James A. Hessler
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The GBMA tried to impose some order on monument placement by decreeing that primary regimental monuments be placed “in the position held by the regiment in the line of battle.” This caused no major issues in the placement of Union primary monuments. Since Meade’s army was primarily on the defensive, Union monuments could meet the GBMA requirements and still be placed in highly visible locations (such as on Little Round Top or where Pickett’s Charge was repulsed). But increasingly thorny questions were being asked as to whether Confederate monuments belonged on the field and, if so, where should they be placed. Lieutenant Colonel Byron M. Cutcheon, a Medal of Honor winner who did not fight at Gettysburg, asked, “What positions? The ‘Union line’ is a fixed quantity. It is where the wall of flesh stood against the wave of steel. But where was the Confederate line?”39 Many Northerners agreed, but Sickles took a progressive view on the subject, telling John Bachelder:
I have no hesitation in saying that I see no good reason why the lines of both armies at Gettysburg should not be marked. The Union lines are already shown. Everybody interested in the battlefield would like to know the positions held by both sides in the great conflict. So much has been done already to commemorate the history of Gettysburg, that it would seem to be worthwhile to go on and complete the work. I am sure the survivors of the Third Army Corps would be glad to see the positions held by Longstreet’s infantry and artillery plainly marked. The battlefield of Gettysburg should belong to the government. It should be a military post, garrisoned by artillery. With all the monuments prescribed it would be an object lesson of patriotism for mankind through the centuries.40
Sickles was popular enough to make yet another Gettysburg visit in 1889 for “Pennsylvania Day.” Wet and “miserable” weather dampened the crowds, but the aging Sickles was among the hardy dignitaries who stuck it out. During indoor speeches, the governor of Pennsylvania made a reference to his state’s part in Sickles’ “gallant forward movement.” The Gettysburg Star and Sentinel reported, “This reference to Sickles was loudly applauded by the veterans in the auditorium.”41
Sickles’ accusations against Meade, however, left many cold. Speaking at the dedication of the 120th New York (Brewster’s brigade) monument in June 1889, Major General George H. Sharpe disagreed with the premise that Meade had planned a retreat, and also told the audience that Sickles’ advanced position actually favored the execution of Longstreet’s attack. “Longstreet’s prescribed order of battle, in which he did not agree, was…to sweep up the Emmitsburg Road, under cover of his batteries, and roll up our lines in the direction of Cemetery Hill…The Third Corps formation, in its second position, considerably thrown out in advance of the general line from Cemetery Hill to the Round Tops, with an angle at the Peach Orchard, favored the execution of such an order of battle.” This was indeed a rare Third Corps monument dedication: Sharpe said nothing complimentary of Sickles, supported Meade, and was generally critical of Birney’s performance to boot. Rather than honoring the men who fought, these dedication speeches were frequently degenerating into attacks on each others’ records. The squabbling was not lost on the veterans. Captain Charles Hale of the 5th New Hampshire told John Bachelder in 1890, “There has been some strange ‘perversion of History’ on the field within a year or so.”42
A planned 1890 visit by the Comte de Paris, a noted Civil War observer who had gotten to know Sickles as a member of George McClellan’s staff in 1862, revealed a rift between John Bachelder and the Sickles-Butterfield duo. Bachelder, who could be stubborn and opinionated in his own right, learned that Butterfield desired to exclude him from joining the Comte’s party. Bachelder told John Nicholson that Butterfield “knows that I despise his attempt to injure the reputation of General Meade…and hence that it would be pleasanter if there was no person present with the Comte to criticize the statements and innuendoes which he and that clique will make.” Bachelder referred to the “scandalous attack on General Meade [that] was made in the papers by ‘Historicus,’ about which I did not hesitate to give my opinion. And General Butterfield knows that I do not sympathize with those who have tried so hard to injure the reputation of the dead Commander-in-chief.” To add insult to injury, Bachelder had further drawn Butterfield’s ire for omitting Butterfield’s July 3 wounding from his popular Isometric Drawing because “I had already found that he lost no blood when he fell from his horse during the cannonade on the 3d day, though he embraced the opportunity to go so far to the rear that he would be in no danger.”43
Finally, another difference arose over the placement of the planned New York State Monument in the Soldiers’ National Cemetery. “The New York Monument Commission desires to erect a memorial structure on the summit of Cemetery Hill which will overshadow everything on the field—National Monument and all, and I have not acquiesced,” explained Bachelder, who wanted to instead place a monument to Meade “on the crowning summit of Cemetery Hill. This as you know would hardly suit the tastes of the man who has never lost the occasion to stab General Meade’s reputation under the fifth rib.” Sickles had pestered the secretary of war to demand the location, which Bachelder and others hardily resisted. Bachelder did discuss placing monuments to the other Union corps commanders on the field, and the modern editors of Bachelder’s Gettysburg papers have speculated that his tensions with Sickles may have resulted, “at least in part,” because of Sickles’ lack of a Gettysburg statue. It should be noted, however, that as late as 1890, John Reynolds was the only Union corps commander with a statue on the field. Several corps commander statues were placed after the turn of the century—well after Bachelder had passed on—and despite Bachelder’s prominence, he did not have the lasting ability to permanently ban a Sickles statue.44
The Comte de Paris finally arrived at Gettysburg in October 1890. Although Bachelder was excluded, the menagerie of aging Union generals in attendance included Sickles, Butterfield, Slocum, Doubleday, Howard, and others. The group arrived in town via train, after touring the Antietam battlefield in Maryland, to a large crowd of citizens and cheering college students. They toured nearly every portion of the battlefield and answered questions pertaining to the fighting. Someone questioned Howard when the easiest time would have been for the Confederates to turn Meade’s left flank. When Howard replied that the best Confederate opportunity “was just at dawn on the morning of the second,” Sickles appeared almost immediately, as if on cue, and “was given a seat in the Count’s carriage.”45
The Comte had, up to this point, prudently and “studiously avoided any comment as to the wisdom of Sickles’ forward position.” But General Howard walked up to Sickles and stated in a voice “loud enough to be heard by those” nearby, “I am convinced, General, the more I look at the subject that your movement was the proper one with plenty of troops, and saved Little Round Top by gaining time and breaking the rebels.” Slocum was more “guarded in his comments, and said he ‘didn’t know but that the movement was the proper thing.’”46
Unable to let the matter rest, Butterfield discussed Meade’s “Council of War” on the night of July 2. He recalled that after the vote, Meade had supposedly replied, “Gentlemen, Gettysburg is no place to fight a battle.” All of the visiting generals “confirmed” this recollection, although Howard remembered slight differences in the wording. It was nearly three decades since the great battle had been fought, but anti-Meade sentiments still resided with some of the former generals. The group held an impressive dinner that evening with Sickles presiding, and had their portrait taken by local entrepreneur William Tipton in front of the John Reynolds statue in the National Cemetery. The passage of time was aptly captured in a visibly paunchy and balding Sickles seated near white-haired contemporaries Slocum and Butterfield.47
Sickles had the visit recorded for posterity in the March 1891 issue of the North American Review. The passing decades were not lost on the aging Sickles. “The transition from 1863 to 1890, little more than a quarter of a century, almost confounds the imagination, and makes th
e reality seem like a dream.” Overwhelmed by the reunion of the surviving Union commanders, Sickles believed that “the strongest emotion of the visitor to Gettysburg is the memory of those who here nobly fell in battle.” He briefly included Meade among his own roll call of “great leaders,” but singled out “Hooker, who reorganized the army and led it almost here, his chosen field, compelling Lee to give battle.…The campaigns of Chancellorsville and Gettysburg are monuments of his strategic skill.”48
Sickles argued, once again, that Meade had wanted to fight on Pipe Creek. Reynolds’ battle “was brought on without orders, perhaps against orders,” and the “surprise” battle “gave to Howard the choice of position at Gettysburg.” Sickles admitted that the Cemetery Ridge position in which Meade intended him to occupy was “perhaps the more desirable tactical position for me to occupy, unless overruled by superior considerations.” But he argued that these “superior considerations” included the depression and “swampy character” of the ground before Little Round Top. He admitted that Little Round Top was “obviously the key to our position,” but his own force “was insufficient to hold” Meade’s intended line. “Impossible to wait longer…I advanced my line towards the highest ground in my front, occupying the Emmitsburg Road at the very point where Longstreet hoped to cross it unopposed, covering Round Top and menacing the enemy’s flank if he attempted to turn our left.” The advanced line of the Third Corps prevented another Chancellorsville, he continued, “every inch of ground was disputed along the whole line, from Round Top to the Peach Orchard.”49
While active with the veterans, Sickles was not necessarily consumed by all things Gettysburg. The acquitted murderer served a brief stint as sheriff of New York in 1890, completing a term for a resigned incumbent. Some conjectured that he was appointed in the hopes of strengthening the governor’s support from veterans, but there was speculation that Sheriff Sickles had even greater ambitions to be mayor or governor. Not everyone thought Sickles worthy of the office. One report complained that “General Sickles does not represent the grade of soldiers to whom the public feels most grateful.” Admitting that Sickles “certainly fought bravely” at Gettysburg, he still “needlessly sacrificed nearly ten thousand men and gave Lee an opportunity to break our line which would have been successful had it not been for the promptness of General Warren.” Had Warren not noticed that Little Round Top was unoccupied, “the story of that battle would have been a very different one.”50
His role as chairman of the New York Monuments Commission extended to fields beyond Gettysburg. During his tenure, the commission would place New York monuments at Vicksburg, Mississippi, Chattanooga, Tennessee, Andersonville, Georgia, Cold Harbor, Virginia, and Antietam, outside Sharpsburg, Maryland. He also oversaw the placing of memorials in New York to Generals John Fremont and Newton Curtis. He continued to remain active with the Third Army Corps Union, whose duties (embalming and sending home Third Corps dead) had ceased with the close of the war. The old soldiers still decided to keep the organization alive and have reunions, often at locations besides Gettysburg. Sickles was an obvious choice as a frequent guest speaker, and as an honored dignitary he was often given amenities, such as private cars and choice accommodations, befitting his always lavish lifestyle.51
Sickles did not limit his endless Gettysburg opinions to controversies surrounding the old Third Corps. He was among “400 braves” who represented Tammany Hall at the dedication of the 42nd New York (the “Tammany Regiment”) monument on Hancock Avenue in September 1891. The monument features a statue of Indian Chief Tamenend in front of a bronze wigwam, giving generations of Gettysburg visitors the erroneous impression that an Indian regiment fought at the battle. Sculptor James Kelly, who completed Gettysburg’s John Buford monument, was approached to do the Tammany monument but declined because he considered the design “ridiculous.” He offered the pretense that he could not complete it in the one month that the New York commission was requesting. Upon hearing this, Chairman Sickles berated him: “W-h-a-t! Not do it in a month? W-h-y-! If I were sculptor, I could do it in a month! A-l-l you have to do is get an I-deah – a vivid I-deah!” (When Kelly viewed the final monument on the field he decided, “Sickles m-u-s-t h-a-v-e m-a-d-e it.”) 52
Although the 42nd fought in Hancock’s Second Corps, the regiment had been raised by Tammany Hall at the beginning of the war, so it was natural that Tammany’s most famous Gettysburg “brave” would speak. Despite the fact that their monument was near the so-called “High Water Mark” where Pickett’s assault had been repulsed (a portion of the battle about which Sickles possessed no firsthand knowledge), he was “received with cheers and repeated huzzahs by the old veterans” as he “referred to the pensions now enjoyed by the veterans and said no man could ever be elected chief ruler of this nation who would deprive them of one cent of pension money so justly earned.” He combatively offered his opinion of the nearby 72nd Pennsylvania regiment, whose veterans had recently gone to court to have their monument placed farther in advance of the line than they actually occupied on July 3. Pointing toward the Angle, Sickles proclaimed:
No doubt it has struck many of you with surprise that the [42 NY] monument is not over yonder, and that the Seventy-Second Pennsylvania is not over here or further back beyond the Avenue. You, gentlemen of the Memorial Association, are not responsible for that falsification of history and that grave error. You did all in your power to prevent it, but you were overruled by the judicial authority of your State. Your hands are bound, but no injunction is put on me to prevent me saying what I think. I protest in the name of history, and in the name of the brave men who fell here, against the outrageous position of that Pennsylvania monument.
“I don’t know why those men [72nd PA] were so modest that they would not advance when ordered,” Sickles rhetorically asked and answered about the 72nd’s failure to move forward to the stone wall on July 3. “I don’t know why the Forty-second were so immodest as to advance. It must have been because they were Irish-Americans; and saw a head and wanted to hit it.” The following speaker, Edward McPherson, diplomatically responded that he hoped for a time when historic truth would outweigh state pride. Sickles may have advanced without orders on July 2, but to a born fighter like himself it was much more preferable than refusing to advance.53
Another event revealed Sickles’ stubborn character at its worst. He had been estranged from his alcoholic daughter Laura for years, having even declined earlier pleas from his father George to help her. Dan had been warned that it would “make a row” if the newspapers learned that his daughter was penniless while he lived in a $100, 000 house. Still, he refused to reconcile. “I have done my whole duty toward the person in whose behalf you write,” he answered coldly. “As far as I’m concerned she is dead and buried.” When Laura died in Brooklyn from cirrhosis in 1892, Sickles did not attend her funeral. Her death certificate listed her as 39 years old and single. She was interred in a family plot in Brooklyn’s Green-Wood Cemetery with Teresa, who had been moved there in 1870. Although Sickles found it within himself to forgive former enemies like General Longstreet, he never forgave Laura for whatever grievance she had caused him.54
On a lighter note, Dan’s wide-ranging travels carried him to Atlanta in March 1892. Longstreet traveled from his Gainesville home to welcome Sickles to Georgia. On St. Patrick’s Day, they both attended a banquet at the “Irish Societies of Atlanta.” As Sickles later told it, the 300 attendees burst into “the wildest and loudest ‘rebel yell’ I had ever heard” when they entered the hall together. Sickles offered a toast to Longstreet’s good health and promised the audience that Longstreet would sing the Star-Spangled Banner. “This was, indeed, a risky promise, as I had never heard the General sing,” joked Sickles. Longstreet surprised everyone present by singing “admirably,” and the crowd joined in with him.55
According to Sickles, after consuming large amounts of Irish whiskey the pair left together onto Atlanta’s darkened late-night streets. Unable to fin
d a carriage at that hour, the disabled and intoxicated war heroes attempted to walk each other home, but each refused to leave the other so they repeatedly walked back and forth between their respective hotels. “Old fellow,” Dan asked on route, “I hope you are sorry for shooting off my leg at Gettysburg. I suppose I will have to forgive you for it some day.” A drunken Longstreet exclaimed, “Forgive me? You ought to thank me for leaving you one leg to stand on.” The two former enemies increasingly became friends during this period of their long lives. Since both shared the distinction of having their Gettysburg performance assailed by critics on both sides, many historians have assumed they mutually exploited one another in order to defend their war records. At least one author speculated that Sickles was using a politically naive Longstreet to gain favors from Northern Republicans. Although it is a testimonial to both of their postwar reputations that historians will not accept the relationship at face value, each man frequently told anyone who would listen that the other had done right on July 2, 1863.56
By the early 1890s, Sickles was not only still active and dangerous (he received a pistol carry permit from New York City) but he was also extremely wealthy. His father, George Sickles, had died in 1887 with an estate full of investments and real estate reportedly valued at a minimum of $4, 000, 000. George’s second wife Mary and three step-daughters received the bulk of the estate (contrary to Dan’s claims that he inherited most of it), but Dan was bequeathed several properties. Laura, George Stanton, and Eda were also to share ownership and income on three properties. “The reports of Gen. Sickles’ large fortune are not exaggerated,” reported the New York Timesin 1892. He bragged that he owned a large stock and bond portfolio along with a series of rental and commercial properties throughout the city, employing a “clerical force” to collect his rents. His residence on Fifth Avenue was also estimated to be worth several hundred thousand dollars. Dan lived on the first floor and rented out the second and third floors for additional income. The rooms on the house’s ground floor were “literally crowded with pictures and relics and statuettes and bric-a brac.” Most of the George Sickles properties would be sold at auction in 1895. Dan bought several parcels from the estate himself, notably George’s large 100+ acre homestead in New Rochelle, which was purchased jointly with son Stanton and step-sister Alta. He was appointed a trustee for Stanton and Eda’s shares of George’s estate, and was also named the Executor of his step-mother’s estate when she died in 1893. In his mid-seventies, it appeared that Dan would never have to worry financially ever again, but as he demonstrated throughout his life, placing large sums of money in his hands was always a precarious proposition.57