George Meade, The Life and Letters of George Gordon Meade, Major-General United States Army
George Gordon Meade, Ed.

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[401] that time they had the moral support of the controlling element of the Committee on the Conduct of the War, free access to all the records of the War Department, and ample opportunity to confer with all the officers of the Army of the Potomac who had been present at the battle of Gettysburg; and, during the last ten years, have had the decided advantage that he whose reputation is assailed has lain dead in his grave, yet, as Mr. Swinton says, in his ‘Campaigns of the Army of the Potomac,’ when referring to the late work of General Doubleday, he ‘does not produce one scintilla of testimony in support of his accusation,’ to refute which assertion is the ostensible motive of General Doubleday's late letter.

In order to show how utterly inconsistent all General Meade's actions were with any such intention as that ascribed to him by General Doubleday, it is necessary to take a retrospective view of what occurred just previous to the time specified by General Doubleday.

On the evening of July 1, 1863, General Meade was at Taneytown, distant from Gettysburg about thirteen miles. He had made every exertion to hasten the troops to the front, and was preparing to go to Gettysburg in person, when General Hancock, just returned from the front, reported to him. That officer's report as to the advantages of the ground for fighting a battle there, and as to the dispositions that had been made, confirmed him in his intention of fighting there, and determined him upon proceeding at once to that place. He sent out additional orders, urging the rapid advance of the corps which had not yet reached Gettysburg, and soon afterward started for the front, arriving at the Cemetery about 1 A. M., July 2, stopping for a few moments only on the way, to order General Gibbon, temporarily commanding the Second Corps, to move forward as soon as it was daylight. After a conference with General Howard and other officers, as soon as objects could be distinguished, General Meade made a personal inspection of the lines. He fully approved of the position as selected, and issued his orders for the posting of the various corps as soon as they should arrive upon the field. At 9.30 A. M., the Fifth Corps having in the mean time arrived and been posted on the right of the Twelfth Corps, General Meade sent a despatch to General Slocum to examine at once the ground in his front with reference to the practicability of attacking the enemy in that quarter. At 10 A. M. this was followed by an order to General Slocum to make arrangements for an attack from his front with his own and the Fifth Corps. General Meade expressed his intention to General Slocum that this should be a ‘strong and decisive attack,’ which he would order made as soon as he received definite information of the approach of the Sixth Corps, which corps he intended should cooperate in the attack. The attack contemplated was, however, abandoned, owing to the fact that General Slocum, as also General Warren, General Meade's Chief Engineer, who had been sent to confer with General Slocum, advised against it. General Meade then decided to move the Fifth Corps to the left as soon as the Sixth Corps had arrived, and to attack from that wing, providing that the enemy did not in the mean time attack. The