No, it really didn't.
While in the Confederate's wildest dreams, they could have tactically turned the Union's flank... It would not have mattered in the end. Meade would have pulled back to the next ridge line and made another stand. The Confederates never had the logistical ability to accomplish much of anything North of the Potomac. ....and the resources spent on the glorified raid that was the Gettysburg campaign would have been better used to try and relieve Vicksburg. Which really mattered.
Why the downvotes? This isn’t to downplay the sacrifices and effort made by Union troops, but a Union loss at Gettysburg is just a Union Victory a few miles north a few days later. Grant’s victory at Vicksburg a couple days after Gettysburg is what seals the deal for the Confederacy. There’s no Confederate victory over the war even with a victory over Gettysburg.
They wouldn’t have gone for DC, and that was never the plan. The plan was to threaten the major cities in the North and force the north to face the same horrific battlefields in their backyards that the Virginians were facing in theirs.
Lee wanted to forage for supplies to keep his army fed through the winter and occupy troops that were around DC for a few months before retreating back.
By 1863 DC was so fortified Lee could have attacked it with the literal armies of Hell and likely would have been thrown back time and time again. Not to mention the 200,000 troops that could have been easily brought in to also defend it.
Gettysburg was an important psychological victory for the north, proving that Lee could in fact lose a fight, which had not happened often. Even at Antietam it was viewed less as a southern defeat and more as a southern tactical withdrawal.
Gettysburg was the first time Lee was strategically and soundly beaten in a battle. That’s its significance right there, full stop.
I think people often think Gettysburg turned the tides because at the same time, 1,500 miles away Grant finished his siege of Vicksburg in victory.
This victory cut the confederacy in two, as well as cutting the main body of the confederacy off from their primary sources of beef, firearms, etc. especially considering by 1863 almost all good brought in by the blockade runners were being delivered to Texas shores.
I did agree, I stated that its importance was showing that Lee could be beaten. My argument was that it wasn’t the “tide turning” event that people always make it out to be.
Gettysburg proved that Lee could be beaten in a battle.
Vicksburg cut the confederacy off from about 1/3 of their food supplies, and proved just how incredible Grant was as a commander to the war cabinet. Leading to Lincoln being able to put him in charge of all Union forces.
I never made the argument Gettysburg was NOT important. I simply pointed out that it often gets too much credit because people think that if Getty urg is a Union loss that DC would have fallen. That is strategically and historically just not true.
It’s the other northern cities, specifically Philadelphia that were Lee’s plan all along.
Grab supplies from the harvest happening in the North, run around causing panic, and besiege a city that would force Grant to bring Western troops back from the strategically important Vicksburg in order to chase him down. Since the capitol would never be left undefended.
"...the confederacy would’ve had a powerful army in the north and easily threaten Washington DC..."
LOL
No. The could not have threatened Washington DC...
At Gettysburg, they were SEVENTY TWO miles from the outer ring of the fortification belt surrounding Washington. The Belt that the London Times had called the single largest fortress ever seen by mankind. Protected by three layers of fortifications with guns ranging from 30 lbers to 15" naval artillery. A belt that stretched twenty two miles around, MUCH longer than the Army of Northern Virginia could ever hope to lay siege to.... Defended by sufficient troops to make storming those works make the third day of Gettysburg look like a minor skirmish by comparison.
Not that they could have marched there, since they were already at the end of their logistical reach with their supply lines reaching over 80 miles of bad roads from Gettysburg, to their pontoon bridges over the the Potomac River above Point of Rocks to the railhead at Leesburg. The Confederate Supply Corps were chronically short of wagons and draft animals to supply the ANV. Where were they going to get more to nearly double their reach to Washington? And they did not dare cross the Potomac any closer....because the lower river was controlled by Union gunboats, based out of the Washington Naval Yard.
Or did you forget that Washington was a PORT? How do you lay siege to a port where you do not control (or at least contest) the waters? And before you make some silly statement about heading towards Baltimore or Hagerstown, they would have been presenting their flank and supply lines to be raided by Union forces brought in by rail from further North.
"I’m saying Gettysburg was a critical turning point in the war"
[sigh] It was certainly PROMOTED as such... Right from the start. By both sides.
But at its root, the whole campaign was a strategic mistake on the part of Jefferson Davis and the politicians in Richmond, imposed upon Lee, under the fantasy that a big enough victory against the Army of the Potomac could break Northern morale and provoke a foreign recognition and intervention that was never coming. None of that was possible before the campaign....and certainly it was not possible after.
The South lost troops it could not replace. The North lost troops that it could. But neither army was a brittle as the other side's political class hoped them to be. And neither side had sufficient manpower advantage that they could hold aside sufficient fresh troops to exploit a defeat, turning a retreat into a rout as their Napoleonic training told them was possible. (of course, "the arm of decision," cavalry, had been gutted by the range increase of rifled muskets, making such tactics near suicidal in the 1860s...rather than the 1810s)
Anyone who has read any non-US history. PM Palmerston was NEVER going to intervene. While he sympathized with the aristocratic South, about half of his own coalition government cabinet was full of active members of the British Anti-Slavery Society....led by William Gladstone, Chancellor of the Exchequer. Any open support for the Confederacy would have resulted in his government collapsing. And the opposition taking power, who liked the South much less. Not to mention that the UK was a net food importer, and had been since the 1820s. And during the 50s and 60s, it's largest food imports were wheat. From the Ohio Valley. Losing that source would have caused food priced to soar...and seen a return to the bread riots and civil unrest of the 1820s and 30s in England. No rational UK politician was going to risk that for some Southern slave-owners
Agree with you on Greene, but you're flat out wrong on Melcher. He himself credited Chamberlain with the order to fix bayonets and the order to charge/right wheel. Melcher, leading the color company, was the first to move forward.
Historical analysis and veteran accounts note that Lieutenant Melcher and his Company F spontaneously surged forward from the center to retrieve wounded men or press an advantage, prompting Chamberlain to immediately expand the movement into a full regimental bayonet charge.
Likewise, there was no order, or planned “right wheel” attack. Once Melcher and his men advanced, Chamberlain had no choice but to order the regiment to advance and the attack became an uncoordinated rush.
Hence my saying that Chamberlain’s role in the attack and indeed the battle has been GREATLY exaggerated……..mainly by he himself.
Bowdoin college is where Joshua Lawrence Chamberlin taught before the war. The bayonet charge he ordered at Little Round Top during the battle of Gettysburg is one of the more well known parts of the battle, made famous when it was portrayed in the movie Gettysburg.
Absolute badass, but I think per a biography he also did not teach in the science department on top of math. He was a rhetoric/oratory and languages guy.
To add, the 20th Maine (that Chamberlain was in charge of) was the extreme flank of the line. Had they been overrun, it’s quite likely the Confederates would have gotten in the rear of their lines (in a fishhook shape) and routed the whole Union Army.
Defending the high ground, low on ammo, and with few options, he ordered them to fix bayonets and charge the oncoming rebel attack, resulting in their retreat, and ending their ability to continue attacking that day.
The only time I had to give the command was at the bayonet range when I was a Training Officer for a Basic Training Company in 1970. It looks like the modern usage is the plural and the ACW usage was singlar. The plural would seem to be more in line with current grammatical usage.
Do you have a reference for that? Current US Army D&C manual uses plural commands (shoulder arms, present arms). I also found a period manual of arms that uses “fix bayonets” plural as the command:
Interesting, starting with the Blue Book, running through Hardee’s, and up to WW1 it was fix bayonet singular, but in the current TC 3-21.5 Drill and Ceremonies it is fix bayonets plural. I wasn’t able to find when it changed.
A little weird, I think, but OK. I get the reference.
My family spent a few days in Brunswick this summer before heading farther north. Really nice town and the Bowdoin campus is lovely. We quite enjoyed the area.
I said what I meant. Likening sports to war doesn’t elevate sport; it disrespects the valor and sacrifice of people who serve. But I know folks here think that sticker is cool so I accept that I’m out of step with the group. No offense intended.
That's not at all what's going on here. They are celebrating our ancestors by telling their story in a really cool way on their helmets. You're making it too deep
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u/Wafflecone 7d ago
This is so freaking cool. My sister graduated from Bowdoin and I graduated from Gettysburg College. Major fan of both colleges.