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CHAPTER 1
"We will stay and fight it out ... "
The Strategic Situation on the Afternoon of July 3, 1863
The Union Army of the Potomac under George G. Meade and the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia under Robert E. Lee spent the first two days of July 1863 locked in titanic combat. The second day witnessed large scale Southern attacks against both ends of the Union line. James Longstreet's massive assault smashed Dan Sickles' Third Corps, wrecked additional brigades, and nearly collapsed Meade's left flank. On his right, another attack swept across Rock Creek and up the wooded and rocky slopes of Culp's Hill, where only hard fighting and good luck saved the Union defenders. The day produced combined casualties of more than 16,000 men and continued late into the night before finally sputtering out on the slopes of Culp's Hill.
By the end of the day, the Army of the Potomac held a shorter fishhook-shaped line anchored on high ground with the advantage of interior lines of communication. The prominent points on this line were Culp's Hill and Cemetery Hill on the northern end, and Little Round Top and Big Round Top on the southern end. Between those hills ran a low ridge called Cemetery Ridge. Meade's army had the advantage of holding a more compact line anchored on good terrain, but he was not convinced his army should stand and fight at Gettysburg for a third day. Meade, a military engineer by training and experience, preferred a formidable defensive line in Maryland along the banks of Big Pipe Creek.
About 9:00 p.m. on July 2, Meade convened a council of war with his two wing commanders, his seven corps commanders, his chief engineer, and his chief of staff. The Federal brass debated the merits of staying and fighting at Gettysburg versus retreating to the Pipe Creek line until Meade finally put it to a vote. The majority favored staying at Gettysburg. Accordingly, Meade resolved to "stay and fight it out." He had fresh forces available to defend his line despite two days of heavy combat. Almost an entire infantry corps, the Sixth, was fresh; only one of its divisions had been engaged in the fighting on the second. Meade was confident that General Lee would resume the offensive the next day. The only question was where he would attack.
For his part, Lee had indeed tested both Union flanks on the second and failed. Reasoning that Meade had shifted troops to his flanks to meet threats, Lee concluded that the Union center was weaker than it should be and resolved to attack it the next day using George Pickett's fresh division of Virginians from Longstreet Corps, together with other troops. The attack would have to be made across a long gently undulating open field a mile wide against a position on higher and more commanding ground. In order to give his infantry a better chance of success, Lee ordered a massive artillery barrage before the attack to knock out the more potent Federal long-arm and demoralize the waiting enemy infantry.
Unlike Meade's army, Lee's army held a long extended exterior line curved at both ends and roughly parallel to the Federal position. Lee had to weaken his flanks somewhat to support his grand attack on July 3 because of the heavy loses his army had suffered on July 1-2. In particular, he had largely stripped his right flank to support the infantry assault against the Federal center; only a small force of exhausted infantry was available to hold that flank, which made it vulnerable to being turned. Lee and his army of veterans faced a difficult task as dawn broke on the morning of July 3.
Only July 2, when Longstreet was preparing his divisions to march and then launch his sledgehammer blow against the exposed Federal left on July 2, Brig. Gen. John Buford's two tired and battered brigades of Federal cavalry rode off the battlefield at Gettysburg. Buford had orders to ride to Maryland to guard the Army of the Potomac's wagon trains, which were at that time near Taneytown. His departure meant there was no Federal cavalry on the southern part of the battlefield on July 2. Only Brig. Gen. David M. Gregg's depleted Second Cavalry Division was near the battlefield, pinned down and battling Confederate infantry of the legendary Stonewall Brigade on Brinkerhoff's Ridge, about two miles east of the main battlefield on the Hanover Road. As a result, there were no horsemen available to screen the Federal left flank and no good force available to gather intelligence about Southern dispositions on the morning of July 3. All of this would prove critical in the coming fight.
Brigadier General Wesley Merritt and his Regulars
On the evening of July 1, Buford faced Lt. Gen. A. P. Hill's Confederate corps with only two-thirds of his division. To his great regret, one of his brigades, the Reserve (or Regular) Brigade, commanded by Brig. Gen. Wesley Merritt, had been detached to patrol the passes through the South Mountain range in Maryland several days before the beginning of the battle. The Reserve Brigade consisted of some of the best cavalrymen in any army of the Civil War. It had a nucleus of the four regiments of Regular Army cavalry attached to the Army of the Potomac (the 1st, 2nd, 5th, and 6th U.S., the latter a new regiment formed at the beginning of the war), along with the 6th Pennsylvania Cavalry, a fine volunteer regiment. It was no wonder that Buford regretted losing this fine brigade on July 1.
The four Regular Army regiments had been used improperly during the early phases of the Civil War and were largely under-strength by the time of the battle of Gettysburg. The 6th Pennsylvania Cavalry (Rush's Lancers) had done so well at the Brandy Station fight that Buford told Cavalry Corps commander Maj. Gen. Alfred Pleasonton, "These men did splendidly yesterday; I call them now the Seventh Regulars." In fact, some Confederates believed the Lancers were in fact Regular cavalry. Writing many years later, George W. Watson of the 12th Virginia Cavalry actually referred to them as the Seventh Pennsylvania Regulars. The proud and well-disciplined professional men of the Reserve Brigade had borne the brunt of the 14-hour fight at Brandy Station on June 9, 1863, and a day of severe fighting at Upperville, Virginia, on June 21. By the time of Gettysburg, the Reserve Brigade numbered 52 officers and 1,870 enlisted men.
Twenty-nine year-old Wesley Merritt, a West Pointer who graduated 22nd out of 41 in the Class of 1860, commanded the Reserve Brigade. He was assigned to the 2nd Dragoons and served in John Buford's company at Camp Floyd, Utah. After the outbreak of the Civil War, Merritt came east with the 2nd Dragoons, now known as the 2nd U.S. Cavalry, and served as aidede-camp to Brig. Gen. Philip St. George Cooke, commander of the Army of the Potomac's cavalry forces and the father-in-law of Confederate cavalry chieftain Maj. Gen. J. E. B. Stuart. Cooke, known as the father of the U.S. cavalry, wrote the official manual for cavalry field operations and was an outstanding role model for the young West Pointer. Merritt performed ably as Cooke's aide and later served as ordnance officer under the Army of the Potomac's first Cavalry Corps commander, Maj. Gen. George Stoneman. When Stoneman took medical leave after the Chancellorsville Campaign in the spring of 1863, Pleasonton assumed temporary command of the Cavalry Corps. Merritt took active command of the 2nd U.S. Cavalry about the same time.
Merritt performed conspicuously at Brandy Station and his courage and leadership skills caught Pleasonton's eye. Buford, his former company commander, also praised him and, as one Regular noted, "in those days the praise of John Buford was more highly esteemed by the officers under his command than a brevet commission." Merritt again distinguished himself at Upperville on June 21, and a couple of days later Pleasonton requested Merritt's promotion to brigadier general. Pleasonton had been disappointed with the performance of the two officers who led the Army's Regular Cavalry after John Buford was promoted to division command when Stoneman left for his medical leave. The first, Maj. Charles J. Whiting, was relieved of command of the Reserve Brigade for allegedly treasonous conduct following Brandy Station.
Whiting's successor, Maj. Samuel H. Starr, performed poorly at Upperville. Here is how one member of the 6th U.S. Cavalry described Starr's performance:
The men were pretty thoroughly disgusted with the affair of [Upperville]. Major Starr, to whose want of judgment and feeble efforts on this occasion the defeats were proudly chargeable, took an early opportunity to deliver the regiment a lecture, in the presence of the Second Cavalry, in which he charged the Sixth with cowardice during the first part of the conflict. Of course, this was resented, and in a less-disciplined body of men, might have led to difficulties.
After Upperville, Pleasonton knew Starr was not competent to command a brigade and that the morale of the men would suffer under his continued stewardship. There was a command void to fill, and Merritt was the man for the job. "It is necessary that I have a good commander for the regular brigade of cavalry," explained Pleasonton, "and I earnestly recommend Capt. Wesley Merritt to be made a brigadier-general for that purpose. He has all of the qualifications for it, and has distinguished himself by his gallantry and daring. Give me good commanders, and I will give you good results."
Merritt, recalled one eyewitness, "was a pleasant, handsome young fellow, wearing his rank with easy grace, and apparently processing just the temperament for a cavalryman." Considered a protégé of his former company commander John Buford, the hard fighting to come would also demonstrate that Merritt had the same mettle as well. Quiet, modest, tough, and competent, Merritt possessed tremendous personal courage and leadership skills. Another former dragoon described Merritt as "tall, slender, and intellectual-looking. He had a constitution of iron, and under a rather passive demeanor, concealed a fiery ambition." Although clean-shaven and baby-faced, he was known as a martinet. "Modesty which fitted him like a garment, charming manners, the demeanor of a gentleman, cool but fearless bearing in action were his distinguishing characteristics." Brevet Brigadier General Theophilus F. Rodenbough, who served under Merritt in the 2nd U.S. Cavalry, also put pen to paper with complimentary things to say about the young general. "Merritt at his high prime was the embodiment of force," recalled Rodenbough. "He was one of those rare men whose facilities are sharpened and whose view is cleared on the battlefield. His decisions were delivered with the rapidity of thought and were as clear as if they had been studied for weeks. He always said that he never found that his first judgment gained by time and reflection. In him a fiery soul was held in thrall to will. Never disturbed by doubt, or moved by fear, neither circumspect nor rash, he never missed an opportunity or made a mistake."
Merritt was not infallible however, and not everyone thought him possessed of outstanding capability, as observations made by a member of the 3rd Indiana Cavalry demonstrate: "[Merritt] hails from West Point, girt with the usual amount of red tape and slight show of military capacity. Mind may at length triumph over matter, but thus far humbugs win the race between wisdom and ignorance." Whether humbugs or wisdom would win the day remained to be seen.
After he assumed command, Merritt had to deal with a difficult period as the army moved north through Virginia, Maryland, and into southern Pennsylvania in search of Lee's men. The twelve-day period between Upperville and the last day of Gettysburg wore down the Union cavalry and tested the young commander's strength: Years after the war ended, Merritt wrote his memoirs and described this narrow period of his service. "[W]hile the history of these days is disposed of in a few sentences," he began, "it must not be imagined that the work was not severe. Every day and many nights we marched and countermarched, through good weather and bad, over mountains and through woods, subsisting as best we could on the army ration, when it was possible to obtain it, or "living on the country," which in that district — filled as it was, with soldiers who were hungry and citizens who were naturally trying to save for their own uncertain future — was a precarious living at best."
Another officer in Buford's division confirmed Merritt's recollection when he observed that "The cavalry ... had been in active service for nearly a month; men and horses had about reached the limit of endurance; intense heat and dust, hard fighting, short of food for men and forage for horses, had done its work; hundreds of horses had fallen unable to rise again; and men tramped on foot, leading their horses to save the little strength left in them."
Supporting the Regular cavalry were the six three-inch rifles of Capt. William M. Graham's Battery K, 1st U.S. Artillery, organized into three sections of two guns each. Graham, a 29-year-old, was General Meade's nephew and a Regular himself. He was appointed 2nd lieutenant of the 1st Artillery June 7, 1855, and was promoted to 1st lieutenant on March 1, 1861. Graham received a brevet to major on July 1, 1862, for gallant service in the Peninsula Campaign and to lieutenant colonel two months later on September 17 for good service at Antietam. When a promotion to captain followed in November, Graham assumed command of the battery. He was a competent and experienced officer who enjoyed a 33-year career in the Regular Army.
In part because of the heavy pounding it received during the early phase of the Gettysburg campaign, the Reserve Brigade was detached on June 29 and sent to Mechanicstown, Maryland (today known as Thurmont, near Camp David). Away from direct fighting, it spent two days picketing, scouting, and patrolling the roads and mountain passes to protect the Army of the Potomac's line of retreat and communications. The detachment of his favorite brigade did not please Buford. He requested several times that the Reserve Brigade be returned to him, to no avail. Buford would have to make do with only two of his three brigades. As a result, he was without the experienced Regulars when he faced his most critical assignment of the war on the morning of July 1 west of Gettysburg.
On July 2, the Reserve Brigade was finally relieved of its duty guarding the wagon trains and rode to Emmitsburg, Maryland, only eight miles from the Gettysburg battlefield. It spent the day patrolling and picketing through the mountains. The Regulars camped at Emmitsburg on the night of the 2nd and received orders to ride to the battlefield on the morning of the 3rd.
On the night of July 2, a squadron of the 1st U.S. Cavalry under the command of 30-year-old Capt. Isaac R. Dunkelberger was picketing a road on the lookout for Confederate cavalry. Dunkelberger, a Pennsylvanian who earned a promotion to captain by the time of Brandy Station on June 9, posted some 20 men in advance of a fork in the road, set up other vidette posts manned by at least six or eight men each, and spent the night visiting each position. "On visiting my largest and most important post," he recalled, "I found to my surprise and horror, every man lying on the ground dead drunk. I replaced the pickets with other men, packed the drunken men back on horses, placed them under arrest and put a guard over them, and expected to prefer charges with a view of setting a terrible example of their misconduct." Before he could do so, however, orders to move to Gettysburg came through. Dunkelberger forgot the courtmartial charges; all of the men would be needed soon.
By this time Buford's other two brigades were guarding the Army of the Potomac's wagon trains in Westminster, Maryland. After being engaged heavily much of the day on July 1, Buford's pair of brigades withdrew from Gettysburg on Meade's orders to guard the army's lines of communications and supply at the critical railhead at Westminster. This duty gave Buford an opportunity to rest and reorganize his worn-out command. As a result, Merritt's brigade was not attached to any command when it broke camp early on the morning of July 3 and began the short ride to Gettysburg via the Emmitsburg Road. The brigade arrived in the Gettysburg area about 11:00 a.m. and, minus the 6th U.S. Cavalry, which was temporarily assigned to Cavalry Corps headquarters, was attached to Judson Kilpatrick's command for the rest of the battle.
A Hell of a Damned Fool: Brigadier General Judson Kilpatrick
The only other Union cavalry command on the main battlefield at Gettysburg was a single brigade from Brig. Gen. Hugh Judson Kilpatrick's Third Division. Kilpatrick, a 27-year-old West Pointer, was a year behind Merritt at the academy but got his general's star earlier. A native of New Jersey, Kilpatrick was born the son of a farmer on January 14, 1836. He had little formal education but still received an appointment to West Point in 1856 and graduated in the May class of 1861. "His ambition was simply boundless," recalled a fellow cadet, "and from his intimates he did not disguise his faith that ... he would become governor of New Jersey, and ultimately president of the United States."
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "Gettysburg's Forgotten Cavalry Actions"
by .
Copyright © 2011 Eric J. Wittenberg.
Excerpted by permission of Savas Beatie LLC.
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