The sun rose on 2 July 1863 with the Army of the Potomac on
the high ground south and east of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. A good stroke of
fortune had allowed Union commanders to find this ground before the conflict
began, and the bulk of the previous day’s fight had been devoted to holding off
the Army of Northern Virginia until the bulk of their forces could arrive.
Now US Maj. Gen. George G. Meade’s forces formed a
fishhook-shaped line starting at Spangler’s Spring and Culp’s Hill to the
southeast, running north to the northernmost point of Cemetery Ridge, then
falling back south along the line of the ridge to fetch up against Little Round
Top. This gave Meade the advantage not only of visibility and artillery range
but also of interior lines, which allowed him to move units and materiel to
reinforce any part of his line without exposing the reinforcements to enemy
fire. By contrast, while the Confederates could move units out of the Federals’
range, the length of their lines, which roughly paralleled the Federals’, meant
reinforcement could be a slow, time-consuming business.
Most of the morning was consumed in consolidating the lines,
as the bulk of both armies arrived on the field. On the positive, from Lee’s
side, was the arrival of Lt. Gen. James “Pete” Longstreet and his First Corps.
Moody, taciturn and profane, Longstreet was a competent, occasionally
brilliant, tactician who became Lee’s right hand after the death of Thomas
“Stonewall” Jackson. However, his corps was missing Maj. Gen. George Pickett’s
division, which would not arrive until after the day’s action. Even more
disturbing was the absence of Maj. Gen. Jeb Stuart’s cavalry; without their
eyes, Lee’s knowledge of the Union dispositions was imprecise. Stuart finally
arrived around noon, but played no part in the day’s action.
Believing the Federal left to lie along Emmetsburg Road, Lee
ordered Longstreet’s corps to flank them en
echelon, a maneuver in which succeeding units attack in intervals to
prevent the enemy from shifting reinforcements. Longstreet disagreed; an
advocate of defensive warfare, he argued that Lee should swing the ANV to
Meade’s south, cut the Federals’ lines and force them to fight on grounds of
Lee’s own choosing. But Lee was determined to fight and defeat Meade where they
were; Longstreet, a career soldier who had served with distinction in Mexico,
eventually accepted his orders.
Lee had left the timing of the attack to Longstreet’s
discretion, which was just as well; as the First Corps was moving into place,
they stumbled upon a Union signal station in their path which could have blown
the plan open. Nor could the soldiers simply about-face and march to the rear;
to preserve the order of attack, the line had to double back on itself. Not
until late afternoon, between 4 and 5 p.m., were the two divisions in place to
attack.
