" Longstreet's Charge " And Other Mysteries Left Us By July, 1863's Eyewitness Edwin Forbes

JPK Huson 1863

Brev. Brig. Gen'l
Joined
Feb 14, 2012
Location
Central Pennsylvania
artist longstreet charge july 3.JPG

' Longstreet's Charge ', as documented by eye witness Edwin Forbes. We don't have Forbe's 'key', the numbered positions he used to write of the scene. Love to fill in so many questions from this eye witness document. What is Forbe's indicating by those numbers and why do era artists and writers refer to ' Longstreet's Charge ' intead of ' Pickett's '?

Yes, it's artwork and a whole lot of questions I keep running into era and images post-war of that awful day's assault on Union lines. It's famous for a reason, every foot marched into death, every hour-long second endured and every position forever marked in History.

Please ( please? ) may we not devolve into ancient contention over Longstreet? He was a decent guy doing his job the same way Webb and Cushing and Hancock and Meade and hundreds of others were, watching that mile and more of men come at them. On him lay responsibility and the poor man knew it.

Waud, Forbes and anyone else recording those blood drenched moments refer to " Longstreet's Charge ". Not to take a thing from Pickett ( who lived through it and must have been astonished every day from July 3rd 1863 until his death ), how did it become ' his '?

artist longstreet charge july 3 key 2.jpg

Snip, numbers, Culp's Hill and a battery- what do the numbers indicate?

The other question is- what is Forbe's numbered key, please? These war correspondents wrote articles and sent both back to Harper's or Leslie's, news of the war. We have countless eye witness images thanks to them. Everything from hospital scenes to men falling in battle to pickets to old mules- and a few from July, 1863.

artist longstreet charge july 3 key 1.jpg

3 ( over a nice clump of trees ), 8, 1, 6 and another 8- anyone know?
 
why do era artists and writers refer to ' Longstreet's Charge ' intead of ' Pickett's '?
Probably because until the Virginia 'lobby' of the Southern Historical Society began to control the narrative, everyone knew it as 'Longstreet's Charge'.
 
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