary. For more than two years the effort to fill the ranks of the Southern armies had alarmingly reduced the ranks of Southern producers, with no appreciable diminution in the number of consumers. Indeed, the consumers had materially increased; for while we were not then seeking to encourage Northern immigration, we had a large number of visitors from that and other sections, who were exploring the country under such efficient guides as McClellan, Hooker, Grant, Sherman, Thomas, and others. We had, therefore, much need of borrowing supplies from our neighbors beyond the Potomac. The bill of fare of some commands was already very short and by no means appetizing. General Ewell, having exhausted the contents of his larder, thought to replenish it from the surrounding country by a personal raid, and returned after a long and dusty hunt with a venerable ox, which would not have made a morsel, on division, for one per cent. of his command. Ewell's ox had on him, however, that peculiar quality of flesh which is essential in feeding an army on short rations. It was durable--irreducible.
The whole country in the Wilderness and around Chancellorsville, where both Hooker's and Lee's armies had done some foraging, and thence to the Potomac, was well-nigh exhausted. This was true, also, of a large portion of the Piedmont region and of the Valley of Virginia beyond the Blue Ridge Mountains; while the lower valley, along the Shenandoah, had long been the beaten track and alternate camping-ground of both Confederate and Union armies. It had contributed to the support of both armies until it could contribute no more. How to subsist, therefore, was becoming a serious question. The hungry hosts of Israel did not look across Jordan to the vine-clad hills of Canaan with more longing eyes than did Lee's braves contemplate the yellow grain-fields of Pennsylvania beyond the Potomac.
Again, to defend Richmond by threatening Washington and Baltimore and Philadelphia was perhaps the most promising purpose of the Confederate invasion. Incidentally, it was hoped that a defeat of the Union army in territory so contiguous to these great cities would send gold to such a premium as to cause financial panic in the commercial centres, and induce the great business interests to demand that the war should cease. But the hoped-for victory, with its persuasive influence, did not materialize. Indeed, the presence of Lee's army in Pennsylvania seemed to arouse the North to still greater efforts, as the presence of the Union armies in the South had intensified, if possible, the decision of her people to resist to the last extremity.
The appearance of my troops on the flank of General Meade's army during the battle of Gettysburg was not our first approach into that little city which was to become the turning-point in the Confederacy's fortunes. Having been detached from General Lee's army, my brigade had, some days prior to the great battle, passed through Gettysburg on our march to the Susquehanna. Upon those now historic hills I had met a small force of Union soldiers, and had there fought a diminutive battle when the armies of both Meade and Lee were many miles away. When, therefore, my command--which penetrated farther, I believe, than any other Confederate infantry into the heart of Pennsylvania--was recalled from the banks of the Susquehanna to take part in the prolonged and stupendous struggle, I expressed to my staff the opinion that if the battle should be fought at Gettysburg, the army which held the heights would probably be the victor. The insignificant encounter I had had on those hills impressed their commanding importance upon me as nothing else could have done.
The Valley of Pennsylvania, through which my command marched from Gettysburg to Wrightsville on the Susquehanna, awakened the most conflicting emotions. It was delightful to look upon such a scene of universal thrift and plenty. Its broad grain-fields, clad in golden garb, were waving their welcome to the reapers and binders. Some fields were already dotted over with harvested shocks. The huge barns on the highest grounds meant to my sore-footed marchers a mount, a ride, and a rest on broad-backed horses. On every side, as far as our alert vision could reach, all aspects and conditions conspired to make this fertile and carefully tilled region a panorama both interesting and enchanting. It was a type of the fair and fertile Valley of Virginia at its best, before it became the highway of armies and the ravages of war had left it wasted and bare. This melancholy contrast between these charming districts, so similar in other respects, brought to our Southern sensibilities a touch of sadness. In both these lovely valleys were the big red barns, representing in their silent dignity the independence of their owners. In both were the old-fashioned brick or stone mansions, differing in style of architecture and surroundings as Teutonic manners and tastes differ from those of the Cavalier. In both were the broad green meadows with luxuriant grasses and crystal springs.
One of these springs impressed itself on my memory by its great beauty and the unique uses to which its owner had put it. He was a staid and laborious farmer of German descent. With an eye to utility, as well as to the health and convenience of his household, he had built his dining-room immediately over this fountain gushing from a cleft in an underlying rock. My camp for the night was near by, and I accepted his invitation to breakfast with him. As I entered the quaint room, one half floored with smooth limestone, and the other half covered with limpid water bubbling clear and pure from the bosom of Mother Earth, my amazement at the singular design was perhaps less pronounced than the sensation of rest which it produced. For many days we had been marching on the dusty turnpikes, under a broiling sun, and it is easier to imagine than to describe the feeling of relief and repose which came over me as we sat in that cool room, with a hot breakfast served from one side, while from the other the frugal housewife dipped cold milk and cream from immense jars standing neck-deep in water.
We entered the city of York on Sunday morning. A committee, composed of the mayor and prominent citizens, met my command on the main pike before we reached the corporate limits, their object being to make a peaceable surrender and ask for protection to life and property. They returned, I think, with a feeling of assured safety. The church bells were ringing, and the streets were filled with well-dressed people. The appearance of these church-going men, women, and children, in their Sunday attire, strangely contrasted with that of my marching soldiers. Begrimed as we were from head to foot with the impalpable gray powder which rose in dense columns from the macadamized pikes and settled in sheets on men, horses, and wagons, it is no wonder that many of York's inhabitants were terror-stricken as they looked upon us. We had been compelled on these forced marches to leave baggage-wagons behind us, and there was no possibility of a change of clothing, and no time for brushing uniforms or washing the disfiguring dust from faces, hair, or beard. All these were of the same hideous hue. The grotesque aspect of my troops was accentuated here and there, too, by barefooted men mounted double upon huge horses with shaggy manes and long fetlocks. Confederate pride, to say nothing of Southern gallantry, was subjected to the sorest trial by the consternation produced among the ladies of York. In my eagerness to relieve the citizens from all apprehension, I lost sight of the fact that this turnpike powder was no respecter of persons, but that it enveloped all alike--officers as well as privates. Had I realized the wish of Burns, that some power would "the giftie gie us, to see oursels as ithers see us," I might have avoided the slight panic created by my effort to allay a larger one. Halting on the main street, where the sidewalks were densely packed, I rode a few rods in advance of my troops, in order to speak to the people from my horse. As I checked him and turned my full dust-begrimed face upon a bevy of young ladies very near me, a cry of alarm came from their midst; but after a few words of assurance from me, quiet and apparent confidence were restored. I assured these ladies that the troops behind me, though ill-clad and travel-stained, were good men and brave; that beneath their rough exteriors were hearts as loyal to women as ever beat in the breasts of honorable men; that their own experience and the experience of their mothers, wives, and sisters at home had taught them how painful must be the sight of a hostile army in their town; that under the orders of the Confederate commander-in-chief both private property and non-combatants were safe; that the spirit of vengeance and of rapine had no place in the bosoms of these dust-covered but knightly men; and I closed by pledging to York the head of any soldier under my command who destroyed private property, disturbed the repose of a single home, or insulted a woman.
As we moved along the street after this episode, a little girl, probably twelve years of age, ran up to my horse and handed me a large bouquet of flowers, in the centre of which was a note, in delicate handwriting, purporting to give the numbers and describe the position of the Union forces of Wrightsville, toward which I was advancing. I carefully read and reread this strange note. It bore no signature, and contained no assurance of sympathy for the Southern cause, but it was so terse and explicit in its terms as to compel my confidence. The second day we were in front of Wrightsville, and from the high ridge on which this note suggested that I halt and examine the position of the Union troops, I eagerly scanned the prospect with my field-glasses, in order to verify the truth of the mysterious communication or detect its misrepresentations. There, in full view before us, was the town, just as described, nestling on the banks of the Susquehanna. There was the blue line of soldiers guarding the approach, drawn up, as indicated, along an intervening ridge and across the pike. There was the long bridge spanning the Susquehanna and connecting the town with Columbia on the other bank. Most important of all, there was the deep gorge or ravine running off to the right and extending around the left flank of the Federal line and to the river below the bridge. Not an inaccurate detail in that note could be discovered. I did not hesitate, therefore, to adopt its suggestion of moving down the gorge in order to throw my command on the flank, or possibly in the rear, of the Union troops and force them to a rapid retreat or surrender. The result of this movement vindicated the strategic wisdom of my unknown and--judging by the handwriting--woman correspondent, whose note was none the less martial because embedded in roses, and whose evident genius for war, had occasion offered, might have made her a captain equal to Catherine.
As I have intimated, the orders from General Lee for the protection of private property and persons were of the most stringent character. Guided by these instructions and by my own impulses, I resolved to leave no ruins along the line of my march through Pennsylvania; no marks of a more enduring character than the tracks of my soldiers along its superb pikes. I cannot be mistaken in the opinion that the citizens who then lived and still live on these highways will bear me out in the assertion that we marched into that delightful region, and then marched out of it, without leaving any scars to mar its beauty or lessen its value. Perhaps I ought to record two insignificant exceptions.
Going into camp in an open country and after dark, it was ascertained that there was no wood to be had for even the limited amount of necessary cooking, and I was appealed to by the men for permission to use a few rails from an old-fashioned fence near the camp. I agreed that they might take the top layer of rails, as the fence would still be high enough to answer the farmer's purpose. When morning came the fence had nearly all disappeared, and each man declared that he had taken only the top rail! The authorized (?) destruction of that fence is not difficult to understand! It was a case of adherence to the letter and neglect of the spirit; but there was no alternative except good-naturedly to admit that my men had gotten the better of me that time.
The other case of insignificant damage inflicted by our presence in the Valley of Pennsylvania was the application of the Confederate "conscript law" in drafting Pennsylvania horses into service. That law was passed by the Confederate Congress in order to call into our ranks able-bodied men at the South, but my soldiers seemed to think that it might be equally serviceable for the ingathering of able-bodied horses at the North. The trouble was that most of these horses had fled the country or were in hiding, and the owners of the few that were left were not submissive to Southern authority. One of these owners, who, I believe, had not many years before left his fatherland and was not an expert in the use of English, attempted to save his favorite animal by a verbal combat with my quartermaster. That officer, however, failing to understand him, sent him to me. The "Pennsylvania Dutchman," as his class was known in the Valley, was soon firing at me his broken English, and opened his argument with the announcement: "You be's got my mare." I replied, "It is not at all improbable, my friend, that I have your mare, but the game we are now playing is what was called in my boyhood 'tit for tat' "; and I endeavored to explain to him that the country was at war, that at the South horses were being taken by the Union soldiers, and that I was trying on a small scale to balance accounts. I flattered myself that this statement of the situation would settle the matter; but the explanation was far more satisfactory to myself than to him. He insisted that I had not paid for his mare. I at once offered to pay him--in Confederate money; I had no other. This he indignantly refused. Finally I offered to give him a written order for the price of his mare on the President of the United States. This offer set him to thinking. He was quite disposed to accept it, but, like a dim ray of starlight through a rift in the clouds at night, there gradually dawned on him the thought that there might possibly be some question as to my authority for drawing on the President. The suggestion of this doubt exhausted his patience, and in his righteous exasperation, like his great countryman hurling the inkstand at the devil, he pounded me with expletives in so furious a style that, although I could not interpret them into English, there was no difficulty in comprehending their meaning. The words which I did catch and understand showed that he was making a comparison of values between his mare and his "t'ree vifes." The climax of his argument was in these words: "I 've been married, sir, t'ree times, and I vood not geef dot mare for all dose voomans."
With so sincere an admirer of woman as myself such an argument could scarcely be recognized as forcible; but I was also a great lover of fine horses, and this poor fellow's distress at the loss of his favorite mare was so genuine and acute that I finally yielded to his entreaties and had her delivered to him.
When General Early reached York a few days later, he entered into some business negotiations with the officials and prominent citizens of that city. I was not advised as to the exact character of those negotiations, but it was rumored through that portion of the army at the time that General Early wanted to borrow, or secure in some other way, for the use of his troops, a certain amount of greenbacks, and that he succeeded in making the arrangement. I learned afterward that the only promise to repay, like that of the Confederate notes, was at some date subsequent to the establishment of Southern independence.
It will be remembered that the note concealed in the flowers handed me at York had indicated a ravine down which I could move, reaching the river not far from the bridge. As my orders were not restricted, except to direct me to cross the Susquehanna, if possible, my immediate object was to move rapidly down that ravine to the river, then along its right bank to the bridge, seize it, and cross to the Columbia side. Once across, I intended to mount my men, if practicable, so as to pass rapidly through Lancaster in the direction of Philadelphia, and thus compel General Meade to send a portion of his army to the defence of that city. This programme was defeated, first, by the burning of the bridge, and second, by the imminent prospect of battle near Gettysburg. The Union troops stationed at Wrightsville had, after their retreat across it, fired the bridge which I had hoped to secure, and had then stood in battle line on the opposite shore. With great energy my men labored to save the bridge. I called on the citizens of Wrightsville for buckets and pails, but none were to be found. There was, however, no lack of buckets and pails a little later, when the town was on fire. The bridge might burn, for that incommoded, at the time, only the impatient Confederates, and these Pennsylvanians were not in sympathy with my expedition, nor anxious to facilitate the movement of such unwelcome visitors. But when the burning bridge fired the lumber-yards on the river's banks, and the burning lumber fired the town, buckets and tubs and pails and pans innumerable came from their hiding-places, until it seemed that, had the whole of Lee's army been present, I could have armed them with these implements to fight the rapidly spreading flames. My men labored as earnestly and bravely to save the town as they did to save the bridge. In the absence of fire-engines or other appliances, the only chance to arrest the progress of the flames was to form my men around the burning district, with the flank resting on the river's edge, and pass rapidly from hand to hand the pails of water. Thus, and thus only, was the advancing, raging fire met, and at a late hour of the night checked and conquered. There was one point especially at which my soldiers combated the fire's progress with immense energy, and with great difficulty saved an attractive home from burning. It chanced to be the home of one of the most superb women it was my fortune to meet during the four years of war. She was Mrs. L. L. Rewalt, to whom I refer in my lecture, "The Last Days of the Confederacy," as the heroine of the Susquehanna. I met Mrs. Rewalt the morning after the fire had been checked. She had witnessed the furious combat with the flames around her home, and was unwilling that those men should depart without receiving some token of appreciation from her. She was not wealthy, and could not entertain my whole command, but she was blessed with an abundance of those far nobler riches of brain and heart which are the essential glories of exalted womanhood. Accompanied by an attendant, and at a late hour of the night, she sought me, in the confusion
which followed the destructive fire, to express her gratitude to the soldiers of my command and to inquire how long we would remain in Wrightsville. On learning that the village would be relieved of our presence at an early hour the following morning, she insisted that I should bring with me to breakfast at her house as many as could find places in her dining-room. She would take no excuse, not even the nervous condition in which the excitement of the previous hours had left her. At a bountifully supplied table in the early morning sat this modest, cultured woman, surrounded by soldiers in their worn, gray uniforms. The welcome she gave us was so gracious, she was so self-possessed, so calm and kind, that I found myself in an inquiring state of mind as to whether her sympathies were with the Northern or Southern side in the pending war. Cautiously, but with sufficient clearness to indicate to her my object, I ventured some remarks which she could not well ignore and which she instantly saw were intended to evoke some declaration upon the subject. She was too brave to evade it, too self-poised to be confused by it, and too firmly fixed in her convictions to hesitate as to the answer. With no one present except Confederate soldiers who were her guests, she replied, without a quiver in her voice, but with womanly gentleness: "General Gordon, I fully comprehend you, and it is due to myself that I candidly tell you that I am a Union woman. I cannot afford to be misunderstood, nor to have you misinterpret this simple courtesy. You and your soldiers last night saved my home from burning, and I was unwilling that you should go away without receiving some token of my appreciation. I must tell you, however, that, with my assent and approval, my husband is a soldier in the Union army, and my constant prayer to Heaven is that our cause may triumph and the Union be saved."
No Confederate left that room without a feeling of profound respect, of unqualified admiration, for that brave and worthy woman. No Southern soldier, no true Southern man, who reads this account will fail to render to her a like tribute of appreciation. The spirit of every high-souled Southerner was made to thrill over and over again at the evidence around him of the more than Spartan courage, the self-sacrifices and devotion, of Southern women, at every stage and through every trial of the war, as from first to last, they hurried to the front, their brothers and fathers, their husbands and sons. No Southern man can ever forget the words of cheer that came from these heroic women's lips, and their encouragement to hope and fight on in the midst of despair. When I met Mrs. Rewalt in Wrightsville, the parting with my own mother was still fresh in my memory. Nothing short of death's hand can ever obliterate from my heart the impression of that parting. Holding me in her arms, her heart almost bursting with anguish, and the tears running down her cheeks, she asked God to take care of me, and then said : "Go, my son; I shall perhaps never see you again, but I commit you freely to the service of your country." I had witnessed, as all Southern soldiers had witnessed, the ever-increasing consecration of those women to their cause. No language can fitly describe their saintly spirit of martyrdom, which grew stronger and rose higher when all other eyes could see the inevitable end of the terrific struggle slowly but surely approaching.
Returning from the banks of the Susquehanna, and meeting at Gettysburg, July 1, 1863, the advance of Lee's forces, my command was thrown quickly and squarely on the right flank of the Union army. A more timely arrival never occurred. The battle had been raging for four or five hours. The Confederate General Archer, with a large portion of his brigade, had been captured. Heth and Scales, Confederate generals, had been wounded. The ranking Union commander on the field, General Reynolds, had been killed, and Hancock was assigned to command. The battle, upon the issue of which hung, perhaps, the fate of the Confederacy, was in full blast. The Union forces, at first driven back, now reënforced, were again advancing and pressing back Lee's left and threatening to envelop it. The Confederates were stubbornly contesting every foot of ground, but the Southern left was slowly yielding. A few moments more and the day's battle might have been ended by the complete turning of Lee's flank. I was ordered to move at once to the aid of the heavily pressed Confederates. With a ringing yell, my command rushed upon the line posted to protect the Union right. Here occurred a hand-to-hand struggle. That protecting Union line once broken left my command not only on the right flank, but obliquely in rear of it. Any troops that were ever marshalled would, under like conditions, have been as surely and swiftly shattered. There was no alternative for Howard's men except to break and fly, or to throw down their arms and surrender. Under the concentrated fire from front and flank, the marvel is that any escaped. In the midst of the wild disorder in his ranks, and through a storm of bullets, a Union officer was seeking to rally his men for a final stand. He, too, went down, pierced by a Minié ball. Riding forward with my rapidly advancing lines, I discovered that brave officer lying upon his back, with the July sun pouring its rays into his pale face. He was surrounded by the Union dead, and his own life seemed to be rapidly ebbing out. Quickly dismounting and lifting his head, I gave him water from my canteen, asked his name and the character of his wounds. He was Major-General Francis C. Barlow, of New York, and of Howard's corps. The ball had entered his body in front and passed out near the spinal cord, paralyzing him in legs and arms. Neither of us had the remotest thought that he could possibly survive many hours. I summoned several soldiers who were looking after the wounded, and directed them to place him upon a litter and carry him to the shade in the rear. Before parting,
No battle of our Civil War--no battle of any war--more forcibly illustrates the truth that officers at a distance from the field cannot, with any wisdom, attempt to control the movements of troops actively engaged. On the first day neither General Early nor General Ewell could possibly have been fully cognizant of the situation at the time I was ordered to halt. The whole of that portion of the Union army in my front was in inextricable confusion and in flight. They were necessarily in flight, for my troops were upon the flank and rapidly sweeping down the lines. The firing upon my men had almost ceased. Large bodies of the Union troops were, throwing down their arms and surrendering, because in disorganized and confused masses they were wholly powerless either to check the movement or return the fire. As far down the lines as my eye could reach the Union troops were in retreat. Those at a distance were
The Rev. J. William Jones, D.D., writing of this statement of General Lee's, uses these words: "General Lee made that remark to Professor James J. White and myself in his office in Lexington one day when we chanced to go in as he was reading a letter making some inquiries of him about Gettysburg. He said, with an emphasis that I cannot forget, and bringing his hand down on the table with a force that made things rattle:'If I had had Stonewall Jackson at Gettysburg, I would have won that fight, and a complete victory there would have given us Washington and Baltimore, if not Philadelphia, and would have established the independence of the Confederacy.' "
No soldier in a great crisis ever wished more ardently for a deliverer's hand than I wished for one hour of Jackson when I was ordered to halt. Had he been there, his quick eye would have caught at a glance the entire situation, and instead of halting me he would have urged
I should state here that General Meade's army at that hour was stretched out along the line of his march for
My thoughts were so harrowed and my heart so burdened by the fatal mistake of the afternoon that I was unable to sleep at night. Mounting my horse at two o'clock in the morning, I rode with one or two staff officers to the red barn in which General Ewell and General Early then had their headquarters. Much of my time after nightfall had been spent on the front picket-line, listening to the busy strokes of Union picks and shovels on the hills, to the rumble of artillery wheels and the tramp of fresh troops as they were hurried forward by Union commanders and placed in position. There was, therefore, no difficulty in divining the scene that would break on our view with the coming dawn. I did not hesitate to say to both Ewell and Early that a line of heavy earthworks, with heavy guns and ranks of infantry behind them, would frown upon us at daylight. I expressed the opinion that, even at that hour, two o'clock, by a concentrated and vigorous night assault we could carry those heights, and that if we waited till morning it would cost us 10,000 men to take them. There was a disposition to yield to my suggestions, but
Late in the afternoon of this first day's battle, when the firing had greatly decreased along most of the lines, General Ewell and I were riding through the streets of Gettysburg. In a previous battle he had lost one of his legs, but prided himself on the efficiency of the wooden one which he used in its place. As we rode together, a body of Union soldiers, posted behind some buildings and fences on the outskirts of the town, suddenly opened a brisk fire. A number of Confederates were killed or wounded, and I heard the ominous thud of a Minié ball as it struck General Ewell at my side. I quickly asked: "Are you hurt, sir?" "No, no," he replied; "I 'm not hurt. But suppose that ball had struck you: we would have had the trouble of carrying you off the field, sir. You see how much better fixed for a fight I am than you are. It don't hurt a bit to be shot in a wooden leg."
Ewell was one of the most eccentric characters, and, taking him all in all, one of the most interesting that I have ever known. It is said that in his early manhood he had been disappointed in a love affair, and had never fully recovered from its effects. The fair young woman to whom he had given his affections had married another man; but Ewell, like the truest of knights, carried her image in his heart through long years. When he was promoted to the rank of brigadier or major-general, he evidenced the constancy of his affections by placing upon his staff the son of the woman whom he had loved in his youth. The meddlesome Fates, who seem to revel in the romances of lovers, had decreed that Ewell should be shot in battle and become the object of solicitude and tender nursing by this lady, who had been for many years a widow--Mrs. Brown. Her gentle ministrations
Whatever differences of opinion may now or hereafter exist as to the results which might have followed a defeat of the Union arms at Gettysburg, there is universal concurrence in the judgment that this battle was the turning-point in the South's fortunes. The point where Pickett's Virginians, under Kemper, Garnett, and Armistead, in their immortal charge, swept over the rock wall, has been appropriately designated by the Government as "the high-water mark of the Rebellion." To the Union commander, General George Gordon Meade, history will accord the honor of having handled his army at Gettysburg with unquestioned ability. The record and the results of the battle entitle him to a high place among Union leaders. To him and to his able subordinates and heroic men is due the credit of having successfully met and repelled the Army of Northern Virginia in the meridian of its hope and confidence and power. This much seems secure to him, whether his failure vigorously to follow General Lee and force him to another battle is justified or condemned by the military critics of the future. General Meade's army halted, it is true, after having achieved a victory. The victory, however, was not of
It was my pleasure to know General Meade well after the war, when he was the Department Commander or Military Governor of Georgia. An incident at a banquet in the city of Atlanta illustrates his high personal and soldierly characteristics. The first toast of the evening was to General Meade as the honored guest. When this toast had been drunk, my health was proposed. Thereupon, objection was made upon the ground that it was "too soon after the war to be drinking the health of a man who had been fighting for four years in the Rebel army." It is scarcely necessary to say that this remark came from one who did no fighting in either army. He belonged to that curious class of soldiers who were as valiant in peace as they were docile in war; whose defiance of danger became dazzling after the danger was past. General Meade belonged to the other class of soldiers, who fought as long as fighting was in order, and was ready for peace when there was no longer any foe in the field. This chivalric chieftain of the Union forces at Gettysburg was far more indignant at the speech of the bomb-proof warrior than I was myself. The moment the objection to drinking my health was suggested, General Meade sprang to his feet, and with a compliment to myself which I shall not be expected to repeat, and a rebuke to the objector, he held high his
It will not be expected that any considerable space be devoted to the unseemly controversy over those brilliant but disastrous Confederate charges which lost the day at Gettysburg. I could scarcely throw upon the subject any additional light nor bring to its elucidation any material testimony not already adduced by those who have written on the one side or the other. A sense of justice, however, to say nothing of loyalty to Lee's memory, impels me to submit one observation; and I confidently affirm that nearly every soldier who fought under him will sympathize with the suggestion. It is this: that nothing that occurred at Gettysburg, nor anything that has been written since of that battle, has lessened the conviction that, had Lee's orders been promptly and cordially executed, Meade's centre on the third day would have been penetrated and the Union army overwhelmingly defeated. Lee's hold upon the confidence of his army was absolute. The repulse at Gettysburg did not shake it. I recall no instance in history where a defeated army retained in its retreating commander a faith so complete, and gave to him subsequent support so enthusiastic and universal.
General Longstreet is undoubtedly among the great American soldiers who attained distinction in our Civil War; and to myself, and, I am sure, to a large majority of the Southern people, it is a source of profound regret that he and his friends should have been brought into such unprofitable and ill-tempered controversy with the friends of his immortal chieftain. 2
A third of a century has passed since, with Lee's stricken but still puissant army, I turned my back upon the field of Gettysburg, on which nearly 40,000 Americans went down, dead or wounded, at the hands of fellow-Americans. The commanders-in-chief and nearly all the great actors upon it are dead. Of the heroes who fought there and survived the conflict, a large portion have since joined the ranks of those who fell. A new generation has taken their places since the battle's roar was hushed, but its thunders are still reverberating through my memory. No tongue, nor pen, can adequately portray its vacillating fortunes at each dreadful moment. As I write of it now, a myriad thrilling incidents and rapidly changing scenes, now appalling and now inspiring, rush over my memory. I hear again the words of Barlow: "Tell my wife that I freely gave my life for my country." Yonder, resting on his elbow, I see the gallant young Avery in his bloody gray uniform among his brave North Carolinians, writing, as he dies: "Tell father that I fell with my face to the foe." On the opposite hills, Lee and Meade, surrounded by staff and couriers and
The third day's struggle was the bloody postscript to the battle of the first and second. There was a pause. Night had intervened. It was only a pause for breath. Of sleep there was little for the soldiers, perhaps none for the throbbing brains of the great chieftains. Victory to Lee meant Southern independence. Victory to
The collision had shaken the continent. For three days the tumult and roar around Cemetery Heights and the Round Tops seemed the echo of the internal commotion which ages before had heaved these hills above the surrounding plain.
It is a great loss to history and to posterity that General Lee did not write his own recollections as General Grant did. It was his fixed purpose to do so for some years after the war ended. From correspondence and personal interviews with him, I know that he was profoundly impressed with the belief that it was his duty to write, and he expended much time and labor in getting the material for such a work. From his reports, which are models of official papers, were necessarily excluded the free and full comments upon plans, movements, men, failures, and the reasons for such failures, as they appeared to him, and of which he was the most competent witness. To those who knew General Lee well, and who added to this knowledge a just appreciation of his generous nature, the assumption by him of entire responsibility for the failure at Gettysburg means nothing except an additional and overwhelming proof of his almost marvellous magnanimity. He was commander-in-chief, and as such and in that sense he was responsible; but in that sense he was also responsible for every act of every officer and every soldier in his army. This, however, is not the kind of responsibility
If his plan of battle was faulty, then for this he is responsible; but if his general plan promised success, and if there was a lack of cheerful, prompt, and intelligent coöperation in its execution, or if there were delays that General Lee could not foresee nor provide against, and which delays or lack of coöperation enabled General Meade to concentrate his reserves behind the point of contemplated attack, then the responsibility is shifted to other shoulders.
There was nothing new or especially remarkable in General Lee's plans. Novelties in warfare are confined rather to its implements than to the methods of delivering battle. To Hannibal and Caesar, to Frederick and Napoleon, to Grant and Lee, to all great soldiers, the plan was familiar. It was to assault along the entire line and hold the enemy to hard work on the wings, while the artillery and heaviest impact of infantry penetrated the left centre. Cooperation by every part of his army was expected and essential. However well trained and strong may be the individual horses in a team, they will never move the stalled wagon when one pulls forward while the other holds back. They must all pull together, or the heavily loaded wagon will never be carried
Wellington at Waterloo and Meade at Gettysburg, each held the highlands against his antagonist. Wellington on Mont-Saint-Jean, and Meade on Cemetery Ridge, had the bird's-eye view of the forces of attack. The English batteries on the plateau and the Union batteries on Cemetery Heights commanded alike the intervening undulations across which the charging columns must advance. Behind Mont- Saint-Jean, to conceal Wellington's movements from Napoleon's eye, were the woodlands of Soignies. Behind Cemetery Ridge, to conceal Meade's movements from the field-glasses of Lee, was a sharp declivity, a protecting and helpful depression. As the French under Napoleon at Waterloo, so the Confederates under Lee at Gettysburg, held the weaker position. In both cases the assailants sought to expel their opponents from the stronger lines. I might add another resemblance in the results which followed. Waterloo decreed the destiny of France, of England, of Europe. Gettysburg, not so directly or immediately, but practically, decided the fate of the Confederacy.
There were points of vast divergence. The armies, which met at Waterloo were practically equal. This was not true of the armies that met at Gettysburg.3 Napoleon's artillery far exceeded that of Wellington. Lee's was far inferior to Meade's, in the metal from which the guns were moulded, as well as in number. Waterloo was a rout, Gettysburg a repulse. Napoleon, in the ensuing panic, was a deserted fugitive. Lee rode amidst his broken lines calmly majestic, the idol of his followers. With no trace of sympathy for Napoleon's selfish aims, with righteous condemnation of his vaulting ambition, one cannot fail to realize the profound pathos of his position on that dismal night of wildest panic and lonely flight. Abandoned by fortune, deserted by his army, discrowned and doomed, he is described by Hugo as having not an organized company to comfort him, not even his faithful Old Guard to rally around him. In Lee's army there was neither panic nor precipitate retreat. There was no desertion of the great commander. Around him still stood his heroic legions, with confidence in him unshaken, love for him unabated, ready to follow his lead and to fight under his orders to the last extremity.
General Meade evidently, perhaps naturally, expected far greater confusion and disorganization in Lee's army, from the terrific repulse to which it had been subjected. He wisely threw his cavalry upon Lee's flank in order to sweep down upon the rear and cut to pieces or capture the fragments of Southern infantry, in case of general retreat or demoralization. As the Union bugles sounded the charge, however, for the gallant horsemen under Farnsworth, Lee's right was ready to receive them. Proudly they rode, but promptly were they repulsed. Many saddles were emptied by Confederate bullets. The intrepid commander, General Farnsworth himself, lost his life in the charge. On the other flank, and with similar design, Lee had placed Stuart with his dashing Confederate riders. Stuart was to attack when Lee's infantry had pierced Meade's centre, and when the Union army was cut in twain and in rapid retreat. This occasion never came to Stuart, but he found all the opportunity be could reasonably desire for the exercise of his men
The introduction of gunpowder and bullets and of long-range repeating rifles has, in modern warfare, greatly lessened the effectiveness of cavalry in general battle with infantry, and deprived that great arm of the service of the terror which its charges once inspired. In wars of the early centuries, the swift horsemen rode down the comparatively helpless infantry and trampled its ranks under the horses' feet. For ages after the dismemberment of the Roman Empire, it was the vast bodies of cavalry that checked and changed the currents of battles and settled the fate of armies and empires. This is not true now--can never be true again; but a cavalry charge, met by a countercharge of cavalry, is still, perhaps, the most terrible spectacle witnessed in war. If the reader has never seen such a charge, he can form little conception of its awe-inspiring fury. Imagine yourself looking down from Gettysburg's heights upon the open, wide-spreading plain below, where five thousand horses are marshalled in battle line. Standing beside them are five thousand riders, armed, booted and spurred, and ready to mount. The bugles sound the "Mount!" and instantly five thousand plumes rise above the horses as the riders spring into their saddles. In front of the respective squadrons the daring leaders take their places. The fluttering pennants or streaming guidons, ten to each regiment, mark the left of the companies. On the opposite slope of the same plain are five thousand hostile horsemen clad in different uniforms, ready to meet these in countercharge. Under those ten thousand horses are their hoofs, iron-shod and pitiless, beneath whose furious tread the plain is soon to quiver. Again on each slope of the open field the bugles sound. Ten thousand sabres leap from scabbards and glisten in the
Ewell's Corps, of which my command was a part, was the last to leave Gettysburg, and the only corps of either army, I believe, that forded the Potomac. Reaching this river, we found it for the time an impassable barrier against our further progress southward. The pontoons had been destroyed. The river was deep and muddy, swollen and swift. We were leaving Pennsylvania and the full granaries that had fed us. Pennsylvania was our Egypt whither we had "gone to buy corn." We regretted leaving, although we had found far less favor with the authorities of this modern Egypt than had Joseph and his brethren with the rulers of the ancient land of abundance.
The fording of the Potomac in the dim starlight of that 13th of July night, and early morning of the 14th, was a spectacular phase of war so quaint and impressive as to leave itself lastingly daguerreotyped on the
Most of our wounded and our blue-coated comrades who accompanied us as prisoners were shown greater consideration--they were ferried across in boats. The only serious casualty connected with this dangerous crossing occurred at the point least expected. From the pontoon-bridge, which had been repaired, and which
General Meade was deliberate in his pursuit, if not considerate in his treatment of us. He had induced us to change our minds. Instead of visiting Philadelphia, on this trip, he had persuaded us to return toward Richmond. He doubtless thought that the last day's fight at Gettysburg was fairly good work for one campaign, and that if he attempted to drive us more rapidly from Pennsylvania, the experiment might prove expensive. As previously intimated, he was probably correct in this opinion. Had he left his strong position while Lee stood waiting for him to come out on the Fourth of July at Gettysburg and to assume the offensive, the chances are at least even that his assault would have been repelled and might have led to a Union disaster. One of the wisest adages in war is to avoid doing what your antagonist desires, and it is beyond dispute that, from General Lee down through all the grades, even to the heroic privates in the ranks, there was a readiness if not a desire to meet General Meade should he advance upon us. Meade's policy after the Confederate repulse at Gettysburg did not differ materially from that of Lee after the Union repulse at Fredericksburg. General Halleck, as he surveyed the situation from Washington, did not like General Meade's deliberation and pelted him with telegrams extremely nettling to that proud soldier's sensibilities. In the citadel of the War Office at Washington, General Halleck could scarcely catch so clear a view of the situation as could General Meade from the bloody and shivered rocks of the Round Tops. No one doubts General Halleck's ability or verbal impetuosity. To Southern apprehension, however, there was far more serious work
It is one of the curious coincidences of the war that the results at Gettysburg furnished the occasion for the tender of resignation by each of the commanders-in-chief. Lee offered to resign because he had not satisfied himself ; Meade because he had not satisfied his Government. Lee feared discontent among his people; Meade found it with General Halleck. Relief from command was denied to Lee; it was granted at last to Meade.
It would have been a fatal mistake, a blunder, to have accepted General Lee's resignation. There was no other man who could have filled his place in the confidence, veneration, and love of his army. His relief from command in Virginia would have brought greater dissatisfaction, if not greater disaster, than did the removal from command of General Joseph E. Johnston in Georgia. The Continental Congress might as safely have dispensed with the services of Washington as could the Confederacy with those of Lee. Looking back now over the records of that Titanic sectional struggle in the light of Lee's repeated successes prior to the Gettysburg battle and of his prolonged resistance in 1864-65, with depleted ranks and exhausted resources, how strangely sounds the story of his self-abnegation and desire to turn over his army to some "younger and abler man"! How beautiful and deeply sincere the words, coming from his saddened heart, in which he characterized his devoted followers in that official letter tendering his resignation! Speaking of the new commander, whose selection he was anxious should at once be made, he said: "I know he will have as gallant and brave an army as ever existed to second his efforts, and it will be the happiest day of my life to see at its head a worthy leader--one who can accomplish
To General Lee's request to be relieved, and to have an abler man placed in his position, Mr. Davis very pointedly and truthfully replied that to request him to find some one "more fit for command, or who possessed more of the confidence of the army, or of the reflecting men of the country, is to demand an impossibility."
1 I give here the numbers engaged. The figures are taken from the highest authorities:
FEDERAL.--Return, June 30, 1863, effective infantry and artillery (cavalry not reported), Army of the Potomac, 84,158 (Official Records, Vol. XXVII, Part I, p. 151). To which add cavalry (given by "Battles and Leaders" as 13,144), making a total of 97,302.
Estimates, at the battle: "Battles and Leaders," 93,500 (Vol. III, p. 440). Doubleday, 82,000 (he accepts estimate of the Count of Paris). Boynton, 87,000. Meade, in testifying before Commission on Conduct of War, gives 95,000 (Second Series, Vol. I, p. 337). Livermore's "Numbers and Losses in Civil War," 83,000 pp. 102, 103).
CONFEDERATE.--Confederate returns, May 31, 1863, effective force, 68,352 (Official Records, Vol. XXV, Part I, pp. 845, 846).
Estimates, at the battle: "Battles and Leaders," 70,000 (Vol. IV, p. 440). Doubleday, 73,500 (he accepts estimate of the Count of Paris). Boynton, 80,000. Taylor's "Four Years with Lee," 62,000 (p. 113). Livermore's "Numbers and Losses," 75,054 (pp. 102, 103).
2 It now seems certain that impartial military critics, after thorough investigation, will consider the following as established:
1. That General Lee distinctly ordered Longstreet to attack early the morning of the second day, and if he had done so, two of the largest corps of Meade's army would not have been in the fight; but Longstreet delayed the attack until four o'clock in the afternoon, and thus lost his opportunity of occupying Little Round Top, the key to the position, which he might have done in the morning without firing a shot or losing a man.
2. That General Lee ordered Longstreet to attack at daybreak on the morning of the third day, and that he did not attack until two or three o'clock in the afternoon, the artillery opening at one.
3. That General Lee, according to the testimony of Colonel Walter Taylor, Colonel C. S. Venable, and General A. L. Long, who were present when the order was given, ordered Longstreet to make the attack on the last day, with the three divisions of his corps, and two divisions of A. P. Hill's corps, and that instead of doing so he sent fourteen thousand men to assail Meade's army in his strong position, and heavily intrenched.
4. That the great mistake of the halt on the first day would have been repaired on the second, and even on the third day, if Lee's orders had been vigorously executed, and that General Lee died believing (the testimony on this point is overwhelming) that he lost Gettysburg at last by Longstreet's disobedience of orders.
3 General Lee's army at Gettysburg, according to most reliable estimates [see note, pp. 155 and 156], was about 60,000 or 62,000; General Meade's is placed by different authorities at figures ranging from 82,000 to 105,000. Appleton's Cyclopedia of American Biography places the numbers of Lee at 69,000 and Meade's between 82,000 and 84,000.
"Reminiscences of the Civil War", John B. Gordon, New York, Charles Scribner's Sons; Atlanta: Martin & Hoyt Co., 1904, c1903. pp 137-176