The Salt Lake tribune. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1890-current, 1913-07-03
GETTYSBURG, THIRD DAY.

The jubilee anniversary of the great
day of battle at Gettysburg is today.
This day fifty years ago saw the crush
ing of the hopes Of the Confederacy,
and when added to this was the great
reverse of the surrender of Vicksburg,
the Jubilee anniversary Of which Will
be tomorrow, there should have been no
more fighting in that war. The fight
ing which came after was simply pro-
longation of the agony.
This day fifty years ago was ushered
in with the rattle oif musketry and the
boom of cannon in the long fight Of the
Union troops to regain the positions
which they had lost the evening before
on Culp's Hill on the Union right.
Large bodies of troops had been de-
tached from the right to aid the left
in the severe fighting Of the previous
day. On their return they found their
entertainments occupied by the Con-
federates, who had proved too strong
for the weakened force left to hod
the line. Seven hours of hard fighting
was necessary to regain the Union po-
sition which had been lost the evening
before
Then came lull in the battle, an
great fight in the afternoon, the charge
of Pickett's and Pettigrew divisions.
which were chiefly fresh troops, aided
by some detached brigades. which were
assembled by General Lee for the great
master stroke which was expected to
win the battle for him. Other Generals
on the field, especially Longstreet, had
no faith in the movement, and pro-.
tested against it. The troops that made
the assault were Of Longstreet's IS corps,
so that he had more direct interest in
the assault than any other corps com
mander. His protest against it was dis
regarded, for Lee had made up his
mind TO undertake the movement. 1t
was the identical movement through
which Napoleon won the great battle
of Wagram, by charge under General
Macdonald with body of $4,000 men,
which smashed the Austrian center and
gave Napoleon the signal victory which
he won or that day. 1t was supposed
that charge of that kind was ire
sistible; but it happened that the
charge was made against the very
strongest position of the Union line,
position which had been strengthened
enormously by Notifications and by the
massing Sf troops and of cannon, all
being placed in position at that point
by General Meade. who OWNED that
the assault from General Lee would
come upon that portion Of the Union
line. The charge was made gallantly
and with tenacity and determination
that would have been supposed to carry
all before it; but il was hurled back in
bloody slaughter, two.thirds of the at
tacking force being killed, wounded
and captured.
That is where the star of the Con
federacy went down. and there does not
seem to be any reason TO doubt but that
General Meade could have followed up
his victory and practically annihilated
Lee g army; but the opportunity was
lost and the war dragged on, yet more
tnOuSdQuS OF N1cIlnS on sdcn size Delng
added TO the long roll of the dead, the
crippled, and the less severely wounded.
The fighting after that was wonderful
example of endurance in the face Of
predestined defeat. but exhibited a
characteristic Of our race, that never
admits defeat until all power of re.
sistance is gone; and so the war
dragged along almost two years more,
with slaughter that was terrible and
destruction and misery most grievous.
The veterans who are assembled on
the battlefield today will doubtless go
over the scene of the great fight Of fifty
years ago. They will trace the lines of
the fight; they will tell their ex.
periences; they will have their own
ideas as to something else which could
| have been done. or speculs,se as to the
result provided some other line of bat
tie had been adopted. 1t will all be