BATTLE OF GETTYSBURG.
General Lee designed an attack upon Harrisburg, but on the 29th,
learning of the northward movement of Meade, he ordered General
Ewell, then on the road toward the capital, to join the army near Gettysburg,
and at the same time he put the entire army in motion for the
same destination. The march was slow, and it was 10 A. M. on the
morning of the 1st of July when Heth's division in the advance reached
the town destined henceforth to enduring distinction in American history.
Meade had taken advantage of Lee's delay at Chambersburg, and
by rapid marching reached the place in time for the 11th corps to
engage Heth's division on its arrival.
A day pregnant with momentous issue was at hand. The mighty
armies which had ceased to confront each other since leaving the Rappahannock,
found themselves face to face at Gettysburg, on Wednesday,
July 1st.
Buford's cavalry brought on the attack at a point two miles out on the
Chambersburg road, but was soon forced back by the approaching lines
of General Heth. General Reynolds then attempted to stay the advance,
but he fell mortally wounded in the first fire, and his division in confusion
fell back to the town. Another gray line was now moving forward;
it was the corps of Ewell from York and Carlisle. He had heard
the artillery calling him, and had hastened to the point of attack. Unchecked,
they moved into the town, the Federals, under the command of
Doubleday since the fall of Reynolds, retiring to the hill beyond. This
concluded the first day's fighting.
Let us briefly notice the position of the two armies on the morning of
the 2d, which had taken positions during the night of the 1st. Lee's
army was arranged along Seminary Ridge and around to the east of
Gettysburg in the form of a vast crescent five miles in length, its concavity
facing its antagonist. Longstreet was on the right, Hill in the
center, and Ewell on the left. Meade's forces were all up by daylight except
Sedgwick's corps, which did not arrive until 2 P. M. Slocum was posted
on the extreme right; to his left lay the command of Wadsworth; then
to his left was Howard, and following in order were Hancock, Sickles
and Sykes. The corps of Reynolds was held in reserve.
There lay the forces of General Lee—the Army of Northern Virginia—which
had met and defeated the army now before it on many
bloody fields. At Mechanicsville, at Malvern Hill, at South Mountain,
at Antietam, at Manassas, at Fredericksburg and at Chancellorsville, it
had seen the Army of the Potomac routed and fleeing before it. But
now a reverse, the most serious of the war, was to be met, but not from
any want of intrepidity or the absence of heroic achievement, for here on
the field of Gettysburg, though overpowered, it made the grandest stand
in its history.
We have not space to follow all the charges and counter charges, successes
and reverses, on that historic field. Such carnage had not before
been witnessed on this continent. Well may historians class it as one of
the fifteen great battles of the world. Some idea of the terrible struggle
may be formed from its casualties. The Federal loss was 23,210,
of whom 2,834 were killed, 13,733 wounded, and 6,643 missing. That
of the Confederates was 36,000, of whom 5,000 were killed, 23,000
wounded, and 8,000 missing.
On the 4th, Lee began his march to the Potomac, forty miles distant,
which he reached on the 7th, expecting to cross at Williamsport, but
finding the stream so swollen that pontoons were impracticable, he
moved to Falling Waters, where on the 13th he passed into Virginia.
The disabled condition of the Federal army may be inferred from the
fact that although Lee lingered on the shores of Maryland nine days
after the battle, and within forty miles of his enemy, no second attack
was made, nor was any pursuit attempted save that of the cavalry which
followed in his rear.
