July 2, 1863 brought forth no shortage of gruesome fighting during the Battle of Gettysburg in Pennsylvania, due to a Confederate general’s route that breached direct orders.
The Union and Confederacy’s rivalry burned bright at Devil’s Den, where a disobedience of orders was the catalyst behind the fighting. Confederate General Robert E. Lee gave strict instruction to attack up Emmitsburg Road, despite multiple requests from other generals Lafayette McLaws, John B. Hood and Evander Law to avoid this direction.
In 27-year-old Law’s eyes, to go through with the route “would be to spill the blood of his five Alabama regiments to little purpose and with no chance of return.” However, General James Longstreet (Lee’s second-in-command) kept a tight grip on Lee’s orders and repetitively denied anyone who protested.
Utterly disobeying orders, Law led his men east into battle at Devil’s Den to refrain from exposing the flank and rear of his troops to enemy fire. Here, his other two brigades “found the conflict quite as confused as it was fierce” upon their arrival.
Key points/routes: Emmitsburg Road, Devil’s Den, Little Round Top.
With the attack officially launched at Devil’s Den, complete chaos ensued. With nobody even paying attention to commands that were haphazardly called out, a Texan from one of the brigades later reflected, “‘Every fellow was his own general.’”
Link to article:
- Author in the WSJ article does a good job getting straight to the point, with no “flowery” language of similes, metaphors or meaningless words (Orwell)
- Author in WSJ article also uses the active instead of the passive voice (Strunk and White)