General Robert E. Lee’s army entered the Battle of Gettysburg blind, and Confederate artillerist Colonel Edward Porter Alexander believed that blindness was the central reason the South lost the engagement—and with it, any realistic chance of winning the Civil War. The problems began before the first shot was fired on July 1, 1863. On June 22, as the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia marched into Pennsylvania, Lee ordered his cavalry commander, General J.
E. B. Stuart, to screen the army’s movements and guard mountain passes. Instead, Stuart pushed far east of the main force on a raid to seize supplies and disrupt Union operations.
His command did not rejoin Lee until late on July 2—two days into the battle. Without Stuart’s cavalry, Lee was effectively blind. Cavalry units were the army’s eyes and ears, scouting enemy positions and movements. Their absence left Lee unable to make informed decisions at a critical moment.
Alexander later condemned Stuart’s detour as a massive strategic error, arguing that cavalry should have stayed close to the main army for mutual support. Historians continue to debate whether Stuart misinterpreted his orders or deliberately exceeded them, but the result was the same: Lee entered the battle without reconnaissance. The consequences were immediate. On June 30, Confederate Brigadier General Harry Heth advanced toward Gettysburg on a mission to secure shoes for Lee’s army.
Intelligence suggested the town was held only by militia, so no serious resistance was expected. Instead, Heth’s men clashed with Union Brigadier General John Buford’s Federal cavalry, which was already dug into strong defensive positions. Despite being outnumbered, Buford’s troops held their ground, buying time for Union reinforcements to arrive. Heth withdrew and returned the next morning with his full division, supported by Dorsey Pender’s division in reserve.
When Heth and Pender’s combined force of about 12,000 men finally engaged on July 1, they faced a reinforced Union army of roughly 23,000 soldiers—nearly double their strength. Alexander later recounted that Heth’s leading brigade suffered devastating losses in its initial encounter, nearly being wiped out and crippling the division for the rest of the battle. Pender’s division also took heavy casualties. Alexander was sharp in his criticism of the advance.
He saw it as reckless, comparing it to another questionable order issued that same day to General Richard Ewell regarding Cemetery Hill. Ewell was instructed to occupy the high ground but avoid provoking a full engagement—a cautious approach Alexander believed should have applied to Heth’s mission as well. Instead, Heth’s push depleted two divisions before the real fighting even began. After the first day’s fighting, the Union seized Cemetery Hill, a commanding position on the high ground that gave General George Meade’s army a formidable defensive edge.
Alexander argued that while the Confederate position at Seminary Ridge remained strong, it was nowhere near as advantageous as the Union’s. He believed Lee should have adopted a defensive stance and forced Meade to attack. Instead, Lee chose an aggressive assault on July 2, a decision Alexander viewed as both unnecessary and costly. Alexander also criticized the lack of proper scouting before the July 2 assault.
No systematic examination of Union defenses was conducted, leaving Confederate forces to attack fortified positions blindly. He dismissed Lee’s concern that the army was too far from its supply base to sustain a prolonged defense, pointing out that Confederate forces later foraged successfully while stalled at Petersburg for over a week. The odds were heavily stacked against an offensive. Meade commanded roughly 94,000 troops against Lee’s approximately 72,000.
The Federals also held superior numbers, artillery, and terrain. Alexander estimated that the Union’s fortified high-ground position increased its combat effectiveness by 50 percent, making frontal assaults nearly suicidal. Alexander saw July 2 as the turning point—not just of the battle but of the entire war. He estimated that Lee’s decision to attack rather than defend cost the Confederates about 60 percent of their chance for victory.
“I think it must be frankly admitted,” Alexander wrote, “that there was no real difficulty whatever in our taking the defensive the next day. ”
He also questioned Ewell’s inaction on July 2. Ewell’s corps was positioned northeast of Gettysburg but, after being ordered to reposition closer to town, became stuck in an ineffective location near Cemetery Hill. Alexander condemned the decision, saying Ewell’s forces were rendered useless for the rest of the battle.
Lee should have ordered a full withdrawal rather than leaving them stranded, he argued. “They might as well have been spectators,” Alexander lamented. Another critical failure came at Culp’s Hill. Confederate attacks on the position stalled on July 2, yet Lee never ordered a second assault.
Union forces reinforced their lines overnight, making the hill unassailable by July 3. “That night, it was pie for me,” Alexander remarked, noting how poor Confederate planning gave the Union an unfair advantage. On the morning of July 3, with Pickett’s Charge imminent, Longstreet placed Alexander in command of the Confederate artillery barrage. His orders were clear: unleash a devastating bombardment to shatter Union defenses and pave the way for the infantry assault.
But the operation was plagued by disorganization and a fragmented command structure. Alexander soon discovered that General William Pendleton, Lee’s chief of artillery, had reassigned several guns without informing him. Of the nine howitzers originally allocated to support the infantry charge, multiple were missing when the attack began. This lack of coordination, Alexander later wrote, “fatally weakened our firepower.
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The artillery failures followed a broader pattern of broken command. Each Confederate corps operated its artillery independently, with no central coordination. Alexander argued that had the guns been concentrated under a single command, the Confederate bombardment might have shattered Union defenses. Instead, the attack went forward with effectively half-strength artillery support.
At the Union’s “fishhook” defensive line near Cemetery Ridge, the Union position curved in a way that exposed its flank to enfilading fire from Ewell’s corps. But only one of five artillery battalions in that sector ever fired. Despite holding a position that could have raked the Union lines with devastating crossfire, Ewell’s artillery remained silent. “We had the position to slaughter them and did nothing,” Alexander wrote in frustration.
There is also the mystery of A. P. Hill’s artillery on Seminary Ridge. Hill had 65 guns positioned ideally to support Pickett’s charge.
They never fired a shot in support of the assault, despite Pickett’s men advancing directly in front of them. Earlier that morning, Hill’s artillery had futilely shelled Union lines, exhausting ammunition for no gain. Hill refused to reposition or reinforce the guns. “Hill’s guns might have saved the charge,” Alexander wrote.
“Instead, they sat idle while our men were slaughtered. ”
The final assault on July 3 was a disaster. Confederate infantry advanced across open ground against heavily fortified Union positions and were cut down in massive numbers. The charge failed, and with it, Lee’s army lost the battle.
Alexander’s post-battle analysis identified five fatal flaws in Confederate strategy: no unified artillery command, poor reconnaissance, wasted resources, misplaced divisions, and a reckless decision to attack rather than hold defensively. He concluded that Gettysburg was not lost by lack of courage but by poor planning and coordination. Union defenses grew stronger each day while Confederate leadership fumbled opportunities. Alexander believed the crippling losses in Heth’s and Pender’s divisions not only weakened Confederate combat strength but also deprived Lee of vital units for later assaults, including Pickett’s Charge.
He saw Gettysburg as a cautionary tale—a battle lost not just on the field, but in poor intelligence, miscommunication, and the misuse of cavalry. Historians largely agree with Alexander’s assessment. Had Stuart been present with his cavalry, Lee might have had a clear picture of Union positions and could have avoided the ill-advised frontal assault, positioned his forces more strategically, or exploited weaknesses in the Union line. Instead, poor communication, delayed reinforcements, and the lack of real-time intelligence left the Confederates fighting at a severe disadvantage from the very beginning.
The battle wasn’t lost solely on the fields of Gettysburg. It was lost in planning, in broken communication, and in critical missteps that began before the armies even clashed. Had even one of those mistakes been avoided, Gettysburg—and possibly the fate of the Confederacy—might have unfolded very differently.