AREA HISTORY: History of Adams County, Chapter XXIV, Adams County, PA
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History of Cumberland and Adams Counties, Pennsylvania
Chicago: Warner, Beers & Co., 1886
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Part III, History of Adams County, Pages 153-181
CHAPTER XXIV.
BATTLE OF GETTYSBURG-LEE’S NORTHWARD MOVEMENT IN 1863-RALLYING THE FORCES-THE
BATTLE-THE RESULT, LEE’S DEFEAT-AT MEADE’S HEADQUARTERS-NUMERICAL STRENGTH OF
THE TWO ARMIES-EFFECTS FOLLOWING THE BATTLE-NATIONAL CEMETERY.
In the early part of June, 1863, Gen. Lee commenced his northward movement with
his entire army. The lead in that movement was Stuart’s Cavalry, which had been
sent east of the Blue Ridge to guard the mountain passes. By the 15th of June
Ewell’s corps, under Jenkins, had reached Chambersburg. Remaining here two
days, Jenkins fell back to Hagerstown. As soon as Jenkins had reached
Chambersburg, it came to be well understood all over the North that a serious
invasion of Pennsylvania, by the great bulk of Lee’s forces, was on foot, and
haste was made by the people of Adams County to save their property as far as
possible.
Jenkins’ Cavalry galloped into Gettysburg the afternoon of the 26th of June.
They took possession of the town and threw out their pickets. Early soon
arrived, and his presence and words quickly assured the people that they were
not to be seriously molested - that they were in no personal danger of harm.
The rebels met, as they came in from different streets, at the triangle. They
were tired, ragged, dirty and hungry, but evidently suffering more from long
marches than anything else. When permitted to stack arms, or put themselves at
rest, they lay down on the sidewalks and in the streets with their knapsacks
under their heads. When citizens would attempt to engage them in conversation,
they were invariably silent. Guards were posted about them in conversation,
they were invariably silent. Guards were posted about the public buildings and
some of the stores, and a few, but very few, private houses. The saloons were
closed without exception. Early was in command of trained soldiers, as is
evidenced by the observance of his strict orders that the soldier was to molest
neither person nor property of the inhabitants. And as an evidence of how
rigidly orders were obeyed by these poor fellows who had to go on guard duty
about different places and premises, some of the women were excited in sympathy,
and offered them something to eat, or water to drink, which was invariably
refused, and, if asked why, would curtly reply: “I must obey orders.” Early
called the borough authorities to his presence, Messrs. D. Kendlehart and A. D.
Beuhler responding, and he told them what he wanted of the borough; namely:
1,200 pounds of sugar, 600 pounds of coffee, 60 barrels of flour, 1,000 pounds
of salt, 7,000 pounds of bacon, 10 barrels of whisky, 10 barrels of onions,
1,000 pairs of shoes and 500 hats, or, in lieu of all this, $5,000 in cash.
Kendlehart and Buehler replied that it was impossible to comply with the demand;
that the goods were not in the town or could not be found; that the town had no
funds; that the banks had shipped away their money and the people the most of
their personal property, etc., etc. No serious attempt was made to enforce the
order further. Some little effort was made by the rebel quartermaster to
collect provisions, but this was a complete failure, and was relinquished. An
instance related to us by a lady was a sample of the few who were visited. She
informed us that a squad came to her house and told her their mission,
apologizing for the necessity of their visit. She told the corporal in charge
that she had but little provisions in the house, barely enough for her own
family for a short time. She had gone to her larder, taken most of her stores,
leaving only a very scanty portion, and hid them away. The corporal told her
his instructions were not to take all she had, but to divide the store in
private houses, leaving something for the family. She took him to the kitchen,
and first displayed her supply of meat - about two pounds. The officer looked
at her with some incredulity and remarked that he did not want any of her meat;
the flour and meal, and vegetables were all gone over in the same way, and they
soon got to laughing and joking over her starving prospects, and the “Johnnies”
retired without taking a thing. And if any of those visitors are still alive,
there is not much doubt but that they remember their first visit to Gettysburg
as being a place where the people lived in fine houses and furniture, and put on
more style, and yet possessed the leanest larders in the world. Ewell’s forces
arrived Friday afternoon, and only remained here over night, and the next day
marched upon Hanover, and on toward York. This route brought him in the trail
of Stuart’s Cavalry, which has passed east on a line south of Gettysburg.
The governor of the State had called upon the people to rally and arm themselves
to drive back the invader. The people of Adams County, like the people of the
State generally, felt the hopelessness of this late effort. Men enrolled as
soldiers in a sudden emergency are not much in resisting powers against a great
army of trained, ragged and dirty veterans. Then the State was already so
depleted of men who could be spared that it was palpably impossible to gather a
sufficient of this emergency force to amount to any check at all upon the foe.
However, meetings were called in Gettysburg and at other points in the county,
and Maj. R. Bell, of the above named place, rapidly commenced recruiting a
cavalry company. He soon had forty-five men on his rolls, and in the way of
watching the enemy and sometimes deceiving him into the belief that there was a
military command here, this company did much good and caused some delay in the
enemy’s approach.
Saturday, June 20, Maj. Haller, of the United States Infantry, was sent here,
reaching Gettysburg on the day above named. The people assembled at the court
house where he addressed them. And at this meeting Capt. R. Bell’s company of
scouts commenced to form. But the most of the men could not understand Maj.
Haller when he wanted them to enroll themselves and go to Harrisburg. They well
knew that here was the first exposed point, and then their families and property
peremptorily demanded their personal attention.
On the 24th a regiment of Pennsylvania Volunteer Militia, numbering 735 men, of
which Company A was nearly entirely students from Pennsylvania College, had been
started from Harrisburg and Carlisle to Gettysburg. The cars on which they were
coming were thrown from the track at about six miles from town, and there they
were delayed. On the 25th 100 picked men were ordered up from the temporary
encampment to act as scouts. Col. Jennings and his command had reached this
place on Thursday, and Randall and about 100 men from Philadelphia had also
reached here. Maj. Haller, mentioned above, assumed command. Jennings and his
command were sent out on the Chambersburg Turnpike on the morning of the 26th.
When they met the rebels, in the afternoon, the enemy captured nearly all of
Jenning’s advance guard - about forty men; and it was only by prompt and
skillful maneuvering that he saved his command from entire capture, and
retreated toward Harrisburg.
Hence it was, as we have said, that the advance guard of the rebels, 200 strong,
galloped into Gettysburg about 3 o’clock on the afternoon of the 26th
unobstructed. This advance cavalry was soon followed by Early’s division of
Ewell’s corps of 5,000 infantry. But Gettysburg was not the objective point,
and it was but little more than a resting pause the rebels made here. By ten
o’clock the next day the rear of their army had moved out and were pursuing
their way toward the east. As the last rebel filed out of town, a great load
was lifted from off our people, and they for a moment hoped that their troubles
were all over.
On Sunday, the 28th, Gen. Copeland, with 2,000 cavalry, arrived in Gettysburg in
the direction from Emmittsburg. They arrived at noon of that day; and then the
people rejoiced and felt they were safe under any emergency, and they uncovered
their hidden stores; then with a good will went cooking and feeding their
welcome friends. They encamped east of town, and the next morning started
toward Littlestown, meeting some of the enemy’s scouts at Fairfield, and had a
slight skirmish. The few shots here exchanged may be designated as the first
guns fired in the great Gettysburg battle.
On the 29th it became evident the Army of Virginia was concentrating itself on
the Gettysburg & Baltimore Turnpike, south of this place, and at this time the
Federal Army was rapidly gathering its forces at the town of Gettysburg. In the
meantime Ewell’s corps and Short’s cavalry had pushed on through Hanover and
York and gone as far as Wrightsville. At this last point the Union force had
retreated across the Susquehanna and burned the bridge behind them to prevent
the rebels from gaining the east bank of the river. Thus it will be seen that
Lee broke camp on the 3d of June, and started his army north, and this main
force concentrated and marshaled in battle array around Gettysburg on the 29th
of the same month. He had been to some extent delayed on account of not
receiving such information from Stuart and his cavalry as he expected and hoped
for. Stuart had encountered the Union cavalry several times and had been
worsted, and was thereby compelled to change his route, and this at times
prevented his conveying intelligence in apt time to his commander. At one time
the entire Federal Army was between Stuart and Lee. June 28 was the critical
moment in the history of our Government. The contending powers had put forth
their supreme effort, had gathered up their strength, and standing face to face
began to strip and perfect every detail for the mighty and decisive struggle.
Did ever men before move and act under such supreme responsibilities? The long
struggle, the terrible conflict was here concentrated and must be decided by
this great effort. Officers and men on each side understood all this, and mind
and muscle were wrought to the utmost tension. Should history be re-written -
the best century of the world’s civilization rolled back? And equally to the
commanders of these two great armies was it painfully evident that now was the
awful moment arrived. The living world was looked on, and the unborn
generations of a hundred centuries would turn with breathless interest to the
history their success or failure would here make.
And now Gen. Hooker was relieved and Gen. George C. Meade was placed in command
of the Union Army. Nothing more than this can be said to add luster to the name
and fame of Gen. Meade, than simply to tell what he did under these
extraordinary circumstances. The two armies were facing in parallel lines, in
more or less ignorance of the movements and intentions of each other; and yet,
had Gen. Hooker so ably kept his vast responsibilities in hand that he could
turn them over in a moment, and so perfect in form and shape that Gen. Meade,
with hardly time to stop and think a moment, could, as he did, take the great
scheme and combinations and successfully carry them to completion and victory.
If the history of war presents any parallel to this, we are not aware of it.
The simplest and driest detail of these facts far outruns the most eloquent
words of tongue or pen in emblazoning the immortal name of Gen. Meade.
Having assumed command on the 28th, Gen. Meade at once directed his left wing,
under Gen. Reynolds, upon Emmittsburg, and his right wing upon New Windsor,
leaving Gen. French with 11,000 men to protect the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad,
and convey the public property from Harper’s Ferry. Buford’s cavalry was
already here, and Kilpatrick’s was at Hanover, where he had a skimish with
Stuart’s rear cavalry, that was roving over the country really in the hunt of
Lee’s army. On the rebel side, Hill had passed Cashtown, closely followed by
Longstreet.
June 30, at half past ten o’clock in the morning, Buford passed through
Gettysburg upon a reconnoisance in force, passing along the Chambersburg road.
He communicated promptly the information he gathered to Gen. Reynolds, and that
officer at once marched from toward Emmittsburg near to Gettysburg, and encamped
on the right bank of Marsh Creek. The right wing of our army in the meantime
was moved to Manchester. Hill’s and Longstreet’s forces pressed on to the
vicinity of Marsh Creek on the Chambersburg road, and Pettigrew pushed on and
reconnoitered some distance in advance. By nightfall the two forces stood
closely facing each other. The vast details of the coming slaughter were
complete, and the hills and valleys about Gettysburg were lit up by the extended
camp-fires of two mighty armies, and night and quiet reigned over all. Many a
poor, brave fellow, for the last time as he lay down to quiet sleep, looked upon
the twinkling stars and thought and dreamed of his far-away home and the loved
ones there, and wondered if he would ever be there and with them again.
Early on the morning of July 1 the battle opened. The advancing rebels
encountered Buford’s dismounted cavalry, and skirmishing commenced. By 10
o’clock the artillery commenced to play, and about this time Gen. Reynolds came
dashing through the town, and his men moved along the Emmittsburg road in front
of McMillan’s and Dr. Schmucker’s, protected by Seminary Hill. He at once
attacked, at the same time ordering up Gen. Howard’s Eleventh Corps. Gen.
Reynolds had hardly succeeded in placing his men in position, when he was shot
dead. Gen. Doubleday then assumed command of the First Corps. Gen. Howard
arrived at 11:30 A.M. with Shurz’s and Barlow’s division of the Eleventh Corps.
The attacks of the rebels were vigorously repulsed now, and Wadsworth’s division
captured a number of prisoners, including Gen. Archer. But the rebels were soon
reinforced by Rhodes and Early coming up on the Heidelberg road, and they turned
the fortunes of the day. Our army was repulsed, and Gen. Howard withdrew to
what is now the National Cemetery Hill, a large portion of his men passing
through Gettysburg to reach this point. The Eleventh Corps in passing through
the town encountered the rebels, and our men attempted to force their way
through Baltimore and Washington Streets. They did force their way through, but
with a heavy loss. At this time Gen. Hancock arrived to take command until Gen.
Meade could reach the grounds. When Hancock attempted to post troops on our
right, he at once was engaged repelling an attack. Night now came and put an
end to the day’s fighting. Soon after dark Gen. Slocum, with the Twelfth Corps,
and Gen. Sickles, with a part of the Third, arrived. Our troops were driven,
and the apparent general results were largely against the Union forces. But it
should be kept in mind that the very fact of their repulse forced them to the
splendid and advantageous position of Cemetery Hill, and, considering what was
to come, this was a great if not a permanent advantage.
Gen. Hancock had reported the very favorable position our army occupied to Gen.
Meade; he had determined to here give the enemy battle. Long before daylight
the next morning he arrived. He had ordered everything to concentrate as
quickly as possible at Gettysburg. He had broken up his headquarters at
Taneytown at ten o’clock in the evening and arrived here at one o’clock in the
A.M. All night long the silence was only disturbed by the heavy tramp of armed
men, the rattle of the artillery wheels, all hurrying to their appointed places.
Batteries were planted and breastworks hastily thrown up. The Second and Fifth
Corps and the remainder of the Third reached the grounds a little after sunrise.
Sedgwick with the Sixth Corps only arrived after one o’clock in the day. His
command had marched thirty-four miles since nine o’clock of the evening before.
The 2d of July downed, and the two armies were posted, our men on Cemetery Hill
and extending southward, the enemy occupying the lower and longer ranges of
hills in their front, overlapping our forces on either wing. The two lines were
a mile to a mile and a half apart. At 3:30 in the afternoon a signal gun from
the hostile batteries announced the renewal of the savage work. Every cannon of
the rebels along their extended line opened instantly a galling fire, and on our
left the enemy’s infantry advanced. This advance infantry movement extended to
our left center. Gen. Sickles moved forward to gain a commanding position, and
this drew upon him a furious fire from the enemy’s guns, and an assault from
Longstreet’s and Hill’s advance columns. Sickles was driven back and he fell
wounded. The Fifth and Sixth Corps, with portions of the First and Second were
promptly thrown to the support of the Third, and here the fighting on both sides
was stubborn and often furious. By sundown the enemy was repulsed and was
compelled to fall back. At the close of the day Gen. Crawford’s Fifth Corps
made its advance between Round Top and Little Round Top. He had also two
brigades of the Pennsylvania Reserves, of which one company was from Adams
County and the immediate vicinity of Gettysburg mostly. At eight o’clock in the
evening a desperate attempt was made to storm the position of the Eleventh Corps
on Cemetery Hill. Here a terrible hand to hand conflict ensued, but the
assailants were finally repulsed.
In the meantime Ewell, on our extreme right, had succeeded in gaining a foothold
within our lines near Spangler’s Spring. On our left, our lines had been driven
back to Little Round Top, and when the day’s conflict ended they were occupying
this position. This was something like the forced movement of the Union forces
of the day before. They had simply been driven into the most advantageous
positions, and this again was a compensation that had immense results to follow
in the end.
The third and last day of the battle opened early in the morning by Gen. Geary
returning to our right to occupy his old position and strengthen the Third
Corps. A sharp action took place, and he drove the enemy from the ground they
had gained. All morning there was fighting at this point; at eleven o’clock
firing ceased and all became still, and so remained until half-past one o’clock.
Then every rebel gun simultaneously opened fire; over 150 guns of the rebels
alone were worked to their utmost capacity, and the answering guns from the
Union line completed the horrid din and roar that has never before or since been
equaled. Two-thirds of the rebel guns were aimed upon Cemetery Hill. For two
hours this destructive cannonading went on, the enemy in the meantime rallying
his forces and preparing the way for a great and decisive charge of his
infantry.
Long lines of rebel infantry were seen to move out from their cover into the
plain and quickly form in line of battle. They moved into line, quietly and
quickly, at the low command that ran along the line. Fourteen thousand men!
Without a cheer, without a word, hardly so much as a whisper, moving with lock-
step into the wide gaping jaws of death. Just at this point, what an
impressive, what a magnificent sight! It could but excite the momentary
admiration of their most hated enemy upon whom they are moving. They were
nearly all Virginians, picked men from a great army of fire-tried veterans -
they were literally the Old Guard of the Confederacy; terrible soldiers to the
tips of their toes and fingers, every one feeling that the fate of his cause
hung upon the weak and uncertain thread of his life. Every step of their
measured tread they well understood is an awful advance to almost certain death.
Our lines are still and quiet, stopped apparently to view the magnificent
spectacle in front of them in the open plain, where there is nothing to obstruct
the view. Steady, with perfect alignment, they moved like a solid piece of iron
machinery, proceeding directly, until they pass in front of Wilcox, they
suddenly whirl to the left and turn their faces directly at Hancock’s command.
This movement draws the fire from McGilvey’s forces, when the Federal batteries
belch forth a cloud-burst of fire and shot into the serried compact ranks.
Pickett ordered another wheel to the right oblique, and then the moving mass of
men are mowed like grass before the reaper. The Union infantry pours in a
galling fire; the rebels stagger a moment, falling in great rows and heaps and
literal swaths; they rally and double-quick upon our lines through the awful
shower of lead and iron. They throw themselves head-long forward up to the
lines of the Sixty-ninth and Seventy-first Regiments. This brings them under
the crossfire of Standard’s brigade, occupying a small wood to the left of
Pickett’s attack. Hancock quickly forms to take the enemy in flank. They
pierce the lines of Hall and Harrow, and then of Webb, and the Federals fall
back upon their second earthworks, near their artillery.
And now it was an indiscriminate mass of disorganized men, with all identity of
commands gone, and men struggling and fighting. They fought hand to hand, they
fought with guns, pistols, cannon, sticks, ramrods and, when they could place
their hands on nothing else, with stones or clubs - the death-struggling of a
mob. The clump of trees is the Confederate objective point, and a specimen of
the way men fought and died, that illustrates well the fighting of the two
lines, Rebel and Union, as here given: The rebel Armistead on foot, his hat
waving on the point of his sword, rushed forward, followed by 150 men who will
follow him anywhere, toward this coveted battery in the clump of trees. He
passed the earthworks and reaches Cushing’s guns. Then Cushing, mortally
wounded in both thighs, runs his last gun, that will longer work, down to the
fence and shouts back: “Webb, I’ll give them one more short.” He fires the
gun, calls out “Good by,” and falls dead beside his piece. Armistead answers
this challenge: “Give them the cold steel, boys!” and lays his hand upon
Cushing’s gun; but at that moment Armistead falls by the side of Cushing,
pierced with balls. Side by side, slowly stiffening in death, lay the brave and
intrepid Cushing and the gallant, dashing and invincible Armistead - magnificent
types they were of the two contending forces; one could not be driven, the other
could not be stopped. Death alone could stop them, nothing could conquer
either. Stricken with death, they sank smiling to the earth, shouting a
gleesome and jolly “Good-by, boys!” to their companions, and as they quietly
sank to rest and sleep, roar of battle, the din of terrible war died away,
growing fainter and fainter, a slight tremor, and all is forever still and the
rigid lines of death never disturbed the sweet and contented smiles upon their
faces. They lie buried side by side, sweetly sleeping the eternal, dreamless
sleep. Let one monument mark the spot, and upon brave Cushing’s side of the
stone, cut in bold relief a sleeping lion, and on Armistead’s side a sleeping
tiger. This should be the historic monumental stone of all the late war. Here
was the heart of the great battle of Gettysburg, the exact turning point of the
war itself. Here was the extreme point reached by the great wave of rebel
invasion. Here it stopped, stunned, staggered, reeled, and all bleeding, maimed
and torn and mutilated, staggered back, bearing its death wound.
And the decisive and great battle of the war is over. There was but a small
remnant of Pickett’s men when repulsed, returned to their lines, bearing their
ragged, torn and tattered remnants of their flag, a fitting emblem of the body
of men over whom it had waved. To his dying day Lee must have ever regarded the
movements of Pickett’s charge as the crowning mistake and misfortune of his
whole life.
Lee’s army was ruined by Pickett’s charge from further offensive war; he was in
the enemy’s country where he had marched to make offensive war. It was now
demonstrated that he could not rout the enemy from his stronghold. These were
the thoughts that were surging though his mind when Pickett returned defeated.
Now, what could he do? He had recklessly risked too much. He knew how he had
crippled and hurt the enemy, but he sadly realized how dearly this had cost him.
What must he do? Not retreat in wild confusion, and invite the enemy in hot
pursuit to destroy in detail his army. This is never done except by armies that
are whipped, crushed with overwhelming defeat. He sullenly turned his face,
and, in deliberate military order, commenced to retrace his steps; returned to
Virginia, crippled and ruined to the extent that his future tactics could only
be to stand upon the defense. And this was the great morale, the great victory
of the Union at the bloody battle of Gettysburg.
All who have written about the battle or told the story of those three bloody
days in July, whether Federal or Rebel, will tell you that Lee’s losses here in
numbers, saying nothing of the character and excellence of the men, were simply
frightful, and as they charged across the open field without firing a gun they
could inflict but little damage upon the Union forces. This fact being well
understood, what does the table of losses, the grand aggregate of the two armies
show? There is nothing like it in the history of the world’s great and deciding
battles. The losses in each of the two armies is almost exactly the same. Or,
as given from the best attainable official documents, the total Union loss was
23,186 men; the total rebel loss 23,000 to 30,000. In the per cent of men lost,
it was twenty-seven per cent of the Federal Army and thirty-six per cent of the
Confederate.
AT MEADE’S HEADQUARTERS.
Lee alone knew the battle was over when Pickett was driven back. Meade did not
know what moment the attack would be renewed or what point the enemy would
select.
Gen. Meade and nearly all of his division commanders were called in the early
part of 1864, before the Congressional Committee on the Conduct of the War, and
under oath questioned as to the battle of Gettysburg. So far as the different
points were explained, as to the doing and determination of the movements of the
army at Gen. Meade’s headquarters, his testimony throws a flood of light upon
all such subjects. In matters of mere opinion, we care nothing for the
testimony and it is of very little value to history.
Gen. Meade testifies that on the 4th of July he knew the enemy was moving, and
could not then tell whether it was a retreat or a flank movement for another
attack upon him. A terrible rain storm prevailed on the 4th. His best
information was the enemy had a superior force on the ground, that is, more men
that he had, and he could not afford to risk losing all his great gains in the
general battle already fought. He utterly crushed Gen. Butterfield’s oath about
his giving orders after the second day’s fight to retreat.
Gen. Pleasonton testifies he urged Meade to follow up Pickett’s repulse by
taking the offensive and bagging Lee’s army; he thought the rebel army wholly
demoralized and really routed, and describes the face of the earth south of
Gettysburg swarming with Lee’s stragglers and demoralized fugitives.
In answer to a direct question Meade said: “Including all arms of the service,
my strength was a little under 100,000 men, about 95,000. * * As far as I
could judge I supposed Lee had a force about 10,000 or 15,000 superior to mine.”
He says: “The enemy were not a retreating rabble; they moved slowly and in
military order, and by flank movement he pursued them, and at Williamsport the
enemy took a strong position and offered him battle, and in council of war his
subordinate commanders voted it folly to attack the enemy in the position
taken,” etc., etc.
Gen. Sickles testified, among many other statements: “I did not attend any
council held (at Gettysburg) by Gen. Meade. There were several councils; there
was a council Thursday morning, * * another Thursday night, and I understood
there were those who voted on Thursday to retreat. * * I understood there was a
council Friday night, the night after the battle, and that there was a pretty
strong disposition then to retreat, and, as I understood from reliable
authority, the reason why the enemy was not followed up was on account of
differences of opinion whether or no we should ourselves retreat or follow up
the enemy.” Question: “After the final battle?” Answer: “Yes, sir. It was
by no means clear in the judgment of the corps commanders, or of the general in
command, whether we had won or not.”
Gen. Doubleday testified in answer to questions: “We entered the fight the
first day with 8,200 men in the First Corps, and came out with 2,450.” In
answering a question propounded to him he said: * * * “There has always been a
great deal of favoritism in the Army of the Potomac. No man who is an anti-
slavery man or an anti-McClellan man can expect decent treatment in that army as
at present constituted.” Doubleday was removed from his command, and left the
army on July 7. He testified that in his opinion Lee’s army should have been
attacked at Williamsport and that our army could have there crushed his and
captured it before it could have crossed the swollen stream.
Gen. A. P. Howe, among other things, testified: “Our position mainly did the
work for us. The enemy worked at great disadvantage. I was under the
impression at the time, and have been ever since, that Gen. Lee made a great
mistake there, for he evidently thought he could carry the place very much
easier than the result proved; and after the fight of the 3d of July, I
considered that our army had plenty of fight in it, if I may so express myself.
Our army was not badly cut up; we had had quite a number of disabled men, to be
sure, but it was an orderly fight. We were in a position where there was no
straggling and demoralization; we had some pretty sharp cuts from that
cannonading, but it was the most orderly fight I have ever been in, growing out
of the position. In a military point of view it was not much of a battle; it
was a very ordinary affair as a battle. In its results it was immensely
important, for it checked the rebel advance upon vital points; but as a military
operation on our side, no particular credit can attach to it. There was no
great generalship displayed; there was no maneuvering, no combinations.” Among
other things he said, after Pickett’s charge he believed our whole army should
have attacked Lee’s army; that they were, in his opinion, about out of
ammunition, etc., etc. He said he believed our army could have thrown Lee’s
into utter rout and killed and captured it in detail.
Gen. David B. Birney sworn. In reference to councils at Meade’s headquarters,
and referring to a council of Saturday night after the battle he said: “In this
council it was suggested that the enemy were making a flank movement, and would
probably try to interpose between us and Washington. At this council, Saturday
night, it was decided to remain twenty-four hours longer in our position, and
that Gen. Sedgwick, who had come up with fresh troops, whose troops had not been
in the fight, should be sent with his corps to find out as to the enemy’s right,
and as to their position on our extreme left, to see whether they were still in
position. I was also ordered to send out a reconnoisance at daylight (Sunday)
to ascertain the position of the enemy. I did so early Sunday morning, and
reported that the enemy were in full retreat.”
In answer to a question, he said of the Saturday night council: “There were
several, I think, voted on Saturday night for retiring to another position *
* * * It was a matter of some doubt in the council on Saturday night
whether we should remain or retire; but it was finally decided to remain there
twenty-four hours longer before we made any retrograde movement. It was decided
not to make any aggressive movement, but simply to await developments.”
Gen. G. K. Warren testified: * * * “On the evening of the 4th of July, there
was a discussion of the question whether we should move right after the enemy
through the mountains or move toward Frederick; that question was not decided,
for the reason that we did not know enough about the enemy, and to have gone off
the battle-field before the enemy did would have been giving up the victor to
them. And then if the enemy had gone, it was a question which was to go after
him. To go right after him was a good way in one respect; but then we had to
get all our provisions from Frederick.” In another place he said: “We
commenced the pursuit with the Sixth Corps on the 5th of July, and on the 6th a
large portion of the army moved toward Emmittsburg, and all that was left
followed the next day. On July 7 the headquarters were at Frederick. On the
8th of July headquarters were at Middleton, and nearly all the army was
concentrated in the neighborhood of that place and South Mountain. On the 9th
of July headquarters were at South Mountain House, and the advance of the army
at Boonsboro and Rohrersville; on the 10th of July the headquarters, Antietam
Creek,” etc., etc.
It should have properly been previously stated that Meade’s testimony fully
showed that he ordered Sickles to form, resting his right on Hancock’s left and
perfecting the line along Cemetery Ridge to Round Top, and instead of his doing
this he took a position from a half to three-quarters of a mile in advance of
Hancock’s line, and this forced the opening of the second day’s fight at that
point.
Gen. Butterfield, chief of staff, testified that at the council of the 4th of
July, Gen. Meade propounded four questions, as follows: First, “Shall this army
remain here?” Second, “If we remain here, shall we assume the offensive?”
Third, “Do you deem it expedient to move toward Williamsport through
Emmittsburg?” Fourth, “Shall we pursue the enemy, if he is retreating, on the
direct line of retreat?” Those in favor of remaining in Gettysburg were Birney,
Sedgwick, Sykes, Hays and Warren; opposed: Newton, Pleasonton and Slocum;
doubtful, Howard.
Gen. Sedgwick testified among other matters, in answering a question if any
effort was made by Meade, after Pickett’s repulse, to assume the offensive
against the enemy: “My impression,” he said, “is that Gen. Sykes was ordered to
send out a strong reconnoitering party to ascertain if the enemy were
retreating, or if he could force them to retreat. * * I was present with Gen.
Sykes when he gave the order, and was present when the troops returned. They
met the enemy in considerable force, which checked them, and forced their
return.
Gen. Seth Williams, assistant adjutant-general of the Army of the Potomac, when
asked what time on the third day of the battle it became known the enemy was
retreating, replied that he “did not think it was exactly known at all during
that day that the enemy was actually retreating. The enemy had fallen back to
the woods, from which he emerged when he made the attack. I do not think it was
until the next morning and along in the forenoon that we were certain he had
abandoned his position.”
NUMERICAL STRENGTH OF THE TWO ARMIES.
When the Count de Paris wrote his “Civil War in America,” he had had access to
the official reports of Lee and Meade and the files in the War Department. Gen.
Doubleday, in his “Chancellorsville and Gettysburg,” indorses the Count de
Paris’ account of the Gettysburg battle as correct substantially throughout,
especially in its statistics. In speaking upon this point the Count says: “The
strength of the two armies has given rise to lively discussions. The returns
used at the North and South in similar forms, have been increased by some and
reduced by others at their own pleasure. These returns were under three heads:
The first represented the total number of officers and soldiers inscribed on the
rolls, whether absent or present; the second represented those present on active
duty, comprising all men who were in the field-hospitals and under arrest, or
detached on special service; the third contained the real number of combatants
present under arms. The first head, therefore, was quite fictitious; the second
mentioned the number of men to be fed in the army, including non-combatants; the
third, the effective force that could be brought on the battle-field. The
latter number is evidently the most important to know, but as we have observed,
it varied greatly, for a long march in a week of bad weather was sufficient to
fill the hospitals. In ordinary times it was from twelve to eighteen per cent
less than under the second head. It did not always represent exactly the
precise number of combatants; in fact, when, after a long march, the stragglers
did not answer to roll-call, they were not immediately set down as deserters,
which would have caused them to lose a portion of their pay, a few day’s grace
was granted to them, and the result was that thousands of soldiers, separated
from their commands, followed the army at a distance, unable to take part in any
battle, and yet figuring on the returns as able-bodied combatants.” * * *
He then estimates from this source a diminution of our army of 13,000 men.
These are, however, but estimates, and one man has as much right to form
estimates as another. The Count makes the showing so very reasonable that we
accept is as conclusive. They are the necessary concomitants of moving armies,
illustrated by the experience of soldiers in all wars, and therefore are
properly a part of the considerations to be taken in the estimates. But he
returns to official statistics, leaving the domain of estimates, and again we
quote his words: “The Army of the Potomac, without French’s division, which had
not gone beyond Frederick, numbered on its returns on the 30th of June, 167,251
men. * * * simply presenting the figures that have been given us, which we
believe to be as near the truth as possible. * * * The Army of Northern
Virginia (rebel), on May 31, 1863, contained an effective force of 88,754
officers and soldiers present, 74,468 of whom were under arms.” * * *
We have transposed the words of the Count solely to place the two statements,
for the easier understanding of the reader, side by side. Of each of the
armies, he then gives the following details: “More than 21,000” [of the Army of
the Potomac] “were on detached service, and nearly 28,000 in the hospitals. The
number of men present with their corps was 112,988, and that of men under arms,
99,475; but this last figure included those doing duty at headquarters, who
formed a total of 2,750 men who could not be counted among the combatants.
Stanard’s and Lockwood’s brigades having brought Meade a reinforcement of about
5,000 men on the 1st of July, the effective forces borne on the returns may be
stated as follows:
Troops taking no part in battle . . . . . . . . . . . . 2,750
Artillery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7,000
Cavalry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10,500
Infantry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85,500
------
Total . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105,750
And 352 pieces of artillery.
“The artillery and infantry, which were alone seriously engaged, even at the
battle of Gettysburg, form, therefore, a total of about 91,000 men, and 327
pieces of cannon, Meade having left twenty-five heavy guns in reserve at
Westminster. But, in order to ascertain the real number of combatants that the
Union general could bring into line, it is proper to deduct from 3,000 to 4,000
left as additional guards near the supply trains, the batteries remaining at
Westminster, and for all men detached on extra duty, and from 4,000 to 5,000 for
the stragglers entered on the returns. The latter were more numerous on account
of the fact that, the returns having only been prepared at the end of July,
those who joined the army after the battle were entered as being present; so
that the rolls only represent the number of those absent without leave at the
totally insignificant figure of 3,292. This deduction makes the effective
forces of Meade amount to from 82,000 to 84,000 men.
“Lee’s forces, during June, were increased by the return of a certain number of
sick, and those who had been wounded at Chancellorsville, by the arrival of
recruits, the result of the conscription law, and by the addition of four
brigades - two of infantry under Pettigrew and Davis, one of cavalry under
Jenkins, and one of mixed troops under Imboden. The first was nearly 4,000
strong, that of David consisted of four regiments, which were not borne on the
returns of May 31, although two of them had formerly belonged to the enemy,
numbering about 2,200 men; the other two contained each about the same effective
force. The increase of artillery amounted to fifteen batteries, comprising
sixty-two pieces of cannon and about 800 men. On the other hand this effective
force was diminished, first, by the absence of Carn’s brigade of Pickett’s
division, and one regiment of Pettigrew’s brigade left at Hanover Junction, and
three regiments of Early’s division left at Winchester - say about 3,500 men;
then by the loss sustained in the battles of Fleetweed, Winchester and Aldie,
amounting to 1,400 men; finally, by the admission to the hospitals of men unable
to bear the fatigue of the long marches which the army had to make, and the
absence of those who, voluntarily or otherwise, remained behind during these
marches. It is difficult to reckon precisely the number of the disabled, of
stragglers and of deserters that the army had lost during the month of June.
Private information and the comparison of some figures lead us to believe that
it was not very large, and did not exceed 5 per cent of the effective force of
the army - say 3,750 men in all. We can therefore estimate the diminution of
the army at about 3,700 men on the one hand, and its increase, on the other
hand, by the addition of three brigades and some artillery, at 7,000. We
believe that the difference of 1,700 between these two figures must be lessened
at least from 1,000 to 1,200 by the return of the sick and wounded and the
arrival of a number of conscripts; that, consequently, the Army of Northern
Virginia arrived on the battle-field of Gettysburg with about 5,000 combatants
more that it had on the 31st of May, 1863 - that is to say, in the neighborhood
of 80,000 men. As we have done in regard to the Federal Army, in order to find
out the amount of the force really assembled on the battle-field, we will deduct
the number of mounted men, which was increased by Jenkins’ and Imboden’s forces,
and reduced in the same proportion,* making about 12,000 men; and we may
conclude that, during the first three days of July, 1863, Lee brought from
68,000 to 69,000 men and 250 guns† against the 82,000 or 84,000 Unionists with
300 guns collected on this battle-field. Meade had, therefore, from 14,000 to
15,000 men more than his adversary, a superiority which, unfortunately for him,
he was unable to turn to advantage.
“The losses on both sides were nearly equal, and enormous for the number of
combatants engaged, for they amounted to 27 per cent on the side of the
Federals, and more than 36 per cent for the Confederates. Upon this point,
also, the official reports are precise. The Federals lost 2,834 killed, 13,709
wounded, and 6,645 prisoners - 23,186 men in all; the Confederates lost 2,625
killed, 12,599 wounded, and 7,464 missing - 22,728 in all; which, with the 300
men killed or wounded in the cavalry on the 2d or 3d, foot up their total losses
at a little more than 23,000 men; that is to say, precisely the same number as
those of their adversaries. These figures, however, do not yet convey a correct
idea of the injury the two armies had inflicted upon each other in these bloody
battles. Thus, while the Federal reports acknowledge only 2,834 killed, the
reports made by the hospitals bear evidence to the burial of 3,575 Union
corpses; the number of dead in the Army of the Potomac may be estimated at about
4,000, 1,000 or 1,100 having died of their wounds. On the other hand, Meade has
13,621 Confederate prisoners; but, as there are 7,262 wounded among them, there
only remain 6,359 able-bodied men. The number of 7,464, reckoned by Lee as the
number of men missing, must therefore represent, besides these able-bodied
prisoners, most of the men seriously wounded during the attack made by Pickett
and Heth, and abandoned on the battle-field. We must therefore estimate the
number of Confederates wounded at more than 13,600. It is reasonable to suppose
that, after the combat, the number of their dead increased more rapidly for a
few days than in the Union Army.”
EFFECTS FOLLOWING THE BATTLE.
No portion of the Northern States suffered equally with this part of
Pennsylvania, or to speak more clearly, with Adams County, in the late war. It
was on the part of the people of this county, more than even any other county in
the State - all sacrifices, losses, suffering, the general destruction of
property and the total prostration of business, with no compensating advantages.
Gettysburg saw its business of various kinds, where the patient labor of years
and years had been expended and prosperous business built up, literally wiped
out, as we might wipe off a slate with a wet sponge. Adams was a border county,
and in addition to this, it was the open gateway for invasion of the State by
the rebels. It lay in the natural highway of a foe tempted to invade this great
and rich commonwealth, and it now seems like a strange oversight in the
Government that not even a rendezvous, a soldier’s hospital or any other nucleus
of the great army was ever established here. All around us were more or less of
these in all the other counties, but nothing was here where it was palpably a
necessity. A proper action in this respect would have saved the North,
especially the State and the people of the county, incalculable losses and
sufferings. Here should have been the great rendezvous for all those loose ends
of our great armies; the 100-day men, the 90-day men, the convalescing, the new
recruits, the point of rendezvous for the discharged, and all the other
thousands of shreds and floating and passing remnants that, if kept partly
collected here, would have been notice to the enemy that no lone awkward squads
had better venture near. These regular and natural movements of our army would
have gone a long way toward fortifying this great and inviting gateway to the
enemy. It might have prevented all invasion of the North, and certainly it
would have checked and turned away those daring cavalry raids of Stuart that
were such a grievous infliction upon the people of the county. The enemy would
see the gate open and not a soul on guard. The inviting fields and the splendid
horses in every stable, and the toothsome viands in every larder, were a
sufficient temptation to a badly mounted, tired and hungry trooper, and very
naturally he invited himself to the feast prepared for him.
For three years during the five years of bloody contention, Adams County was
virtually a part of the seat of war. Actually invaded three times, and
eventually the Waterloo of the great Southern Army, where the horrid issues
culminated much as it did with the “Little Corporal” whose destiny was burned up
in the flames that destroyed Waterloo. In 1862 Stuart circled our army in his
first great northern raid, and his entire command passed up through the western
part of this county. They made easy stages for themselves through this part of
their route. Flying squads and scattered troopers, in squads of half a dozen to
100 or 200, were free to pry into every nook and cranny of the county; there was
literally nothing to obstruct their way or even compel them to caution. Now
here, now there, they apparently were at every farm-house for their regular
meals, and riding, eating and swapping horses was their jolly pastime. Except
the great scare inflicted upon the people these bold raiders did no great harm.
They ate many a farmer’s smoke-house and cellar literally bare, and left many a
broken-down scrub horse in the stall where had stood the farmer’s sleek and
favored family pets; yet these were trivial affairs. But it opened the people’s
eyes to the position they were in; it was a real confirmation of the disturbing
rumors that for some time would pass over the county, telling that the enemy was
heading this way with bloody intent upon the quiet and unarmed people. Just as
these rumors had begun to be regarded as idle and foolish talk, and sober people
began to feel that there was no danger, then came Stuart and his cavalry, and
showed the people how helpless and wholly unprotected they were. The partially
restored confidence was at once gone, and it could not return until the war was
over and the enemy had ceased to exist as an organization.
This first actual invasion, added to the disturbing rumors that for a year had
passed around, completely prostrated all business in the county. The
commencement of open hostilities struck a blow at every manufacturing business
in the county that had then just commenced to grow and prosper and that promised
brightly for the future, because it cut off all Southern trade, the very markets
upon which our people in some respects wholly relied, and it brought no
compensating business or trade from any other direction. Gettysburg was just
then rapidly growing in importance, especially its chair and carriage factories
were developing into great industries. There were probably 200 skilled workmen
here at the commencement of the war, engaged in the making of carriages and
buggies alone. Here was the timber in boundless quantities and unsurpassed, and
already had the concerns such a foothold that they would have kept pace with the
demands of the country in improved machinery and enlargement of their works, and
firmly held their position and well filled the limitless demands that have been
supplied ever since from other points. So completely were all these factories
destroyed that now there is not even the old tumble-down and decaying buildings
left to mark the spot where they stood. Every vestige has disappeared.
The great invasion of Lee’s army is a part of the general history of our
country. It was more than a passage through the country. A great army of the
enemy came a settler, temporarily, within the borders of the county. Their
coming brought a greater army of our own forces. Before either army got away,
the devastation all over the county was complete. The enemy had respected
private property, it is true, to a degree, perhaps, never before known by an
armed force in the enemy’s country. But soldiers, either friends or enemies,
will forage more or less, and when they are hungry (and a good soldier is always
ravenous for at least a change in his camp diet) will devour the substance of
the country where they may happen to be; when not fighting they are eating and
wasting. Their march is destruction, more or less, in any agricultural country.
After the battle of Gettysburg, and the armies had passed over the hills and
away, they left the bloody debris of the great battle-field, the decaying bodies
of unburied men and dead horses and a country swept bare of nearly everything,
as the heritage of the citizens. And this and the maimed and dying on the hands
of the charity of a people, who had really little except their labors to bestow
in charity, were all the blessings they left behind them. The crops of the
farmers had been indiscriminately destroyed; fences were completely gone. The
smoke-houses were empty and so were the barns, and those who did not lose their
stock were left with nothing to feed them, and wealthy farmers had to sell their
half-starved horses for whatever they could get. So completely were the farm
fences destroyed that, we are told, you could start at Gettysburg and ride,
following any point of the compass, to any part of the county unobstructed, so
far as a farm fence was concerned. These misfortunes have all been remedied,
and such losses made good by time and labor. The work of rebuilding was pushed
with characteristic industry. But when we referred to irreparable losses we had
not these in mind. It was the total destruction of organized industries - these
were all driven away, and, it seems, they are never to return. They were all in
that young stage of development that when forced to flee they were never in a
condition to care to return. Thus were permanently injured the prosperity and
growing wealth of the county.
With the defeat of Lee’s grand army and its return to Virginia there was yet not
an end to the baneful influences of war here. The country was again invaded,
when they burned Chambersburg, and thus new terrors were added to the already
gloomy apprehensions of our people. It began to look like utter annihilation
impended. People had but little heart to even make a struggle to provide for
future life. Despair took the place in the perturbed minds of men when long
they had hoped against hope. Had not the wheels of all industry stopped before,
certainly they would stop now; and be assured they did. The bone and sinew of
the county were away in the ranks, filling the great red gaps of battle upon the
bloody fields or wasting away in the country’s hospitals.
To all this was the great tax upon the people of providing and caring for the
wounded from the bloody battle-field of Gettysburg, and then in burying the dead
that had been left lying where they fell. Rebel and Union lay rotting in the
hot sun side by side. People threw open their private houses; the churches, the
schoolhouses, the public halls, and even the barns and stables, rang with groans
and agony of the shot, maimed and mutilated, that filled apparently every place,
and still the field of death and agony could yet furnish more victims. The
churches looked much as though they had been converted into butchers’ stalls.
The entire community became hosp------------, cooks, waiters or grave-diggers.
In this wide expanse of Christian charity, rebel and Union sufferers were cared
for without material dis------ion. The Government ambulances commenced to carry
away from the field their bleeding cargoes; soon every wheeled vehicle was at
work bearing its loads of bleeding agony, filled with its pale sufferers
garnered from the field where the cannon, the musket, the rifle and the saber
had mowed their hideous swaths in living human ranks. Would these whirling
wheels, in their quick trips back and forth as they dumped their loads of
sufferers, never stop? What a swollen, great rushing river of agony! Literally
half the surface of the entire county was a hospital, and every farm-house,
barn, stable, outbuilding, for twenty miles square, was full to overflowing.
The beds, the floors, the yards, everywhere, were they cared for, and behind
them in the lines of battle, in the brush, by the side of the little spring
streams where they had so painfully dragged themselves or sometimes been carried
by their companions, were the uncollected dead and dying mostly. What a ghastly
harvest to gather from the fair and peaceful fields of Adams County. And when
the poor bruised and maimed bodies were gathered in the widely extended hospital
and laid side by side, what never-to-be-forgotten scenes were there. The pale
sufferers, the flushed, feverish and raving maniacs, who reason had given way as
they lay upon the field suffering, and watching the stars, and welcoming the
storm and rain, that came like pitying tears from heaven to soften their
hardening, blood-clotted clothes to moisten their horrid wounds and cool the
raging fevers of their brows - Union and rebels, son and fathers and brothers.
Here the smooth-checked boy, the darling, the pet and hope of home; there the
lusty man, yesterday in the prime of life and strength, in the midst of his
suffering and pain turning to the grizzled-haired husband and father lying by
his side, and who wonderingly talks of home, and addresses by name the different
ones of his family, to feebly minister with his one yet sound hand to this
pitiful sufferer, and in this charity for a moment forces himself to forget his
own, still perhaps incurable, wounds.
These blue and gray, now so quiet, so friendly, so full of compassion for each
other; and but a few hours ago, how they fought, how viciously they struggled to
kill each other. They fought like well-armed bull dogs, like furious fiends.
The strange and varied wounds met with so frequently are the bloody attestation
to this. Possibly the surgeons, who bound up these wounds, alone can some day
tell the world how savagely men fought upon the bloody field of Gettysburg.
Certainly no one else can. There were here many such wounds, as we are told by
the surgeons who examined them, as were never before known to come from a
battle-field. This incident is related to us by a surgeon:** On the third and
last day of the battle, not a great while after the repulse of Pickett’s
historic charge, the surgeon was riding a short distance to the rear of his
command, a few miles east of the town. The Union cavalry were moving
eastwardly, and coming to the brow of a hill they came in full view of Stuart’s
advance cavalry, that way hurrying to the scene of the battle, from which, by
some blunder, they had been lost, and had supposed they were to meet Lee’s army
near Carlisle. The moment the commander of the Federal cavalry saw the enemy,
his bugler sounded the charge, and instantly rang out on the air the rebel bugle
also to charge. The numerical forces were nearly evenly divided, and each side,
spurring their horses to full speed, came clashing together, the men leaning
forward, firing the pistols with the left hand, standing in their stirrups with
drawn sabers, and with the shock they delivered their blows at each other, each
man only mindful of cleaving the head of the man in front of him. Horses were
knocked down like pins, stunned, and some killed outright. Thus riders were
unhorsed, and men and horses were struggling and fighting still. A rebel, who
was on the ground, ran his saber up the entire back of a Union cavalryman as he
sat on his horse, the point of the blade coming out at the shoulder; fortunately
it was only a flesh wound, but the course and force of the saber thrust showed
the blind fury of the intention that impelled it. Another rebel, who had
nothing else, it seems, to fight with, had used his guidon in lieu of a saber,
and in the force of the shock had thrust this into the mouth of his opponent,
and so viciously had he aimed it that it entered the mouth, tore the cheek to
the ear, and tore away the poor fellow’s entire ear. Men pitched themselves out
of their saddles, and, by the force of the momentum, hurled themselves head
foremost, like battering rams, at each others. These men were simply struggling
to kill, with no thought of self or saving or protecting themselves - eager to
die, even if they could kill the enemy and take him with them over the bank, and
into the dark, deep pit where dwelt death and silence.
Death and convalescence began at once to lessen this great population of
wounded, suffering patients, and the last of the patients from the tent
hospitals, in the beautiful grove east of town, were moved away in the early
part of November, 1863 - over four months from the commencement of the
Gettysburg battle.
NATIONAL CEMETERY.
The battle of Gettysburg took place on the 1st, 2d and 3d of July, 1863, and as
early as the 24th of that month the incipient step was taken by Judge David
Wills, of Gettysburg, which soon led to the formation of the Gettysburg National
Cemetery Association, and the purchase of the grounds and the making of the
Soldiers’ National cemetery that now is the beautiful and enduring testimonial
to the dead at the borough of Gettysburg - already a Mecca for the nation. July
24, 1863, Judge Wills wrote to Gov. Curtin, and in the opening sentence of his
letter he says:
Mr. Seymour is here on behalf of his brother, the governor of New York, to look
after the wounded, etc., on the battle-field, and I have suggested to him, and
also to the Rev. Mr. Cross, of Baltimore, and others, the propriety and actual
necessity of the purchase of a common burial ground for the dead, now only
partially buried over miles of country around Gettysburg.
(This is the origin of national cemeteries, and thus to Judge Wills belongs the
credit of having inaugurated these memorial tributes of a grateful people to her
dead heroes.)
He then proceeded to designate the piece of ground that was finally selected,
and where the splendid monument stands, and that is now the lovely resting place
of the dead heroes. Among other reasons for the selection of this spot, he
says: “It is the place where our army had about forty pieces of artillery in
action all Thursday and Friday, and for their protection had thrown up a large
number of earthworks for the protection of the artillerists.” The desperate
attack of the Louisiana troops was made here on Thursday of the fight, capturing
our guns, but were finally driven away. This point was the key to our whole
line of defense - the apex of the triangular line of battle. There were two
pieces of ground, about eight acres, one part belonging to Mr. Raffensberger,
the other to Mr. Menchy. Judge Wills says of the dead at that time: “Our dead
are lying on the fields unburied (that is no graves being dug), with small
portions of earth dug up alongside of the body and thrown over it. In many
instances arms and legs, and sometimes heads protrude, and my attention,” he
says, “has been directed to several places where the hogs were actually rooting
out the bodies and devouring them.” “Truly,” Judge Wills says, “humanity calls
on us to take measurers to remedy this.” He suggested that Pennsylvania at once
purchase the grounds for a cemetery, and hopes the other States will readily
assist in the work. He estimated that the bodies can be removed and decently
buried at a cost of not over $3.50 to $4 each. He concluded by urging the
Governor to prompt action in making the purchase, and furnishing permanent and
suitable burial grounds, etc. Gov. Curtin highly approved every suggestion of
Judge Wills, at once appointed him State agent, with full power to act upon the
suggestions in his letter, and to correspond with the governors of all the
States that had been represented by troops in the battle. In less than four
weeks the eighteen States had favorably responded, the grounds purchased, and a
competent party, under the direction of Judge Wills, was platting and arranging
the grounds. The purchase contained a little over seventeen acres of ground,
fronting on the Baltimore pike and extending south along the Taneytown road. He
reported on the 17th of August that all the details had been arranged. This was
all within six weeks of the great battle. Great labor and patient care had to
be exercised in identifying the dead. In most instances the names of the
occupants of graves were written upon small rough boards with a lead pencil. In
many instances they were identified by letters, papers, receipts, certificates,
or any other papers, marks on clothing, bolts or cartridge boxes, etc. In this
way, out of 3,564 bodies interred in the cemetery, the names of 2,585 were
ascertained, while 979 remained unknown. Places for the different States had
been carefully marked off, as well as places for the unknown, and the bodies
were taken up, carefully coffined, and placed in their respective places.
Afterward other bodies were found, and seventy bodies had been buried by friends
in Greenwood Cemetery, and the mortally wounded in the hospitals as they died
were added, and thus the total of killed of the Union forces and buried in the
cemetery foots up nearly, if not quite, 4,000. Of those who were taken away and
died, and of the bodies that had been claimed by friends and taken away for
sepulture we have no means of estimating; this number to be added to the roll of
the killed.
At the January session, 1864, the Pennsylvania Legislature incorporated the
Cemetery Association, each of the eighteen States being represented by an
incorporator who had been designated by the respective governors. Each State
promptly responded, eager to bear its portion of the sacred charity, and each
paying the respective sums, which were estimated in the ratio of their
representation in Congress. Pennsylvania’s portion was $20,185.44. The total
of the eighteen States paid in was $129,523.24. At the first meeting of the
board of trustees the following officers were chosen: David Wills, Gettysburg,
president; John R. Bartlett, Providence, secretary; Samuel R. Russell,
Gettysburg, treasurer. Executive committee - Robert H. McCurdy, New York;
Benjamin Deford, Maryland; William Y. Sellick, Wisconsin; Levi Scobey, New
Jersey; Henry Edwards, Massachusetts. Auditing committee - Henry Edwards,
Massachusetts; Gordon Lofland, Ohio; John R. Bartlett, Rhode Island.
The cemetery was enclosed with a substantial stone wall, with iron fence in
front, an imposing gateway of iron, a lodge for the keeper, and headstones to
the graves. The grounds were tastefully laid out with walks and lawns, and
trees planted. The headstones of the graves were all alike, and form a
continuous line of granite blocks, rising nine inches above the ground, showing
a face width of eight inches on their upper surface.
The interments when first completed, the different States were represented as
follows: Maine, 104 bodies; New Hampshire, 49; Vermont, 61; Massachusetts, 159;
Rhode Island, 12; Connecticut, 22; New York, 867; New Jersey, 78; Pennsylvania,
534; Delaware, 15; Maryland, 22; West Virginia, 11; Ohio, 131; Indiana, 80;
Illinois, 6; Michigan, 171; Wisconsin, 73; Minnesota, 52; United States Regular,
138; unknown, 979; total, 3,564.
The trustees adopted the design for a suitable monument, submitted by J. G.
Batterson, of Hartford, the plan being for a shaft of granite, with figures of
white marble on the four buttresses, and a figure of the same material on the
summit of the monument. The whole is symmetrical and very beautiful. It is
purely historical, telling its own story with simplicity and comprehension. The
superstructure is 60 feet high, a massive pedestal of gray granite, from
Westerly, Rhode Island, 25 feet square at the base, and is crowned with a
colossal statue of white marble, representing the Genius of Liberty. Standing
upon the three-quarter globe, she holds with her right hand the victor’s wreath
of laurel, while with her left she clasps the victorious sword.
Projecting from the angles of the pedestal are four buttresses. Supporting each
is an allegorical statue of white marble, representing, respectively, War,
History, Peace, Plenty. War is personified by a statue of an American soldier,
who, resting from the conflict, relates to History the story of the battle which
this monument is intended to commemorate. History, in listening attitude,
records, with stylus and tablet, the achievements of the field and the names of
the honored dead. Peace is symbolized by a statue of the American mechanic,
characterized by appropriate surroundings. Plenty is represented by a female
figure, with a sheaf of wheat and fruits of the earth, typifying peace and
abundance as the soldier’s crowning triumph.
These beautiful pieces of statuary (and certainly they can not be excelled) were
executed in Italy, under the immediate supervision of Randolph Rogers, the
distinguished American sculptor. The main die of the pedestal is octagonal in
form, paneled upon each face. The cornice and plinth above are also octagonal
and heavily molded. Upon the plinth rests an octagonal molded base bearing upon
its face, in high relief, the National arms, and upon the opposite side is cut
into the granite the dedication address of President Lincoln. He was the guest
of Judge Wills, and wrote this address at his residence in Gettysburg, on the
evening of November 18, 1863. The address is very short, but the civilized
world has pronounced every word of it an inspiration, and it will outlive the
granite on which it is inscribed:
“Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new
nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are
created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that
nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are
met on a great battle-field of that war. We are met to dedicate a portion of it
as the final resting-place of those who here gave their lives that that nation
might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
“But in a larger sense we can not dedicate, we can not consecrate, we can not
hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have
consecrated it far above our power to add or detract. The world will little
note or long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did
here. It is for us, the living, rather to be dedicated here to the unfinished
work that they have thus far so nobly carried on. It is rather for us to be
here dedicated to the great task remaining before us - that from these honored
dead we take increased devotion to the cause for which they here gave the last
full measure of devotion-, that we here highly resolve that the dead shall not
have died in vain; that the nation shall, under God, have a new birth of
freedom, and that the government of the people, by the people, and for the
people, shall not perish from the earth.”
The cemetery having been completed, and the care of it by so many States being
burdensome and expensive, June 22, 1871, the board of trustees resolved to
transfer it to the General Government. The transfer was duly made, and the
board was dissolved, first passing highly commendatory resolutions for the
energy and good management of Judge Wills, and frankly saying that to him
belonged the honor of the origin, organization and successful completion of the
great work.
The consecration of the grounds occurred November 19, 1863. The President,
Vice-President of the United States, and members of the Cabinet, Maj.-Gen.
George C. Meade, Lieut.-Gen. Scott, Admiral Stewart, and distinguished
representatives of the Navy, Army and the Civil Departments of Government had
been invited. The President was present, and delivered the dedicatory address
given above. William H. Seward was present, and in answer to a serenade in the
evening at the hotel to the many distinguished guests, he responded in a short
address. The principal address on the day of the ceremonies was made by Hon.
Edward Everett, who was also the guest of Judge Wills. His address was worthy
the great occasion - replete with facts about the battle, classical, finished
and eloquent in its tribute to the dead and the living heroes of the great
battle-field. Centuries from now its eloquent periods, rich and sonorous
sentences will be pored over with infinite delight. Below we give a few
extracts:
“Standing beneath this serene sky, overlooking these broad fields now reposing
from the labors of the waning year, the mighty Alleghenies dimly towering before
us, the graves of our brethren beneath our feet, it is with hesitation that I
raise my poor voice to break the eloquent silence of God and Nature. But the
duty to which you have called me must be performed. * * *
“It was appointed by law in Athens that the obsequies of the citizens who fell
in battle should be performed at the public expense, and in the most honorable
manner. Their bones were carefully gathered up from the funeral pyre, where
their bodies were consumed, and brought home to the city. There for three days
they lay in state, beneath tents of honor, to receive the votive offerings of
friends and relatives - flowers, weapons, precious ornaments, painted vases
(wonders of art, which, after two thousand years, adorn the museums of modern
Europe) - the last tributes of surviving affection. * * * On the fourth
day the mournful procession was formed; mothers, wives, sisters, daughters, led
the way. * * * The male relatives and friends of the deceased followed;
citizens and strangers closed the train. Thus marshaled, they moved to the
place of interment in that famous Ceramicus, the most beautiful suburb of
Athens, which had been adorned by Cimon, the son of Miltiades, with walks and
fountains and columns - whose groves were filled with altars, shrines and
temples - whose gardens were kept forever green by the streams from the
neighboring hills, and shaded with the trees sacred to Minerva, and coeval with
the foundation of the city, whose circuit inclosed
‘the olive grove of Academe,
Plato’s retirement, where the Attic bird
Trilled his thick-warbled note the summer long.’ ---
Whose pathways gleamed with the monuments of the illustrious dead, the work of
the most consummate masters that ever gave life to marble. There, beneath the
overarching plane-trees, upon a lofty stage erected for the purpose, it was
ordained that the funeral oration should be pronounced by some citizen of Athens
in the presence of the assembled multitude.
* * * “And shall I, fellow-citizens, who, after an interval of twenty-
three centuries, a youthful pilgrim from the world unknown to ancient Greece,
have wandered over that illustrious plain [Marathon], ready to put the shoes
from off my feet, as one that stands on holy ground - who have gazed with
respectful emotion on the mound which still protects the dust of those who
rolled back the tide of Persian invasion, and rescued the land of popular
liberty, of letters, and of arts, from the ruthless foe - stand unmoved over the
graves of our dear brethren, who so lately, on three of those all-important days
which decide a nation’s history - days on whose issue it depended whether this
august republican Union, founded by some of the wisest statesmen that ever
lived, cemented with the blood of some of the purest patriots that ever died,
should perish or endure - rolled back the tide of invasion, not less unprovoked,
not less ruthless, than that which came to plant the dark banner of Asiatic
despotism and slavery on the free soil of Greece? Heaven forbid! And could I
prove so insensible to every prompting of patriotic duty and affection, not only
would you, fellow-citizens, fathered many of you from distant States, who have
come to take part in these pious offices of gratitude - you, respected fathers,
brethren, matrons, sisters, who surround me - cry out for shame, that the forms
of brave and patriotic men who fill these honored graves would heave with
indignation beneath the sod.
“We have assembled friends, fellow-citizens, at the invitation of the Executive
of the great central State of Pennsylvania, seconded by the governors of
seventeen other loyal States of the Union, to pay the last tribute of respect to
the brave men, who in the hard-fought battles of the first, second and third
days of July last, laid down their lives for the country on those hillsides and
the plains before us, and who remains have been gathered into the cemetery we
consecrate this day. As my eye ranges over the fields of gallant and loyal men,
I feel, as never before, how truly it was said of old that it is sweet and
becoming to die for one’s country. I feel, as never before, how justly, from
the dawn of history to the present time, men have paid the homage of their
gratitude and admiration to the memory of these who nobly sacrifice their lives,
that their fellow-men may live in safety and in honor. And if this tribute were
ever due, when, to whom could it be more justly paid than to those whose last
resting place we this day commend the blessings of Heaven and all men?
“For consider, my friends, what would have been the consequences to the country,
to yourselves, and to all you hold dear, if those who sleep beneath our feet,
and their gallant comrades who survive to serve their country on other fields of
danger, had failed in their duty on those memorable days. Consider what, at
this moment, would be the condition of the United States if that noble Army of
the Potomac, instead of gallantly and for the second time beating back the tide
of invasion from Maryland and Pennsylvania, had been itself driven from these
well-contested heights, thrown back in confusion on Baltimore, or trampled down,
discomfited, scattered to the four winds. What, in that sad event, would not
have been the fate of the monumental city of Harrisburg, of Philadelphia, of
Washington, the capital of the Union, each and every one of which would have
been at the mercy of the enemy, accordingly as it might have pleased him,
spurred by passion, flushed with victory, and confident of continued success, to
direct his course?
* * * “Who that hears me has forgotten the thrill of joy that ran
through the country on the 4th of July - auspicious day for the glorious
tidings, and rendered still more so by the simultaneous fall of Vicksburg - when
the telegraph flashed through the land the assurance from the President of the
United States that the Army of the Potomac, under Gen. Meade, had again smitten
the invader! Sure I am that, with the ascriptions of praise that rose to heaven
from twenty millions of freemen, with the acknowledgments that breathed from
patriotic lips throughout the length and breadth of America, to the surviving
officers and men who had rendered the country this inestimable service, there
beat in every loyal bosom a throb of tender and sorrowful gratitude to the
martyrs who had fallen on the sternly contested field. Let a nation’s fervent
thanks make some amends for the toils and sufferings of those who survive.
Would that the heartfelt tribute could penetrate these honored graves. * * *
I must leave to others, who can do it from personal observation, to describe the
mournful spectacle presented by these hillsides and plains at the close of the
terrible conflict. It was a saying of the Duke of Wellington, that, next to
defeat, the saddest thing is a victory. The horrors of the battle-field after
the contest is over, the sights and sounds of woe - let me throw a pall over the
scene, which no words can adequately depict to those who have not witnessed it,
in which no one who has witnessed it, and who has a heart in his bosom, can bear
to dwell. One drop of balm alone, one drop of heavenly life-giving balm,
mingles in this bitter cup of misery. Scarcely has the cannon ceased to roar,
when the brethren and sisters of Christian benevolence, ministers of compassion,
angels of pity, hasten to the field and the hospital to moisten the parched
tongue, to bind the ghastly wounds, to soothe the parting agonies alike of
friend and foe, and to catch the last whispered messages of love from dying
lips.
* * * “And now, friends, fellow-citizens of Gettysburg and Pennsylvania,
and you from remoter States, let me again, as we part, invoke your benediction
on these honored graves. You feel, though the occasion is mournful, that it is
good to be here. You feel that it was greatly auspicious for the cause of the
country that the men of the East and the men of the West, the men of nineteen
sister States, stood, side by side, on the perilous ridges of the battle. You
now feel it a new bond of union that they shall lie side by side, till a
clarion, louder than that which marshaled them to combat, shall awake their
slumbers. God bless the Union; it is dearer to us for the blood of brave men
which has been shed in its defense. The sport on which they stood and fell;
these pleasant heights; the fertile plain beneath them; the thriving village,
whose streets so lately rang with the strange din of war; the fields beyond the
ridge, where the noble Reynolds held the advancing foe at bay, and, while he
gave up his own life, assured by his forethought and self-sacrifice the triumph
of the two succeeding days; the little streams which wind through the hills, on
whose banks in after times the wondering plowman will turn up, with the rude
weapons of savage warfare, the fearful missiles of modern artillery; Seminary
Ridge, the Peach-Orchard, Cemetery, Culp, Wolf Hill, Round Top, Little Round
Top, humble names, henceforward dear and famous-no lapse of time, no distance of
space shall cause you to be forgotten. ‘The whole earth,’ said Pericles, as he
stood over the remains of his fellow-citizens, who had fallen in the first year
of the Peloponnesian war, ‘the whole earth is the sepulcher of illustrious men.’
All time, he might have added, is the millennium of their glory. Surly I would
do no injustice to the other noble achievements of the war, which have reflected
such honor on both arms of the service, and have entitled the armies and the
navy of the United States, their officers and men, to the warmest thanks and the
richest rewards which a grateful people can pay. But they, I am sure, will join
us in saying, as we bid farewell to the dust of these martyrs-heroes, that
wheresoever throughout the civilized world the accounts of this great warfare
are read, and down to the latest period of recorded time, in the glorious annals
of our common country, there will be no brighter page that that which relates to
THE BATTLE OF GETTYSBURG.”
When the work on Cemetery Hill had been well completed, then the organization
turned its attention to the main lines of the battle-field, that is, those lines
of the Union forces extending from Cemetery Hill to the two Round Top Mountains,
and the design was conceived of purchasing the land along this line and making a
grand-drive avenue to Little Round Top Mountain, where land suitable for a
picnic ground was purchased, and in a cheap form the necessary buildings erected
to accommodate parties and delegations. And there, also, commenced the work of
designating by suitable stones the positions of the different commands that they
occupied during the most severe and trying times of the three days’ fight. The
eighteen States entered loyally into this project, and ordered suitably
inscribed stones made. All of them put up, so far, are very elegant works of
art, beautiful in design and finish, and already the most of the States have
their battle-field monuments in position, and the coming summer will see them
properly represented. These tell the story of the battle, the part played by
each of the various State troops, in solid granite. And now standing upon any
elevation of the field these gray and white shafts can be seen in every
direction. The association in nearly every instance purchased the grounds where
these monuments stand, so as to bring them under the protecting care of the
Cemetery Association. They will therefore stand here, each telling to the
world, to future generations especially, its own part of the thrilling and
tragic story. Hence, the perpetual story of the battle of Gettysburg will be
gathered and preserved in a way more complete, perfect and enduring that that of
any great battle-field in all history, and in the long future the history of the
organization arising from the first suggestion of Judge Wills, July 24, 1863,
will be of itself an intensely interesting story.
The monument in the cemetery was unveiled and dedicated July 1, 1869. The
dedication ode for that occasion was written by Bayard Taylor, and in it occurs
the following:
“After the thunder storm our heaven is blue;
Far off, along the borders of the sky,
In silver folds the clouds of battle lie,
With soft consoling sunlight shining through;
And round the sweeping circles of your hills
The crashing cannon thrills
Have faded from the memory of the air;
And summer pours from unexhausted fountains
Her bliss on yonder mountains:
The camps are tenantless, the breastworks bare:
Earth keeps no stain where hero-blood was poured:
The hornets humming on their wings of lead,
Have ceased to sting, their angry swarms are dead,
And harmless in its scabbard rusts the sword.”
The president of the Battle-field Memorial Association is ex-officio the
governor of Pennsylvania. The local officers, those who are in immediate
control and management of its affairs are for the years 1885-86 as follows:
Vice-President, David A. Buehler, Esq., Gettysburg, Penn.; secretary, John M.
Karuth, Esq., Gettysburgh, Penn; treasurer, J. Lawrence Schick, Gettysburg,
Penn.; superintendent of grounds, Sergt. Nicholas G. Wilson, Gettysburg, Penn.
Directors who live in Gettysburg are Col. C. H. Buehler, Sergt. N. G. Wilson,
John M. Krauth, Esq., Maj. Robert Bell, Sergt. W. D. Holtzworth, David A.
Buehler, Esq., J. Lawrence Schick, Charles Horner, M.D., Col. John B. Bachelder.
* Twelve hundred cavalrymen lost in the battles of Fleetwood, Aldie, Upperville
and Hanover; 200 maimed and sick.
† These figures relate to the guns actually on the battle-field, deducting
those attached to Stuart’s command on the one hand, and to Pleasonton’s on
the other.
** Dr. T. T. Tate, of Gettysburg, who was surgeon in the Third Pennsylvania
Cavalry.