The battle of Gettysburg is properly included among the great battles
of the world. It was the greatest conflict that has thus far occurred
in America. The losses relative to the numbers engaged were not as
great as those at Antietam, Spottsylvania, and a few other bloody
struggles of our war; but in the aggregate the losses were greatest.
Gettysburg was in truth the high tide of the American Civil War. Never
before and never afterward was there a crisis such as that which broke
in the dreadful struggle for the mastery of Cemetery Ridge.
The invasion of the Northern States by General Lee had been undertaken
at the close of the previous summer. That invasion had ended
disastrously at the battle of Antietam. Once more the Confederate
commander would make the trial. So well had he been able to beat back
every invasion of Virginia by the Union forces that he now thought to
end the war by turning its tide of devastation into Pennsylvania.
Doubtless Lee realized that he was placing everything upon the cast of
a die. He undertook the campaign with a measure of confidence. He,
almost as much as Grant, was a taciturn man, not much given to
revelations of his purposes and hopes. No doubt he was somewhat
surprised at the successful rising of the Union forces against him.
Besides the Army of the Potomac, Pennsylvania seemed to rise for the
emergency.
It has not generally been observed that before the great battle
General Meade was in a position seriously to threaten the Confederate
rear. Armies in the field rarely meet each other at the place and time
expected. There is always something obscure and uncertain in the
oncoming of the actual conflict. The fact is that General Lee was
receding somewhat at the time of the crisis. Then it was that he
determined to fight a great battle, and if successful then march on
Washington. Should he not be successful, he would keep a way open by
direct route for retreat into Virginia.
By the first of July, 1863, a situation had been prepared which
signified a decisive battle with far-reaching consequences to the one
side or the other, accordingly as victory should incline to this or to
that. By this date General Reynolds, who commanded the advance line of
the Union army, met the corresponding line of the Confederates at the
village of Gettysburg, and the rest followed as if by logical
necessity.
On July 1 and 2, the great body of the Union and Confederate armies
came up to the position where battle had already begun between the
advance divisions and the pressure of the one side upon the other
became greater and greater with each hour. At the first the
Confederate impact was strongest. General Reynolds was killed.
Reinforcements were hurried up on both sides. General Howard, who
succeeded Reynolds, selected Cemetery Hill, south of the town of
Gettysburg, and there established the Union line.
General Meade arrived on the field on the afternoon of the first, and
the two armies were thrown rapidly into position. That of the Federals
extended in the form of a fishhook from Little Round Top by way of
Round Top and along Cemetery Ridge through the cemetery itself, by the
way of the gate, and then bending to the right, formed the bowl of the
hook, which extended around as far as Culp's Hill and Wolf Creek. The
ground was elevated and the convexity was toward the enemy.
By nightfall of the first, both armies were in state of readiness for
the conflict. The Union army was on the defensive. It was sufficient
that it should hold its ground and repel all assault. The Confederates
must advance and carry the Federal position in order to succeed. How
this should be done was not agreed on by the Confederate commanders.
General Lee formed a plan of direct assault; but General Longstreet
was of opinion that a movement of the army to the Union left flank
would be preferable, and that by that method the flank might be turned
and the position of Meade carried with less loss and much less hazard.
Longstreet, however, did not oppose the views of his commander to the
extent of thwarting his purpose or weakening the plan adopted. On the
second of July the battle began in earnest about noon. The
Confederates advanced against the Union centre and left, and at a
later hour a strenuous and partly successful attack was made on the
Federal right. But complete success was not attained by Lee in any
part of the field. About sundown the Confederates gained considerable
advantage against Slocum, who held the line along Wolf Hill and Rock
Creek; and on the Union left a terrible struggle occurred for the
possession of Great and Little Round Top. In this part of the field
the fighting continued until six o'clock in the evening; but the
critical positions still remained in the hands of the Federals.
In the centre the contest was waged for the mastery of Cemetery Hill,
which was the key to the Union position. Here were planted batteries
with an aggregate of eighty guns, and here, though the assaults of the
Confederates were desperate and long continued, the integrity of the
Federal line was preserved till nightfall. The fighting along a front
of nearly five miles in extent continued in a desultory manner until
about ten o'clock on the July night, when the firing for the most part
ceased, leaving the two armies in virtually the same position which
they had occupied the day before.
This signified, however, that thus far the advantage was on the Union
side; for on that side the battle was defensive. The Confederate army
had come to a wall, and must break through or suffer defeat. The
burden of attack rested on the Confederate side; but General Lee did
not flinch from the necessity. In the darkness of night both he and
the Union commanders made strenuous preparations for the renewal of
the struggle on the morrow.
On the morning of the third both armies seemed loath to begin the
conflict. This phenomenon is nearly always witnessed in the case of
really critical battles. It was so at Waterloo, and so at Gettysburg.
It seems that in such crises the commanders, well aware of what is to
come, wait awhile, as though each would permit the other to strike
first. As a matter of fact, the topmost crest of the Civil War had now
been reached; and from this hour the one cause or the other must
decline to the end.
The whole forenoon of the third of July was spent in preparations.
There was but little fighting, and that little was desultory. At
midday there seemed to be a lull along the whole line. Just afterward,
however, General Lee opened from Seminary Ridge with about one hundred
guns, directing his fire against the Union centre on Cemetery Hill.
There the counter position was occupied by the American artillery of
about equal strength, under command of General Hunt. The cannonade
burst out at one o'clock with terrific roar. Nothing like it had ever
before been seen or heard in the New World. Nothing like it, we
believe, had ever up to that time been witnessed in Europe. Certainly
there was no such cannonade at Waterloo. For about an hour and a half
this tremendous vomit of shot and shell continued. It was the hope of
General Lee to pound the Union batteries to pieces, and then, while
horror and death were still supreme in the Union centre, to thrust
forward an overwhelming mass of his best infantry into the gap, cut
Meade's army in two, plant the Confederate banner on the crest of the
Union battle line, and virtually then and there achieve the
independence of the Confederate States.
It seems that an action of General Hunt, about half-past two,
flattered Lee with the belief that he had succeeded. Hunt adopted the
plan of drawing back his batteries over the crest of the hill, for the
double purpose of cooling his guns that were becoming overheated and
of saving his supply of ammunition, that was running low. The Union
fire accordingly slackened and almost ceased for a while. Nor was Lee
able to discover from his position but what his batteries under
General Alexander had prevailed. It looked for the moment as though
the battle were lost to Meade, and that victory was in the clutch of
his antagonist.
Already a Confederate charge of infantry had been prepared. About
18,000 men, in three divisions, under Armistead, Garnett and
Pettigrew, and led by General George E. Pickett, of Virginia, had been
got into readiness for the crisis which had now arrived. Longstreet
was the corps commander, and through him the order for the charge
should be given. General Lee had himself made the order, but
Longstreet seeing, as he believed the inevitable, hesitated and turned
aside. It was not a refusal to send an army to destruction, but the
natural hesitation of a really great commander to do what he believed
was fatal to the Confederate cause. Pickett, however, gave his
salutation to Longstreet, and presently said: "Sir, I am going to move
forward!"
Then began the most memorable charge ever witnessed in America. The
Confederate column was three-fourths of a mile in length. It was
directed against the Union centre, where it was supposed the
Confederate fire had done its work. What ensued was the finest
military spectacle that had been seen in the world since the charge of
the Old Guard at Waterloo; and the results were alike! The brave men
who made the onset were mowed down as they crossed rapidly the
intervening space. Hunt's batteries were quickly run back to their
position, and began to discharge their deadly contents against the
head of the oncoming column. That column veered somewhat to the right
as it came. The line staggered, but pressed on. It came within the
range of the Union musketry. Gaps opened here and there. Armistead,
who led the advance, saw his forces sink to the earth; but he did not
waver. Nearer and nearer the column came to the Union line. It
_struck_ the Union line. There was a momentary melee among the guns,
and then all was over. Hancock's infantry rose with flash on flash
from among the rocks by which they were partially protected. The
Confederates were scattered in broken groups. Retreat was well-nigh
impossible. The impact of the charge was utterly broken, and the
Confederate line was blown into rout and ruin. Victory hovered over
the National army. The Confederate forces staggered away under the
blow of defeat. Night came down on a broken and virtually hopeless
cause. The field was covered with the dead and dying. Two thousand
eight hundred and thirty-four Union soldiers had been killed outright;
13,709 were wounded, and 6643 were missing, making a total of 23,186
men. The Confederate loss was never definitely ascertained, but was
greatly in excess of that of the Federals. The best estimate has been
fixed at 31,621. The grand total of losses in those fatal three days
thus reached the enormous aggregate of 54,807!