Gettysburg 1863: High Tide of the Confederacy

The Confederate invasion of the Northern states in 1863 was General Lee's last great gamble. By taking the war to the Union he hoped to force Lincoln into peace negotiations, or win support from the European powers who were watching events closely from across the Atlantic. Equally, Meade's Army of the Potomac needed to regain it's fighting credibility after the setbacks of Fredericksburg and saw this as an opportunity to redeem its honour. With three years behind them, North and South both boasted professional armies. The clash of 150,000 soldiers from both sides would ultimately decide the fate of the nation. Although losses were similar in number, the relative cost to the South was greater because they could not afford to lose the same number of men as the Union. Carl Smith examines the bloody four days of Gettysburg, at which almost one in five participants died, and gives readers to an in-depth examination of this critical battle of the American Civil War.