The Battle of Gettysburg: History & Voices

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The Battle of Gettysburg History Voices
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General Robert E. Lee

• Born on January 19, 1807 at "Stratford" in
  Westmoreland County Virginia
• Lee declined an offer to command the Union Army
  at the outbreak of the Civil War and offered his
  services to his native state.
• Commander of the Confederate "Army of Northern
  Virginia".  
• Under his command, this army exploited Union
  mismanagement on numerous battlefields,
  making Lee one of the most victorious commanders
  in the Confederacy.

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George Gordon Meade

• Born in Cadiz, Spain on December 31, 1815, Meade
  was primarily raised in Philadelphia though his
  family later moved to the Baltimore area. 
• At the outbreak of the Civil War, Meade offered
  his services to Pennsylvania and was
  appointed brigadier general of volunteers
  in command of a brigade of Pennsylvania regiments.
   
• June 28, 1863, while the army camped near
  Frederick, Maryland, when a courier arrived at
  Meade's tent bearing the news that he
  was appointed to command the Army of the Potomac.
  
• Meade protested at first but accepted his
  assignment devised a plan to set the army in
  motion northward to find Lee

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The Daily Life of Civil War Soldiers

• Officers in the field lived better than enlisted
  men.
• They slept one or two officers to a tent.
• Since the officers provided their own personal
  gear, items varied greatly and reflected
  individual taste.
• Each junior officer was allowed one trunk of
  personal belongings that was carried in a baggage
  wagon.
• Higher-ranking officers were allowed more
  baggage.
• Unlike infantrymen, who slept and sat on whatever
  nature provided, officers sometimes had the
  luxury of furniture.

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The Daily Life of Civil War Soldiers

• Enlisted men, unlike their officers, carried all
  their belongings on their back.
• On long marches, men were unwilling to carry more
  than the absolute essentials. Even so, soldiers
  ended up carrying about thirty to forty pounds.
• Each soldier was issued half of a tent. It was
  designed to join with another soldier's half to
  make a full size tent. The odd man lost out.
• The shelter halves were so useful that they were
  used after the war. As a result, very few remain
  today.
• When suitable wooden poles were not available for
  tent supports, soldiers would sometimes use their
  weapons.

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Mapping the Battle of Gettysburg

• Describe where the in the United States the
  Battle of Gettysburg took place.

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July 1, 1863- The Battle Begins

• On June 30, Confederate troops left their camps
  at Cashtown and marched toward Gettysburg in
  search of supplies.
• Upon reaching the edge of Gettysburg, scouts
  spied a column of Union cavalry south of town,
  closing fast.
• Under orders not to initiate a battle, the
  Confederates returned to Cashtown where they
  reported the encounter to their commander, Lt.
  General A.P. Hill.
• Hill agreed to send two divisions of his corps
  toward Gettysburg the next day to investigate the
  arrival of the mystery cavalrymen and the stage
  was set for the opening of the battle on July
  1st, 1863.

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July 2, 1863- "A most terrible day..."

• July 1 was a great victory for General Lee, but
  not a decisive one.
• Though the Union forces had been badly mauled,
  they had retreated to a strong position south of
  Gettysburg.
• General Meade arrived on the battlefield near
  midnight and after discussions with his corps
  commanders, decided to wait for the rest of his
  army to concentrate around Cemetery Hill.
• Come the morning of July 2, he would attack Lee
  or defend the prominent hills where his men now
  rested.
• Lee, meanwhile, seated in his headquarters tent
  on Seminary Ridge, pondered the growing strength
  of the Union position south of Gettysburg. If
  only he could hear from his cavalry chief J.E.B.
  Stuart and information he could provide about the
  remainder of the Union army.

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July 3 - "I will strike him there..."

• At the end of the second day, apart from the
  precious foothold on Culp's Hill, the Confederate
  gamble of simultaneous attacks had failed.
• Knowing that he could not sustain more than
  another full day of battle, a frustrated Lee was
  working at his headquarters when a smiling
  General "JEB" Stuart arrived.
• The disgusted army commander admonished Stuart
  for his long absence and failure to report Union
  movements in the weeks prior to the battle.
  YetStuart's cavalry would fit prominently into
  Lee's strategy for the next day of battle.
• Meanwhile, General Meade held a "Council of War"
  at his headquarters on the Taneytown Road. Though
  the Union line had been restored by midnight
  there was still a sizeable Confederate force on
  Culp's Hill.
• Almost to a man, his generals agreed to stay at
  Gettysburg, retake and secure Culp's Hill, and
  then wait for Lee to attack. If he did not, then
  Meade should order a counterattack and force Lee
  to fight or flee.
• The Gettysburg Campaign was about to reach its
  climax.

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The Battle Ends

• Stuart successfully marched east of Gettysburg
  and turned his force south where they encountered
  a strong Union cavalry force blocking the Hanover
  Road.
• A spirited battle ensued with troopers of both
  armies fighting on foot and horseback..
• Southern charges meant to slice through the Union
  line were stopped cold by Union cavalrymen led by
  Brig. General George Armstrong Custer. His
  attempt to raid the Union rear thwarted, Stuart
  withdrew and retired toward Gettysburg.
• Lee realized his army could no longer remain in
  Pennsylvania. Returning to his headquarters, he
  dictated orders for the army to withdraw, retreat
  to the Potomac River, and return to Virginia.
  "Too bad, too bad," a staff officer heard the
  general say in his discouragement. "Oh, too bad."
• Storm clouds blackened the early evening sky. A
  heavy rain soon fell, symbolically washing the
  land of the carnage wrought by three days of
  bloody battle.

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The Dreadful Aftermath

• The effects of the battle were felt in
  Pennsylvania for many months after the armies had
  left.
• Approximately 5,500 soldiers from both armies
  were killed in the battle, with 22,000 wounded
  soldiers packed into churches, barns, and private
  homes throughout Adams County.
• Some of the wounded had no shelter except for the
  shade of trees.
• Overtaxed Union surgeons who had treated Union
  wounded continuously during the battle were now
  left with thousands of wounded Confederates to
  care for.
• Even with the help of Gettysburg citizens and
  Confederate surgeons who remained, the situation
  appeared to be near calamity.

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The Dreadful Aftermath

• Despite the best efforts of the army and
  charitable organizations, an additional 4,000
  would succumb to their injuries either in
  Gettysburg or in the hospitals where they had
  been sent.
• Approximately 10,000 soldiers were captured
  during the fighting and both armies were burdened
  with their captives until they could be sent to
  prison camps.

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• Swollen by the hot July sun, bodies of Federal
  infantrymen litter a trampled meadow near the
  Peach Orchard. Most of these men probably
  belonged to General Daniel Sickles Union corps
  who defended the area against the massive
  Confederate assault on July 2. Rebel soldiers who
  advanced across the field stripped many of the
  bodies of their shoes and other needed
  accoutrements. Photographer Alexander Gardner
  aptly captioned this image "A Harvest of Death".

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• The body of a young Confederate infantryman lies
  in a stone enclosure in Devils Den, the boulder
  strewn hillside from which Confederate
  sharpshooters had harassed the Federal troops
  holding Little Round Top. Evidence suggests that
  the soldier was killed perhaps 40 yards away
  during the fighting on the afternoon of July 1
  and was moved and arranged by the photographer to
  enhance the images dramatic effect.

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The National Cemetery

• With the wounded being cared for, attention
  turned to the sad condition of battlefield
  burials.
• Patriotic citizens of Adams County undertook
  efforts to establish a proper burial place for
  the Union dead and with funds provided by the
  Pennsylvania legislature, the process of
  reburials began that fall.
• The Soldiers National Cemetery was dedicated on
  November 19, 1863, and was the occasion of
  President Lincoln's highly regarded Gettysburg
  Address, when the president not only dedicated a
  cemetery but gave the north a reason to continue
  the struggle to reunite the nation, the focus of
  the American Civil War.

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