Thanks Beowulf9.
Posted on 07/03/2016 11:22:22 AM PDT by Beowulf9
No? Really? The what did it have?
There were not 3/4 of a million dead. Richmond and Atlanta were torched just as Berlin and Tokyo were torched. They were important to the guys losing them and the union wanted to make sure they didnt come back into play. I’m as Southern as anyone but I can see, with the benefit of 150 years of time that a fragmented north america would have been a disaster later on.
No one can explain Lee’s intransigence at Gettysburg and his insistence over Longstreet’s strongest objections that Picket attack the center of the union lines. The Union had the luxury of interior lines and could move troops around to where they were needed most. Their artillery held its fire until the attackers were close in and the CSA artillery had used most of its ordnance vainly trying to breach the lines. Everything that could go wrong on July 3 for the South did go wrong.
Thanks Beowulf9.
Four score 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 have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for 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 poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor 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 which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. 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 that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
Well said.
Dixie Ping
Wow! A ‘thanks’ from the man himself, Sunkenciv :) How many ‘thanks’ I do owe you, though :)
Bfl
My question is why didn't Pickett have a problem with the plan before they marched across a mile of open ground into the teeth of artillery?
Longstreet knew what was going to happen.
Others might disagree with me and they probably have more knowledge of the subject than I have.
Is it fair to say Pickett just wasn't the visionary, the military prophet, or just the smart, experienced guy that Longstreet was? That's a question on my part...
I think we could infer, though, that Pickett was a loyal officer and had this thing about following orders...
All just my random thoughts... YMMV.
I guess he didn't take notes at Fredericksburg... My complaint isn't that Pickett followed orders; my complaint is that he bitched about it afterwords, particularly when he was so keen to march straight up the middle. He was also bitter towards Lee afterwards, so we could infer that his loyalty had a limited shelf life.
Although I do have to say that if you or I had been in Pickett's situation later, we might have seen Longstreet's point, especially with the benefit of hindsight, and might have possibly harbored just some small vestige of resentment after the fact as well.
Maybe.
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