My favorite battlefields.

[selmaborntidefan]

I’m looking over where Pickett began his charge (at the trees a mile away). Great day here today.

 

[UAH]

I’m looking over where Pickett began his charge (at the trees a mile away). Great day here today.
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Gettysburg and Pickett's charge has always perplexed many of us. How men could be asked to cross those fences under fire and attack a fortified position that commanded the heights is a profound mystery. I have been watching a civil war history channel that reviews the writings of participants both Union and Confederate involved in the charge on that day. Longstreet delayed until the last possible moment but Lee compelled it. A difficult legacy to bear I believe.

 

[OakMtn4Bama]

Read "Lost Triumph" by Tom Carhart. Explains a theory of "why" Pickett's charge. Makes a great deal of sense to me because it was so unlike anything Lee had done before.

 

[Tidewater]

Gettysburg and Pickett's charge has always perplexed many of us. How men could be asked to cross those fences under fire and attack a fortified position that commanded the heights is a profound mystery. I have been watching a civil war history channel that reviews the writings of participants both Union and Confederate involved in the charge on that day. Longstreet delayed until the last possible moment but Lee compelled it. A difficult legacy to bear I believe.

Lee was on a roll. He had defeated a larger Union force in the Seven Days, and made them cower under the protect of Union gunboats in Jun 1862. He had trounced the Union Army at Second Manassa's. Even though greatly depleted by straggling, he had held his own at Sharpsburg in September, even though heavily outnumbered. He had a lopsided victory at Fredericksburg in December 1862. Outnumbered more than 2-1 at Chancellorsville, he had embarrassed the Union Army in May (while Longstreet and two divisions were away on Suffolk, Vir.
Lee had trounced the Union I, XI, and XII Corps on July 1. Badly mauled the Union III Corps on July 2 (and Wright's Georgia Brigade had, at one point, had made it to the top of Cemetery Ridge on July 2, but could not stay because he was not reinforced).
He was starting to believe his men could not lose.
There are some positions that cannot be taken with a frontal assault. That was one of them.
My great great grandfather was in Lew Armistead's Brigade of Pickett's Division. At sunrise, the brigade at 1,640 men. By sundown, it had 420 still in the ranks (including my GGGF). 1,220 killed, wounded, missing including General Armistead.

 

[selmaborntidefan]

Lee was on a roll. He had defeated a larger Union force in the Seven Days, and made them cower under the protect of Union gunboats in Jun 1862. He had trounced the Union Army at Second Manassa's. Even though greatly depleted by straggling, he had held his own at Sharpsburg in September, even though heavily outnumbered. He had a lopsided victory at Fredericksburg in December 1862. Outnumbered more than 2-1 at Chancellorsville, he had embarrassed the Union Army in May (while Longstreet and two divisions were away on Suffolk, Vir.
Lee had trounced the Union I, XI, and XII Corps on July 1. Badly mauled the Union III Corps on July 2 (and Wright's Georgia Brigade had, at one point, had made it to the top of Cemetery Ridge on July 2, but could not stay because he was not reinforced).
He was starting to believe his men could not lose.
There are some positions that cannot be taken with a frontal assault. That was one of them.
My great great grandfather was in Lew Armistead's Brigade of Pickett's Division. At sunrise, the brigade at 1,640 men. By sundown, it had 420 still in the ranks (including my GGGF). 1,220 killed, wounded, missing including General Armistead.

My mother and I enjoyed - thoroughly - the four hours we spent at Gettysburg last week. We got the audio tour that cues to the GPS and did the entire thing, and while it was probably longer than we intended to stay there, it was well worth it.

But as we were standing there and the narrator is going through the setting, I look down that hill and see how far those trees are and my first thought (and hers, too) was, "What kind of an idiot who has far fewer men (overall) thinks he can charge up this hill and take it when you can see the death awaiting you?"

Look, I didn't go to West Point (the toughest combat I ever had was my gut fighting with an MRE), but I just could not believe anyone could think that they could do that - not rationally.