Why Gettysburg? The Civil War in 1863

May 1863.

Once again, victorious Confederate General Robert E. Lee and his Army of Northern Virginia have handed the Union cause another major defeat at Chancellorsville. And that's a good place to start understanding how Gettysburg came about.

Considered by many to be Lee's tactical masterpiece, the Chancellorsville campaign began in late April and would not end until May 6, when the Army of the Potomac under Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker retreated after being repeatedly attacked and outgeneraled.

"Fighting Joe" Hooker was but one of the many Union generals who suffered at the hands of Lee. The last Union debacle occurred at Fredericksburg the previous December, where Maj. Gen. Ambrose E. Burnside (notable for his prominent sideburns) led the Army of the Potomac to a bloody defeat with his series of headlong attacks against an impregnable Rebel position. The final straw for President Abraham Lincoln arrived a few weeks later in January when Burnside's army bogged down in the the winter mud in yet another failed effort to get at Lee's Virginia army. Burnside was out.

In his ongoing search for a general who could win against Lee, Lincoln decided on Joe Hooker, a bachelor with a penchant for the ladies and a host of vices — swearing, gambling, and alcohol among them. (While "hooker" is much older than our general's taste for the companionship of females of questionable character, the term is still frequently associated with his name.) The origin of his appellation "Fighting Joe" was the result of a bad pick-up by a typesetter of a newspaper reporter's dispatch that read: "Fighting — Joe Hooker ..." The Northern press, naturally enough, seized upon the nickname "Fighting Joe" and ran with it. It is said Hooker disliked it, though that seems doubtful. General Lee — a man not widely known for his sense of humor — took a malicious delight in referring to his opponent as "Mr. F. J. Hooker."

In the spring of 1863, Hooker led an army of some 130,000 men against Lee's roughly 60,000 strong. (Much of Lee's First Corps under James Longstreet was away in southeastern Virginia, leaving Lee to operate solely on the defensive.) When Hooker stole a wide march around the Confederate left flank, Lee boldly divided his army to meet him. He left a small part at Fredericksburg to watch Federals hovering there and marched westward to confront the bulk of Hooker's command in the tangles of the Wilderness around Chancellorsville Inn, a crossroads with little more than the brick mansion.

Lee seized the initiative and sent Lt. Gen. Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson's corps marching around Hooker's exposed right flank. Jackson attacked and crushed Maj. Gen. Oliver O. Howard's XI Corps in a bold surprise attack, but was accidentally wounded by his own men on the evening of his greatest triumph. During ferocious fighting the next day, Hooker was knocked temporarily senseless by a cannonball that smashed into the porch upon which he was standing. When Federals broke through at Fredericksburg and marched against Lee's rear, the Southern general split his army yet again and turned to meet the new threat at Salem Church. The heavy fighting killed and wounded thousands across the sprawling front. With his confidence shattered, Hooker — even though a large portion of his army had yet to fire a shot — withdrew across the Rappahannock River, giving Lee what many consider to this day to have been his most spectacular victory.

Lee's victory at Chancellorsville, however, was costly for the South. At the height of his greatest success, Stonewall Jackson was wounded by friendly fire. His arm was amputated (and buried on a farm near the battlefield), and it appeared as though he would make a full recovery. Pneumonia set in, however, and he died just one week later. When he learned of Jackson's wounds, Lee lamented, "Jackson has lost his left arm, but I have lost my right." Stonewall's death was an irreparable loss to the Confederate cause.

Late May 1863. Lee has reorganized his army from two corps into three, and reinforcements have swelled his ranks. Despite the loss of Stonewall, he decides for the second time to invade Union territory. The first thrust north, undertaken after Second Manassas in September 1862, ended in the bloodbath in Maryland known in the North as Antietam and in the South as Sharpsburg. (It was the general practice for the Union to name battles after a geographic feature — usually a river — near where the battle was fought, while the Confederates named battles after communities closest to the fighting. Thus the Union battles of First and Second Bull Run (a stream) are the same as theConfederacy's First and Second Manassas (a community). Occasionally, however, the warring sides settled on the same name — like Gettysburg.)

By mid-1863, the South is seriously feeling the strain of the war. A long war it is not equipped to fight and win. As far as Lee is concerned, only a battlefield triumph on Northern soil will quickly bring it to a close. This time around Lee's goal is to move through Maryland and into Pennsylvania, where he hopes to threaten its capital Harrisburg, as well as Philadelphia, Baltimore, and perhaps even Washington itself. Lee expects one or two more major victories — especially on Northern soil — to finally swing European support behind the Confederacy.

Strategically, he hopes to draw the Army of the Potomac into a tiring pursuit and turn and defeat it piece-by-piece on favorable terrain of his choosing. Despite a steady string of Union victories in the Western Theater (that area of the country between the Appalachian Mountains and the Mississippi River), enthusiasm for the conflict is waning in the North. The numerous defeats at the hands of Lee's army and growing casualty lists are exhausting Lincoln's people. Lee's confident troops believe they can whip the Army of the Potomac anywhere they meet it. Even without a major battle, the invasion will give the Confederates access to the lush and prosperous Pennsylvania farms while relieving the pressure on hard-pressed Virginia, which has...