Replies

Why did Lee attack at Gettysburg?

The historians argue variously that Lee underestimated the Union Army’s strength, as Jeb Stuart’s division was not in position to provide reconnaissance; or, that he was overly confident in his and his men’s ability to defeat the Union Army (due to prior success).

Longstreet, in his memoirs, and aided perhaps by hindsight, says that at a war council he recommended Lee form his army into a defensive position and allow the Yankees to exhaust themselves attacking them. He (Longstreet) argued that the Yankees would have significant forces (by extrapolating the march of Union units from various positions to the site of the battle), and would be able to reinforce the middle of their line since their line bent inward.

Longstreet, who became a Republican after the war, and as commander of police and militia forces, unsuccessfully attempted to prevent the Klan from taking over Louisiana during the reconstruction period, came to be blamed by The Lost Cause for not having his corps ready early enough on the morning of Pickett’s Charge.

The piece is written from the perspective of Pittsburgh, which makes it fresh, although its real focus is the battle. All across the north, Yankees were aroused by the advance of Lee northward, by his commandeering of supplies and his capture of blacks to send them south as slaves. Militia units and volunteers raced to Harrisburg, to be organized into a new army under the command of the Governor, should the Army of the Potomac have been defeated.

Lincoln may have started the war to preserve the Union, but had to issue the Emancipation Proclamation to sustain the support of the people of the North. Historians can debate the real cause of the war, but to the farm boys and town clerks that filled the ranks of the Union Army, the reason was obvious.

"The historians argue variously that Lee underestimated the Union Army’s strength, as Jeb Stuart’s division was not in position to provide reconnaissance;"

All the more reason he should have been hesitant to engage the Army of the Potomac at Gettysburg. Lack of intelligence means he should have excercised more caution. It started out as just a skirmish, one of many that was going on all throughout June as Lee's forces marched north. He chose to make it something larger. I'm glad he did, because he signed the beginning of the end.

On another note, even if he had beaten the Army of the Potomac there, I believe it would have been inevitable that the south would have still lost. It just would have been longer and more painful.

Lincoln may have started the war to preserve the Union, but had to issue the Emancipation Proclamation to sustain the support of the people of the North.

Just recently discovered Jeff Davis' official response to Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation. Issued January 5, 1863, four days after the EP.

We can, I guess, call it the Enslavement Proclamation.

In it he announces official CSA policy is to enslave all free blacks presently in the South, as well as any free blacks or escaped slaves they are able to capture when invading northern states. And he officially states that these kidnapped people and their issue will be slaves forever.

Utterly destroys the notion that there was "no difference" in Union and Confederate attitudes towards blacks. In the same week one government issues a proclamation of its intention to forever free all black slaves it can reach, and the other announces its intention to forever enslave all black people, free or slave, it can get its hands on.

http://corematerials.homestead.com/files/jd63.pdf