American Civil War Game Club (ACWGC)

Kennon,

Make that into a scenario. That sounds like a tough one for the Yanks. Set it up as a full battle, large map, all day. [:D]

MG Al "Ambushed" Amos, Commanding Officer
4th "Amos' Ambushers" Bde, 1st Div, XX Corps, AoC, USA

Unless I'm completely mistaken, Sickles arrived with 2/3 of III Corps later afternoon of July 1. Gibbon brought II corps up that evening, and camped just southeast of BRT that same night. (Staying there in case of the turning movement that we speak of here.)

Of course, I can't argue that Longstreet was sulky, and did drag his feet. I just can't seem to find a way that the rebs win after July 1st. I'd tend to lay the blame more at Stuart's feet. Who knows if the battle even takes place at Gettysburg if he's present, and doing his job. Also, those 3 days weren't Lee's best. Again though, I can't see what he could have done, that he didn't do, save, bringing Ewell over to the west side of town. Then he could have made this attack with both Ewell, and Longstreet. Who can say how that turns out?

I like this discussion. I'm a huge Gettysburg fanatic, have been there close to 100 times, and totally love the what if aspect of it. Maybe I'll get to work on a scenario with Ewell having been moved around to Hill's right...how long do you fellas think it would have taken to get Ewell there? I'll have to look and see what time Lee went to visit him, and maybe start him out from there...thoughts?

"General Sickles, this is in some respects higher ground than that to the rear, but there is still higher in front of you, and if you keep on advancing you will find constantly higher ground all the way to the mountains."
-Major General George Meade, Commanding the Army of the Potomac, July 2, 1863

Lt. General Rusty Hodgkiss
VIII AoS
[img][IMG]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v660/mongohuey/generalhodge.jpg[/img]

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<blockquote id="quote"><font size="3" face="book antiqua" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Maybe I'll get to work on a scenario with Ewell having been moved around to Hill's right...how long do you fellas think it would have taken to get Ewell there? I'll have to look and see what time Lee went to visit him, and maybe start him out from there...thoughts?
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

Hmmmm...a movement on that size would take a while to complete. It might simply have been easier to slide Hill down and put Ewell in his place. Johnson's division could be shunted over before he's even taken up position, provided that Lee though of this early enough. However, I doubt that Lee would move all of Ewell over since he still needed a flank. The trouble is, the ground over there isn't all that good with the exception of Benner's Hill, and it would be too isolated. Also, I may be mistaken about this, but Lee had by that time a vague idea of where Stuart was, and so he needed to keep a force available in that direction for a link up.

Even if that isn't much of a factor, you would need to factor the Union reaction in. Ewell's removal from that flank allows Geary to remain on the left and frees up Williams to join him, adding an extra 8000 or so men to defend. The second corps can take its historical position, and the fifth corps can head directly to the Union left rather than waiting near Power's Hill. Meade would also pay much more attention to the actions of his corps commanders on the flank (Sickles). In fact, Ewell's movement could mean that the Union has more men on hand face the attack.

At any rate, for the movement to be effective in any way, Lee would have to make that decision the night before, allowing Johnston to march directly into position and probably be joined by Rodes, allowing Early to keep watch over the Union flank. The surprise would be lost the moment the sun came up, and unless the Confederate player wants to attack without Longstreet, the Union player will more than likely have rearranged his lines to place most of his men on the left.

Lt. Dylan McCartney
IV Brigade/ I Division
XIV Corps
Army of the Cumberland
Union Army

I'm pretty sure, but I'm going to have to get out Pfanz' books and see exactly when, that Lee, at some point during the night of the 1st/2nd, order Ewell to bring everyone over to the other side of town. Ewell talked him out of it, saying that patrols had reported Culp's Hill as being undefended.

I'm not certain that Meade would have known immediately where Ewell had gone. There was no cavalry on that flank. He'd have had to make a recon with infantry. (The bonus of Stuart being away from Lee's army, is that the Union cavalry was off chasing him.)

Thanks for the reply.

"General Sickles, this is in some respects higher ground than that to the rear, but there is still higher in front of you, and if you keep on advancing you will find constantly higher ground all the way to the mountains."
-Major General George Meade, Commanding the Army of the Potomac, July 2, 1863

Lt. General Rusty Hodgkiss
VIII AoS
[img][IMG]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v660/mongohuey/generalhodge.jpg[/img]

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It is very hard to pin down where everyone was during the morning of the second day since no actions occurred making it worth people's while to research it. Coddington's The Gettysburg Campaign talks a little about it saying:

Birney with two brigades did arrive on the battle field at dusk. Humphrey and his two brigades got misdirected to Blackhorse Tavern where at dusk they found already occupied by Rebels. They back marched to Taneytown Road and it looks like they camped somewhere south of the Round Tops along with II Corps. The two missing brigades failed to get orders until late and didn't arrive about 1 PM.

Meanwhile Sickles didn't like the position he was ordered too and kept his Corps along Taneytown Road behind the ridge until mid morning when Meade finally gave him specific orders to move left of II Corps on Cemetary Ridge's southern end. Early morning Geary's division was in this position but got sent back to Culp's Hill area. In early morning II Corps was still well south of the battlefield but at some point moved up to occupy Cemetary Hill.

V Corps apparently marched all over the far right all morning exhausting itself. Eventually went into reserve near Power's Hill.

While unlike what Freeman says there were a lot of troops nearby even at dawn, most were in reserve or camp and not deployed to receive an attack. It is doubtful considering how poorly the ANV high command was performing that an early attack could be made or would be successful if made, it stood a much better chance of success up to about mid morning that it had at 5 PM with no daylight to exploit any success it made.

It would probably make a good historical study to document all these movements by force not engaged on the first day. There was a huge list of errors made by both sides during the afternoon of the first day, during the night and morning of the second day. But for Lee, the Southern errors insured that the Union errors didn't matter in the long run. The Union II Corps finally got into the right place, Sickles got into the wrong place but with lots of support, the V Corps was finally rested and available, and the VI Corps while exhausted from marching was available as a reserve if things really went bad.

LG. Kennon Whitehead
Chatham Grays
1/1/III AoM (CSA)

I had always toyed with the idea of pulling Ewell back to the west of town and forting him up on Oak Hill / Seminary Ridge, allowing Hill and Longstreet more latitude in their actions on Day 2. On the old TS map, this is fairly feasible because of the size of the map which doesnt really help the Yanks if they should try to turn a Rebel line that is anchored on Oak Hill/Seminary Ridge. The HPS map, at least the one that normally is used for Gettysburg, is far too large to cover all avenues to attack a Rebel line based there.


Lt. Col. Nick DeStefano
IV "Wolf-Pack" Corps, AoM