up his success and occupying Cemetery Heights upon the afternoon of July 1st.
Others confidently agree with Colonel Taylor, General Lee's adjutant-general, that "General Longstreet was fairly chargeable with tardiness" on the 2nd July, in not making his attack earlier; and again it is stated, that his charging column upon the 3rd, which moved so magnificently to assault the positions of the Federals, was not composed of all the troops General Lee designed should be placed in it.
And last, but by no means least, the Confederate Commander-in-Chief himself is now for the first time charged with everything relating to the disaster of Gettysburg, and the whole accountability for the results of the battle are pointedly placed upon his shoulders by one of his subordinates, in a paper prepared for the Philadelphia Times. To whom, therefore, it may be asked, can the loss of the battle of Gettysburg be properly attributed—to Stuart, or Ewell, or Longstreet, or to General Lee? Very many of us who are deeply interested in the subject may honorably differ as to that, but upon the splendid courage displayed by the rank and file of the Confederate army upon those three first days in July, 1863, wherever tested, the world unites in perfect harmony.
We were indeed "within a stone's throw of peace" at Gettysburg—and although in numbers as 62,000[1] is to 105,000, before any portion of either army had become engaged—yet the advantages were so manifestly on General Lee's side in consequence of the more rapid concentration of his troops upon a common point, that the heart of every Southern soldier beat with the lofty confidence of certain victory.
Any new light, therefore, thrown upon the matter in discussion, should be well-sifted before permitting it to shine for the benefit of the future historian, less it dazzle by false rays the sympathetic minds of generations yet to come.
The Philadelphia Times of November 3rd, 1877, in commenting upon some additional points furnished that paper by General Longstreet as an addenda to his article published in the same issue, says:
- ↑ Walter Taylor.—The Federal force is overestimated. Their total of all arms was about 90,000. General Humphreys puts, in a letter to me, the Federal infantry at 70,000, inclusive of 5,000 officers.
