"The allegation is that the Confederate army was surprised at Gettysburg on account of the absence of the cavalry. The gist of the complaint is that Gettysburg was Lee's objective, as his first report says; that the leading divisions of Hill's corps ran unexpectedly against the enemy there; and that he had to fight a battle under duress to save his trains. The trains were then in the Cashtown Pass, and Longstreet's corps and Imboden's command were at the western end of it, while Lee, with two corps, was at the other end. Now the party surprised is, as a rule, the party attacked. But in the three days' fighting around Gettysburg, Lee's army was the assailant all the time and got the better of it on the first and second days. If Lee had selected Gettysburg as a battleground, it is strange that he should apologize for fighting there. General Lee was surprised by A. P. Hill — not by the enemy. It is a curious thing that Lee's report should have shielded A. P. Hill and Heth, who broke up his plan of campaign. It is not claimed that Lee needed cavalry in the battle, but before the battle, to bring him intelligence. How he suffered in this respect his report does not indicate, but it says that the spy told him where the enemy were on the night of the twenty-eighth when Meade's army was fifty miles away at Frederick. If this was the case, Lee had ample time to concentrate at Gettysburg. If he had this information, it is immaterial how he got it. Nobody can show that Lee did anything or left anything undone for want of information that cavalry could have given him.
Stuart was absent from the battlefield on the first day because he was away doing his duty under orders, and two divisions of Meade's cavalry were in pursuit of him. Lee and Longstreet were absent from the field on that day because they did not expect a battle at Gettysburg, and did not have foreknowledge of what Hill and Heth were going to do. While the spy that is alleged to have appeared on the stage at night and to have changed the program of invasion is an invention for dramatic effect, a spy did appear in a commonplace way two days afterwards, when the army was on the march to Cashtown....
...On June 30, Heth, with his division, was at Cashtown and sent Pettigrew, with his brigade, to Gettysburg to get a lot of shoes that were said to be there. When Pettigrew got in sight of the place, he saw a body of cavalry coming in; so he returned and reported to Heth — who proposed to go there the next morning. The cavalry was Buford's division, which kept close to Meade's left flank. At 5 A.m. on July I, Hill, with Heth's and Fender's divisions and artillery, left camp for Gettysburg in the same spirit of adventure that took Earl Percy to hunt the deer at Chevy Chase. They evidently intended a raid and to return to camp and meet Lee that evening. All of the impedimenta were left behind. General Lee would be at Cashtown that day, and the army would be concentrated by evening. Lee said that he had no idea of taking the offensive. Heth's leading brigade, Archer's, soon ran against Buford's pickets; the latter fought his cavalry dismounted and checked Heth until Reynolds arrived. Reynolds had left his camp early that morning for Gettysburg before Meade's order had come to retire to Pipe Creek. Heth's report reads:
It may not be improper to remark that at this time — nine o'clock on the morning of July lst — I was ignorant what force was at or near Gettysburg, and supposed it consisted of cavalry, most probably supported by a brigade or two of infantry. . . . Archer and Davis were now directed to advance, the object being to feel the enemy, to make a forced reconnaissance and determine in what force they were — whether or not he was massing his forces on Gettysburg. Heavy columns of the enemy were soon encountered. . . . General Davis was unable to hold his position.
Archer's brigade was soon shattered, and he and a large portion of his brigade were captured. If Heth had any curiosity about the enemy being there in force, he and Hill ought now to have been satisfied and should have retired — that is, if they were only seeking information. But Fender's division was now put in to support Heth's and was faring no better. Hill would have been driven back to Cashtown, but Ewell, without orders, came to his relief and won the day. Early's division gave the final stroke as he did at Bull Run. Hill said that his division was so exhausted that it could not join in pursuit of the enemy. Yet he called the affair, which had lasted nearly a whole day, a reconnaissance just to conceal his blunder.
After the war, Heth published an article in which he said nothing about their making a reconnaissance, but that they went for shoes. He claimed that he and Hill were surprised and said it was on account of the want of cavalry, yet both said they knew the enemy was there. The want of cavalry might have been a good reason for not going there — it was a poor one for going. Heth did not pretend that he and Hill had orders to go to Gettysburg, nor was there any necessity for their going. All that the army had to do was to live on the country and wait for the enemy at Cashtown Pass — as Lee intended to do.
The truth is that General Lee was so compromised by his corps commanders that he stayed on the field and fought the battle on a point of honor. To withdraw would have had the appearance of defeat and have given the moral effect of a victory to the enemy. A shallow criticism has objected that Lee repeated Hooker's operation with his cavalry at Chancellorsville. Both Lee and Hooker did right; both retained sufficient cavalry with the main body for observation and outpost duty. The difference in the conditions was that Lee sent Stuart to join Ewell, and the damage he would do on the way would be simply incidental to the march. Hooker's object in detaching his cavalry, on the other hand, was to destroy Lee's supplies and communications. With his superior numbers Hooker had a right to calculate on defeating Lee, and, in that event, his cavalry would bar Lee's retreat as Grant's did at Appomattox.
That the inventions of the staff officers have been accepted by historians as true is the most remarkable thing in literary history since the Chatterton forgeries. But the history of the world is a record of judgments reversed." Mosby