How Strong were the Washington Defensive at the time of the Gettysburg Campaign?

The June 30, 1863, troop strength returns for the Department of Washington can be found in the Official Records (Series 1, Volume XXVII, Part 3, page 440. The department commander, MG Samuel P. Heintzelman reported 21,467 officers and men Present for Duty. A breakdown of units follows. The troop returns for the Middle Department (Baltimore area), MG Robert C. Schenck commanding, are found are found on page 444. Those returns show 5090 officer and men in the Baltimore area, plus an additional 10,749 officers and men at Maryland Heights and Frederick MD.
 
At least one regiment (27th Maine) was asked to remain in the fortifications a few days past their expiry date, and for it the whole regiment got Medals of Honor - even the ones who left!
I'm pretty sure the situation was quite serious for that reason.


Heintzelmann's report for June 30 1863 gives 21,500 PFD all told (after removing troops sent to Army of the Potomac) of which
11,000 are the fort garrisons (mostly under Haskin and De Russey)
4,900 are the City Guards for Alexandria and Washington (basically the troops in excess of the fort garrisons)
1,300 is the Artillery Camp of Instruction (12 batteries)
800 is the Railway Guard
2,500 is cavalry
and 1,000 is "Camp Convalescent, Camp Distribution, paroled prisoners and detachment of Pennsylvania Reserves" (which basically amounts to about three regiments of actual formed troops - two PA reserves regiments and the 1st USCT)



Which I think means you can basically model it as:

Fort garrisons (11,000 men who more or less have to stay in the forts to maintain a cordon defence)
And a field force of about 7,000, i.e. an average division (at best) by mid 1863 standards - note that in reality much of this force would be absorbed in bulking out the fort garrisons
plus the cavalry to do scouting.

Effectively this is about as weak as you can safely reduce the defences of Washington, and it's not stable by itself without extra troops in the vicinity as a covering force.
 
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- Brigadier General J.T. Copeland's Brigade (1st, 5th, 6th, 7th Michigan)
- Colonel R. Butler Price's Brigade (Companies A & C, 1st Ohio, 2nd, 18th Pennsylvania, 1st Vermont)
- Colonel O. DeForest's Brigade (5th New York, 1st West Virginia)
Copeland's brigade was given to George Custer. Price's and DeForest's brigades were merged and given to Elon Farnsworth
 
Something which I think is kind of interesting to contemplate is that in September 1862 the Defences of Washington weren't allowed to go down nearly so low. In the 20th September report there were (in PFD)


HQs/staff etc. 459
Garrisons (of forts) 19,349
City guards 3,638
Casey 6,368
Cavalry 1,700
~4,000 PFD in the camp of convalescents, stragglers and recruits
3rd Corps 17,127 PFD
11th Corps 10,299 PFD
Whipple's division 3,834 PFD

For a total of about 66,800.

Imagine the effect it might have had on Gettysburg or the subsequent campaign if the defences of Washington had been not allowed to go below that strength in 1863 - it'd have cost Meade about 45,000 men PFD!
 
Something which I think is kind of interesting to contemplate is that in September 1862 the Defences of Washington weren't allowed to go down nearly so low. In the 20th September report there were (in PFD)


HQs/staff etc. 459
Garrisons (of forts) 19,349
City guards 3,638
Casey 6,368
Cavalry 1,700
~4,000 PFD in the camp of convalescents, stragglers and recruits
3rd Corps 17,127 PFD
11th Corps 10,299 PFD
Whipple's division 3,834 PFD

For a total of about 66,800.

Imagine the effect it might have had on Gettysburg or the subsequent campaign if the defences of Washington had been not allowed to go below that strength in 1863 - it'd have cost Meade about 45,000 men PFD!
Maybe this was because the Third and Eleventh Corps had recently been badly bloodied at Second Manassas, and much of the 3rd Corps' commanders were disabled in the campaign. The senior officer of the Corps remaining from the Campaign, Hooker, was transferred to command McDowell's old 1st Corps.
 
Maybe this was because the Third and Eleventh Corps had recently been badly bloodied at Second Manassas, and much of the 3rd Corps' commanders were disabled in the campaign. The senior officer of the Corps remaining from the Campaign, Hooker, was transferred to command McDowell's old 1st Corps.
I don't think that's all it is, because (1) there's a lot of understrength brigades and divisions in the AotP and loose regiments/brigades respectively that could be used to fill them out without needing new senior commanders, (2) the mauling of 11th Corps etc. at Chancellorsville didn't stop those being kept with the AotP in 1863, and (3) the reasoning used by Halleck for keeping the defences of Washington strong in 1862 was pretty explicitly that he thought there was another Rebel column that might be able to strike at Washington.
 
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