Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 40.djvu/278

 274 after nightfall had been spent on the front picket line, listening to the busy strokes of Union picks and shovels on the line, to the rumble and the tramp of their troops as they were hurried forward by Union commanders and placed in position. There was, therefore, no difficulty in divining the scene that would break on our view with the coming dawn. I did not hesitate to say to both Ewell and Early that a line of heavy earthworks and guns with infantry ranks behind them, would frown upon us at daylight. I expressed the opinion that even at that hour, 2. o'clock A.M., by a concentrated and vigorous night assault we could carry those heights, and that if we waited until morning it would cost us 10,000 men to take them."

Was it not, indeed, extraordinary blindness to wait at the foot of Cemetery hill for 24 hours while the Federal troops were making their lines impregnable before the Confederate forces were led to the attack ? Here then we have to record the failure of still another of General Lee's lieutenants, a fine and gallant soldier. No wonder Colonel McIntosh exclaims in his account of the battle, "A greater military blunder was never committed." There were still three hours of daylight, and Anderson's division was close at hand. (See further facts in Addendum, p. 299.)

The first of the three days' battle of Gettysburg had ended in a brilliant success for the Confederates; but it was a costly victory, for it compelled General Lee to accept the alternative of retreating or fighting; fighting on a field where the Federals had every advantage of position; where they must be assaulted at a great disadvantage whether on the right, or the left flank, or in the center. Whoever has visited the field will recognize the great difficulty of a concerted attack by the forces of Lee, and will also recognize that when Meade was attacked on one side of his line he could hurry troops easily and quickly from another part to its succor, because his position was like a horse- shoe, or rather like a fish hook, and he held the interior line. And yet in my opinion General Lee's decision to attack the Federal army the next day was justified by the situation at nightfall of July 1st.