General Gordon gives an account of an amusing incident of the first day:
“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 dwellings 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 minie 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 I am for a fight than you are. It don’t
hurt a bit to be shot in a wooden leg.’
“Ewell was a most interesting and eccentric character. 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 maiden 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, Mrs. Brown, who had been for many years a widow. Her gentle
ministrations soothed his weary weeks of suffering, a marriage ensued,
and with it came the realization of Ewell’s long-deferred hope. He was a
most devoted husband. He never seemed to realize, however, that marriage
had changed her name, for he proudly presented her to his friends as ‘My
wife, Mrs. Brown, sir.’”