“Despite winning the largest battle ever fought in the Western Hemisphere, few Americans even know his name.”

By Robert Kofman

MAJOR GENERAL George Gordon Meade is best known for leading the Army of the Potomac to victory over Robert E. Lee at the Battle of Gettysburg.

Meade is a fascinating historical figure who remains lesser-heralded than the Rebel generals he fought like Lee and Stonewall Jackson. He also stands in the shadow of his Union compatriots like Ulysses S. Grant, William Tecumseh Sherman and even Phillip Sheridan.

And despite winning the largest battle ever fought in the Western Hemisphere, few Americans today even know his name.

Here are some interesting facts most people probably don’t know about Meade.

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He wasn’t even born in the United States

Despite being one of the greatest American generals of his age, Meade was actually born abroad. His father, Richard Worsam Meade, was a wealthy Philadelphian who was serving as a U.S. naval agent in Cadiz, Spain when George was born in 1815. In fact, Meade the Elder had loaned money to the Spanish monarchy to help fund its fight against Napoleon, who had occupied the country in 1808. But when Richard requested repayment after Bonaparte’s downfall, he was thrown in jail. Later, under the terms of 1819 Florida Purchase Treaty, the U.S. government acquired the future Sunshine State as settlement for all American citizens’ financial claims against Spain. Despite acquiring the new territory for nothing, Washington never did compensate Spain’s many U.S. creditors. As a result, the Meade family fortune was lost.

He served closely with his famous future foe

So many Civil War generals first faced hostile fire in America’s 1846 war with Mexico. Meade was one of them. In fact, he was breveted first lieutenant for gallant conduct during the Battle of Monterey. Remarkably, Meade and his future Gettysburg opponent, Robert E. Lee, travelled together on the steamship Petrita with General Winfred Scott to Veracruz Bay. The expedition sought a location to land U.S. troops. While scouting one stretch of promising coastline, Mexican cannon balls fell perilously close to the ship. If the enemy artillerymen had slightly better aim, neither men might have survived to meet each other in battle years later.

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He made a name for himself building lighthouses

At West Point, Meade was trained to be a topographical engineer. In the 1850s, the army assigned him to design and erect lighthouses. He oversaw their construction on coral reefs off the Florida coast at Carysfort Key, Sand Key and Sombrero Key, which are familiar sights to Florida boaters to this day. Meade designed one particularly elegant lighthouse at Jupiter Inlet, Florida. Others can be found in Absecon and Barnegat New Jersey, and Brandywine Shoal in Delaware Bay. He even designed a new lighthouse lamp to replace a more complicated but popular French style. Meade’s innovation was successful and ended up being used in other American lighthouses. In 1856, the army assigned Meade to supervise a survey of the Great Lakes. He oversaw detailed mapping of Lake Huron and Saginaw Bay before the outbreak of the Civil War.

His men gave him the nickname the “Old Snapping Turtle”

Meade was a perfectionist with a volatile temper. He could pitch into people when they made even the slightest mistake. Although respected for his intelligence, boundless energy and courage in battle, his staff didn’t like being subjected to his sharp tongue.

He rose steadily through the ranks

Meade began the war as a brigadier general. Wounded at the Battle of Glendale in June 1862, he fought in all of the Army of the Potomac’s major battles. After Antietam, he was promoted to division commander and following Fredericksburg, he became commander of the Fifth Corps. When Lee invaded Pennsylvania in June of 1863, Fighting Joe Hooker offered his resignation. Lincoln accepted and placed Meade in charge of the Army of the Potomac. The three previous commanders, George McClellan, Ambrose Burnside and Hooker had all been defeated by Lee. It would be up to Meade to break the losing streak.

He saved the Union cause at Gettysburg

Although many remember the repulse of Pickett’s Charge on Gettysburg’s third and final day as the pivotal moment of the battle, it was Meade’s actions the afternoon before that really saved Union army, and perhaps even the entire war. Amid the fighting on July 2, Meade positioned the Third Corps under General Dan Sickles on the Federal left at Cemetery Ridge. Dissatisfied with the ground he was assigned, Sickles ignored orders and moved his 10,000-man force more than half a mile forward, leaving Little Round Top, and the entire Union flank, dangerously exposed. When Lee attacked through the Peach Orchard and the Wheatfield, Sickles’ troops fought bravely but were overwhelmed. With the Union line suddenly in grave danger, Meade decisively rushed in troops from all over the battlefield to keep the Confederates from rolling up the Yankee line. Meade remained on the frontlines in the saddle as enemy bullets whizzed all around him. One even struck his trusty warhorse, Old Baldy – one of four times the animal would be wounded during the war.

Many blamed him for Lee’s escape after Gettysburg

Meade’s pursuit of the retreating Confederate army was hindered by torrential rain storms that hit the day after Gettysburg. The downpour also bedevilled Lee, as the swelling Potomac was suddenly unfordable. After the Union cavalry destroyed a Rebel pontoon bridge, Lee’s men were caught with their backs to the river. They prepared fortifications on a ridge facing mostly open farmland. Before attacking, Meade held a council of war with his corps commanders. Most were against a frontal assault across the soggy ground. Fearing a repeat of Fredericksburg, Meade delayed for a day. But when he was ready to advance, Lee was gone. The river had receded enough to be forded and the Confederates had built a new pontoon bridge. Lincoln was disconsolate, believing Meade had been too hesitant to attack. “Our army held the war in the hollow of their hand and they would not close it,” the president lamented.

After Gettysburg, he was investigated by Congress

Meade’s insubordinate general, Sickles, lost a leg to a shell at at Gettysburg. After recuperating, he asked to be restored to command of the Third Corps. When Meade refused, Sickles went before the Committee on the Conduct of the War in Washington and falsely testified that the general wanted to retreat and not fight at Gettysburg. He even had an anonymous article published in The New York Herald, the country’s largest circulation paper, claiming that Meade ineptly handled the army during the battle and that only his own unauthorized advance foiled Lee’s plans. Sickles’ false narrative damaged Meade’s reputation.

He made enemies in the press

All of the major Northern newspapers sent war correspondents to cover the Army of the Potomac. But when one Philadelphia Inquirer reporter published rumours that Meade had wanted to retreat after the Battle of the Wilderness, the outraged general expelled the offending journalist from camp. Stinging from the rebuke of one of their own, several other newsmen conspired to write only negative stories about Meade. Henceforth, Grant would get the credit for the Army of Potomac’s victories while Meade’s name only appeared in articles where reporters could blame him for defeats.

He was snubbed at Appomattox

When Lincoln placed Grant in charge of all U.S. armies in 1864, the commanding general decided to make his headquarters next to Meade’s troops. The two worked reasonably well together, although Grant began making strategic decisions for the Army of the Potomac on his own. Meade rarely challenged Grant fearing that such infighting would be injurious to the Union cause. Later, when Lee surrendered to Grant in 1865, no senior officers from the Army of the Potomac were present. Perhaps the reason for this snub was Meade’s illness during the Appomattox campaign; he traveled with his army in an ambulance. Still, Meade was a few miles away and could have easily attended. He wasn’t invited.

Old Baldy outlived Meade by 10 years

Meade stayed in the army until his death in 1872 at the age of 56. His Battle of Glendale wounds left him susceptible to illness. His often-shot warhorse, Old Baldy, followed the caisson carrying his master’s casket in the funeral procession. The animal died 10 years after his famous owner.

More random facts

• The Fort Meade army base in Maryland is named in his memory. The city of Fort Meade, Florida, was named in his honour, as well.

• Meade’s last headquarters was in Philadelphia and he was made a commissioner of that city’s Fairmount Park. He took a deep interest in the development of the park

• Meade’s insightful letters to his wife Margaret during the Mexican and Civil Wars are often cited by historians. They were published by his son and grandson in 1913 in The Life And Letters of General George Gordon Meade.

• Mathew Fox, the television and movie actor famous for his role in the TV series Lost is actually Meade’s great-great-great-grandson. (Fox is fifth from the left in the cast photo above.)

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Robert Kofman is the author of General Meade: A Novel of the Civil War from Lion Valley Publishing. He lives in Miami, Florida.