The four-hour+ Turner classic movie GETTYSBURG was viewed again two days ago. In the late afternoon that day July 2, 1863, Colonel Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain's 20th Maine Regiment made their successful downhill bayonet charge off Little Roundtop just outside Gettysburg, PA. The 20th Maine's exploits that day crushed a nearly successful left flank attack by rebel army units on the Union line. And it was on this day July 4, 1863, that Union Commanding General George Meade allowed the rebel troops under Confederated States of America (CSA) General Robert E. Lee to complete their escape across the Potomac River back into the safety of their home ground in Virginia. A supermajority of folks who study the American Civil War perhaps agree that General U.S. Grant would have followed the retreating rebel forces to re-engage them -- and perhaps ending that bloodiest of all American wars then in that hot summer of 1863. How many thousands of casualties would General Grant's leadership have saved?
General Robert E. Lee in no way accepted the premise that the Confederate Rebellion was lost following those bloody first three days in July 1863 at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania -- one hundred and sixty years past. More Civil War causalities occurred following the Battle of Gettysburg than were suffered before this American Civil War fight. General Lee does not appear to be a broken man as he writes this August 1863 letter from Richmond to his second-in-command top general and his most trusted right-hand man Lieutenant General James Longstreet:
"GENERAL, I have wished for several days past to return to the army, but have been detained by the President. He will not listen to my proposition to leave to-morrow. I hope you will use every exertion to prepare the army for offensive operations, and improve the condition of our men and animals. I can see nothing better to be done than to endeavor to bring General Meade out and use our efforts to crush his army while in its present condition."
R. E. LEE
General.
