I'm so glad you also stressed the importance of Vicksburg. I think people can get so caught up in Gettysburg that they miss the fact that Vicksburg was the real dagger in the heart of the South. The war was won by the North on those couple days in July.
The reason to fight in Pennsylvania, in addition to getting fresh supplies and hoping to hasten an end to the war with a spectacular victory on Northern soil, was to get to Harrisburg, which was a major rail and troop training center, and cause a major disruption to the Union Army supply and troop transport. His scouts got as far as Camp Hill which was just across the Susquehanna River from Harrisburg.
The capture or threatening the capture of Harrisburg was bate. This was an idea born from the history of the AoP moving at glacial speeds. Of course, Lee became disabused of this idea when Longstreet's paid spy informed them the the AoP was much closer and that Meade was in charge.
I love your coverage of history. I discovered you this week. The emancipation proclamation also decreed that all slaves in areas of the south under Union control was now Union property and they were set free. One of the consequences of this is that huge African American caravans would travel with Union troops. By the way Lincoln and Churchill are the two men I consider the greatest men of the last millennia
Not a small quibble at all. I’m very disappointed with the treatment of the American Civil War by the rest is history. If a historian doesn’t know what a split rail fence is and looks like, what does he really know about the tactics and strategy of this war
Two points to note: 1) An absolutely enormous blemish against Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia was the fact that they literally kidnapped freed black Pennsylvanians during the Gettysburg campaign and hauled them back with them on their retreat into bondage. That abhorrent behavior is rarely brought up regarding the supposedly gentlemanly myth of the Southern officer corps. 2) Meade didn't arrive on the battlefield until the end of the first day, which left operational field command of the Union forces in the hands of a general by the name of Abner Doubleday. Decades later, this same Abner Doubleday would retroactively (and falsely) be declared by Major League Baseball to have been the inventor of baseball. So good old mythological Abner is to blame for cricket's downfall over here.
I think the notion that even foreign intervention would have helped the south’s odds is a vastly overstated view. Backing the south at this time would have been making a commitment to a total loss of resources without much upside in the event of a win & no chance of ever recouping those resources. You also had 90 years of industrial development in the US between the revolution & the civil war. It was a well established economic power at this point with armies gearing up to hundreds of thousands. It was a logistical nightmare for both England & France during the revolution. It would have been doubly so at this point & for far less to gain. Basically, it was never going to happen anyway.
I think that is only true on a martial level. Much in the same way the uk definitely could of won in the us revolution the continental army got the uk to the position where there wasn't the political will power in the uk to continue. Victories like this have occurred at many points in history but it is basically impossible to predict at what stage one side will expend its domestic political capital. In five years I'm sure we will look back on ukraine and either think they never had a chance or it was obvous that after x amount of russian deaths that the war would be untenable for the kremlin to sustain
Picket's charge was crazy and suicidal. Lee not having Stonewall Jackson to coordinate the strategy was crucial. Ewell and A.P. Hill didn't have the strategic capabilities that Jackson did.
Re: 23:20 "But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate-we can not consecrate-we can not hallow-this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract." - Abraham Lincoln
I find nothing romantic about the Civil War and especially the Confederacy. Many people over the years have tried to whitewash and romanticize the Confederacy and their cause. General Grant summed up the reality of the situation as good as anybody who was there: “I felt like anything rather than rejoicing at the downfall of a foe who had fought so long and valiantly, and had suffered so much for a cause, though that cause was, I believe, one of the worst for which a people ever fought, and one for which there was the least excuse.”
Not all Irish immigrants were against the war. About 180,00 fought for the Union. A substantial contribution. Conversely, about 20,000 fought for the confederacy. Why they failed to point this out while rightly siting Irish violence against black people in New York is beyond me. Perhaps it isn’t their cup of tea. Still, I do love the podcast.
I personally disagree with the assessment that Pickett's charge wasn't doomed. They had to cross a mile+ of open terrain under fire in full view of the Union Army. It was a reverse situation of Fredericksburg, where Lee shattered a Union army that tried to do the same thing under similar circumstances. Lee needs to be called out for his victory disease here. Pickett's charge was 10x worse of a decision than Grant's greatest blunder at Cold Harbor.
Custer has been credited with an important contribution to the Union victory (of avoidance of defeat) at Gettysburg. It is said that he led two or three cavalry charges which were significant in the Union victory. Is this fair comment or exaggeration?
Been to Gettysburg a couple times and watching reenactments with a thousand actors and realizing there were 100 times that many soldiers on those fields in 1863
The angle at Gettysburg was to the Union, What Arnolds order for Morgan's sharpshooter to target general Simon Fraser was to the continental army at Saratoga. If the confederacy had been able to break the Union line and rout the army of the Potomac, or even just be seen to win the battle then The British and the French and the other European powers who had a vested interest in seeing The United States of America's power in the western hemisphere broken, would have finally offered to arbitrage a truce and it would have essentially been an ultimatum as the alternative would be war with the European powers as well and the blockade of the US Navy which would prevent our blockade of the south and force us to either fight the world or give up the south. The European powers could demand massive concessions in land and revision of the Monroe doctrine by the confederacy in order to help them and the same from the united states in order to end the war and not lose everything in the armistace. At the battle of Saratoga if General Simon Fraser had not been killed on Arnold the traitors orders, we would have lost the battle the British would have routed Gates and marched on Albany taking control of the Hudson, splitting the northern colonies from the middle and south and isolating the heart of the rebellion meaning we would have been defeated. In both instances the US could have lost everything in one battle but gained everything instead.
"Jackson has lost his left arm and I have lost my right arm" -- Robert E. Lee. Jackson died anyway. The place where he died is a national park site which up until recently was called "the Stonewall Jackson shrine." They changed the name to "the Stonewall Jackson death site." :)
The point of this conversation seems to be to explain why anyone ever rejected Britain and the British empire ever in anyway anywhere in the world. Subtle cultural arrogance is all the Brits have left, so they are clinging to it.
We had no choice but to give the confederate armies and the average fighter and even the generals good terms because if we had made it a bloody peace, they would simply pass into Appalachia and hunker down for guerilla war. A war that large armies and lots of material power in the shape of weapons and technology cannot win. A war that after a short time, prace on easy terms or any terms other than annihilation become impossible. Lincoln knew this and so did Lee and Davis. We smart Yankees are thankfully that in the end, the southern rebels saw Lee as the man where the buck stopped and not Davis. Davis was a bitter and vainglorious man. He was a spiteful man. He was the exact opposite in character and action to Abraham Lincoln. I believe Davis through the confederate secret service knew about and let happen the Assassination of President Lincoln. I know that Davis wanted to initiate a guerilla war by disbanding the armies and giving each man weapons and a mandate to carry on a war of attrition in the south using Appalachia as a base to melt into. Lee was not of that ilk and willing to have his army and the others who would do as he did, reassimilate into their legal station as US citizens. Lee was better than he gets credit for if only for that. Few rebels are so willing to give up being a rebel and few nations so willing to take them back, but they are ours and we theirs. We fought the war so as to prevent their leaving, we could not make coming back so hard that they would give up hope and keep fighting.
I disagree with the (commonly held) idea that the battle of Gettysburg broke the myth of Lee’s invincibility. That’s a creation of history written years later. As late as the summer of 1864 both union and confederate officers refer to Lee as a man who has never been beaten in battle. It would seem that at least during the war, Gettysburg was seen (particularly in the south) as similar to Antietam (a tactical draw). It only become the turning point of the war in hindsight, but the confederates still thought they could win as late as fall/early winter of 1864
It is an unmistakable loss when you are forced to retreat and leave your opponent in control of the field of battle. What officers were still referring to Lee as unbeaten? It certainly wasn't General Pickett.
@@curtkoehn3906 I agree it’s obviously a loss. Historian Gary Gallagher though extensively documents that it generally didn’t impact the perception of Lee amongst his men or among the Union by and large. I’m no civil war historian by any stretch, but Gallagher provides mountains of primary sources post-Gettysburg to back up this claim
A collab between the Rest Is History and Drunk History would be epic!
I'm so glad you also stressed the importance of Vicksburg. I think people can get so caught up in Gettysburg that they miss the fact that Vicksburg was the real dagger in the heart of the South. The war was won by the North on those couple days in July.
Vicksburg was Grant's masterpiece of strategy and determination.
The reason to fight in Pennsylvania, in addition to getting fresh supplies and hoping to hasten an end to the war with a spectacular victory on Northern soil, was to get to Harrisburg, which was a major rail and troop training center, and cause a major disruption to the Union Army supply and troop transport. His scouts got as far as Camp Hill which was just across the Susquehanna River from Harrisburg.
The capture or threatening the capture of Harrisburg was bate. This was an idea born from the history of the AoP moving at glacial speeds. Of course, Lee became disabused of this idea when Longstreet's paid spy informed them the the AoP was much closer and that Meade was in charge.
I love your coverage of history. I discovered you this week. The emancipation proclamation also decreed that all slaves in areas of the south under Union control was now Union property and they were set free. One of the consequences of this is that huge African American caravans would travel with Union troops.
By the way Lincoln and Churchill are the two men I consider the greatest men of the last millennia
Loving these.
A small quibble, the fences were rail fences, not picket fences.
Not a small quibble at all. I’m very disappointed with the treatment of the American Civil War by the rest is history. If a historian doesn’t know what a split rail fence is and looks like, what does he really know about the tactics and strategy of this war
Two points to note:
1) An absolutely enormous blemish against Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia was the fact that they literally kidnapped freed black Pennsylvanians during the Gettysburg campaign and hauled them back with them on their retreat into bondage. That abhorrent behavior is rarely brought up regarding the supposedly gentlemanly myth of the Southern officer corps.
2) Meade didn't arrive on the battlefield until the end of the first day, which left operational field command of the Union forces in the hands of a general by the name of Abner Doubleday. Decades later, this same Abner Doubleday would retroactively (and falsely) be declared by Major League Baseball to have been the inventor of baseball. So good old mythological Abner is to blame for cricket's downfall over here.
I think this gentleman drastically overstates the CSA's odds of winning the war without foreign intervention.
I think the notion that even foreign intervention would have helped the south’s odds is a vastly overstated view. Backing the south at this time would have been making a commitment to a total loss of resources without much upside in the event of a win & no chance of ever recouping those resources. You also had 90 years of industrial development in the US between the revolution & the civil war. It was a well established economic power at this point with armies gearing up to hundreds of thousands. It was a logistical nightmare for both England & France during the revolution. It would have been doubly so at this point & for far less to gain. Basically, it was never going to happen anyway.
Agreed
Yeah there wasn't much of a chance for them to win the war without without foreign intervention
I think that is only true on a martial level. Much in the same way the uk definitely could of won in the us revolution the continental army got the uk to the position where there wasn't the political will power in the uk to continue. Victories like this have occurred at many points in history but it is basically impossible to predict at what stage one side will expend its domestic political capital.
In five years I'm sure we will look back on ukraine and either think they never had a chance or it was obvous that after x amount of russian deaths that the war would be untenable for the kremlin to sustain
"Self-emancipation" - I love that word!
Picket's charge was crazy and suicidal. Lee not having Stonewall Jackson to coordinate the strategy was crucial. Ewell and A.P. Hill didn't have the strategic capabilities that Jackson did.
Re: 23:20 "But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate-we can not consecrate-we can not hallow-this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract." - Abraham Lincoln
Damn I welled up instantly. Thank you to my sixth grade teacher for having made us recite it in 1969.
I find nothing romantic about the Civil War and especially the Confederacy. Many people over the years have tried to whitewash and romanticize the Confederacy and their cause. General Grant summed up the reality of the situation as good as anybody who was there:
“I felt like anything rather than rejoicing at the downfall of a foe who had fought so long and valiantly, and had suffered so much for a cause, though that cause was, I believe, one of the worst for which a people ever fought, and one for which there was the least excuse.”
....free Palestine
I hear some people get a high feeling of ecstasy and grandeur when engaged in virtue signaling. Is it true?
What kind of emotions do you feel when supporting the slavers?
Not all Irish immigrants were against the war. About 180,00 fought for the Union. A substantial contribution. Conversely, about 20,000 fought for the confederacy. Why they failed to point this out while rightly siting Irish violence against black people in New York is beyond me. Perhaps it isn’t their cup of tea. Still, I do love the podcast.
I personally disagree with the assessment that Pickett's charge wasn't doomed. They had to cross a mile+ of open terrain under fire in full view of the Union Army.
It was a reverse situation of Fredericksburg, where Lee shattered a Union army that tried to do the same thing under similar circumstances. Lee needs to be called out for his victory disease here. Pickett's charge was 10x worse of a decision than Grant's greatest blunder at Cold Harbor.
Pickett's charge had no chance to succeed.
Custer has been credited with an important contribution to the Union victory (of avoidance of defeat) at Gettysburg. It is said that he led two or three cavalry charges which were significant in the Union victory. Is this fair comment or exaggeration?
Listen to the Podcasts on Custer by the same duo of historians.
Been to Gettysburg a couple times and watching reenactments with a thousand actors and realizing there were 100 times that many soldiers on those fields in 1863
FIRST! Well done, gentlemen - well done!
The angle at Gettysburg was to the Union, What Arnolds order for Morgan's sharpshooter to target general Simon Fraser was to the continental army at Saratoga.
If the confederacy had been able to break the Union line and rout the army of the Potomac, or even just be seen to win the battle then The British and the French and the other European powers who had a vested interest in seeing The United States of America's power in the western hemisphere broken, would have finally offered to arbitrage a truce and it would have essentially been an ultimatum as the alternative would be war with the European powers as well and the blockade of the US Navy which would prevent our blockade of the south and force us to either fight the world or give up the south.
The European powers could demand massive concessions in land and revision of the Monroe doctrine by the confederacy in order to help them and the same from the united states in order to end the war and not lose everything in the armistace.
At the battle of Saratoga if General Simon Fraser had not been killed on Arnold the traitors orders, we would have lost the battle the British would have routed Gates and marched on Albany taking control of the Hudson, splitting the northern colonies from the middle and south and isolating the heart of the rebellion meaning we would have been defeated. In both instances the US could have lost everything in one battle but gained everything instead.
In the Age of Trump, the Gettysburg address brings tears to my eyes. It is that powerful to a thinking and feeling American.
TDS much? .. there is help , please get some. 😊
The influence of Thomas Parker is found in the Gettysburg address.
I apologize you did say something about Vicksburg I apologize
You should have mentioned that the rioters also resented that wealthy men could pay a $300 commutation fee to avoid being drafted.
"Jackson has lost his left arm and I have lost my right arm" -- Robert E. Lee. Jackson died anyway. The place where he died is a national park site which up until recently was called "the Stonewall Jackson shrine." They changed the name to "the Stonewall Jackson death site." :)
I think you Brits are missing the point don't forget about Vicksburg
Hi Shane 👋
Gettysburg could be won by the South, and nothing would have change
The point of this conversation seems to be to explain why anyone ever rejected Britain and the British empire ever in anyway anywhere in the world. Subtle cultural arrogance is all the Brits have left, so they are clinging to it.
>The Empire will strike back ..
Didn't we (the British regulars) arm black Americans during our fratricidal kerfuffle 90 years or so earlier?
We had no choice but to give the confederate armies and the average fighter and even the generals good terms because if we had made it a bloody peace, they would simply pass into Appalachia and hunker down for guerilla war. A war that large armies and lots of material power in the shape of weapons and technology cannot win.
A war that after a short time, prace on easy terms or any terms other than annihilation become impossible.
Lincoln knew this and so did Lee and Davis.
We smart Yankees are thankfully that in the end, the southern rebels saw Lee as the man where the buck stopped and not Davis.
Davis was a bitter and vainglorious man. He was a spiteful man. He was the exact opposite in character and action to Abraham Lincoln.
I believe Davis through the confederate secret service knew about and let happen the Assassination of President Lincoln. I know that Davis wanted to initiate a guerilla war by disbanding the armies and giving each man weapons and a mandate to carry on a war of attrition in the south using Appalachia as a base to melt into.
Lee was not of that ilk and willing to have his army and the others who would do as he did, reassimilate into their legal station as US citizens.
Lee was better than he gets credit for if only for that.
Few rebels are so willing to give up being a rebel and few nations so willing to take them back, but they are ours and we theirs.
We fought the war so as to prevent their leaving, we could not make coming back so hard that they would give up hope and keep fighting.
I disagree with the (commonly held) idea that the battle of Gettysburg broke the myth of Lee’s invincibility. That’s a creation of history written years later. As late as the summer of 1864 both union and confederate officers refer to Lee as a man who has never been beaten in battle. It would seem that at least during the war, Gettysburg was seen (particularly in the south) as similar to Antietam (a tactical draw). It only become the turning point of the war in hindsight, but the confederates still thought they could win as late as fall/early winter of 1864
It is an unmistakable loss when you are forced to retreat and leave your opponent in control of the field of battle. What officers were still referring to Lee as unbeaten? It certainly wasn't General Pickett.
@@curtkoehn3906 I agree it’s obviously a loss. Historian Gary Gallagher though extensively documents that it generally didn’t impact the perception of Lee amongst his men or among the Union by and large. I’m no civil war historian by any stretch, but Gallagher provides mountains of primary sources post-Gettysburg to back up this claim
William Cuthbert Faulkner is a great writer and a complete shit (in a Martin Luther sort of what) in what it would cost in human lives.