Civil War Battles of Chancelorsville and Gettysburg

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This is only two battles in the whole Civil War yet countless lives were lost in each one. These battles were only two months apart. The goal of this paper is to give information on these two Civil War battles Chancelorsville and Gettysburg.

The Battle of Chancelorsville

In the Battle of Chancelorsville, Hooker was the Union general and Lee was the Confederate general. Hooker had 130,000 men and Lee had 60,000 men. Hooker had more men and supplies and Lee was outnumbered. Before the battle Hooker said, “May God have mercy on General Lee, for I will have none.” In the morning of May 1, 1863, Hooker was condensing his forces waiting for Lee to attack. That afternoon fighting started, with Hooker and Lee having skirmishes outside of Chancelorsville. Hooker then pulled back to Chancelorsville to wait for Lee to attack. Lee took advantage of this and divided his force. Lee was in charge of one group and he put Jackson in charge of the other group. Lee had 15,000 men and Jackson had 25,000 men. Jackson, the next morning was supposed to attack Hooker’s flank.

On May 2, 1863, 10:00 A.M. Jackson’s force began to move towards Hooker’s flank. Union scouts found Jackson and reported it to Hooker but Hooker thought it was the Confederates retreating. By 3:00 P.M. Jackson had made his way across the Orange Turnpike towards Hooker’s flank. At 5:00 P.M. Jackson’s force attacked Oliver O. Howard 11th Corps near the Wilderness Church. Jackson’s attack was so swift the Union didn’t have time to form a line. By 8:00 P.M. the Union had formed a secondary line. That night when Jackson came back to camp from a scouting mission he was shot by his own guards who didn’t recognize him. Command of Jackson’s portion of the Confederate force then we...

... middle of paper ...

...tt of the Confederates led a charge straight at the Union’s middle in the famous “Pickett’s Charge” across an open field. The attack failed and the Confederates pulled back to the other side to await a counter-attack but it never came. On July 4, 1863 Lee retreated back to Virginia. Over the course of three days the Union lost 23,000 men and the Confederates lost 28,000 men.

This was only a small portion of how many brave men were lost in the American Civil War. It was a big step forward for the United States of American but at very high cost.

Works Cited

Borrit, Garbors. “Civil War.” The World Book Encyclopedia.

1998 ed.

Creason, Pamela B. and Larson, Rachel C. The American Republic for Christian Schools

Greenville: South Carolina, 1988

Symonds, Craig L. A Battle Field Atlas of the Civil War

Baltimore: Maryland, 1983

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