Four years later, Now GENERAL Dan Sickles, promoted BECAUSE he was a congressman, in command of a corps at Gettysburg, was worried about his position, on the left flank of the Union position, and moved his corps forward, to what he perceived as a better spot, along a road and in a peach orchard. Both his flanks were in the air, and it left the rest of the army's position exposed.
Longstreet hit like a trip hammer, and all but wiped Sickle's corps out.
Sickles was hit by a cannon ball, just below the knee, and was carried off the field, smoking a cigar. They took his leg off, above the knee, what was left, and asked Sickles what they should do with it. He told them to pack it in salt, and send it to the Army Medical Museum.
In later years, he would visit the bones, in a glass case.
It's still there, in the Nation Museum of Health, in Silver Springs, Md.
http://www.medicalmuseum.mil/index.cfm?p=media.news.article.mrmc_to_exhibit_amputated_leg
That brigade was the Saviors-of-Little-Round-Top and the pivotal
troops that turned the tide of the War in favor of the Union that day.
I love the knowledge of history among Freepers.
Not only did Sickles violate Meade’s order in how he mis-deployed his III Corps troops, but he spent much time and energy in years after maligning Meade and falsely presenting himself as the savior of the Union army at Gettysburg. Many years later he was removed from the NY “Monuments Commission” for embezzling funds raised for war memorials.
He was an all-around scoundrel but brave in battle. Lacking in ethics and judgment for just about any era....
Gen. Sickles was also instrumental in getting the Gettysburg battlefield preserved and documented.
I didn’t finish the biography because I just didn’t like him very much, but that could have been the author’s fault, too.
The nicotine in the cigar would have released dopamine and norepinephrine which would have raised his blood pressure, clamped down on his peripheral vessels, and helped staunch his bleeding. Might be why he survived.