Talk:Battle of Gettysburg

Semi-protected edit request on 13 March 2017

Typo fix. In the 2nd day section it says Lee did not order the attack to begin until 11pm. Should be 11am. 207.131.251.19 (talk) 22:13, 13 March 2017 (UTC)

Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. I think you're probably right, but the cited source simply says "eleven o'clock", and it's impossible to tell for sure from the context. Rivertorch^FIRE_WATER 03:14, 14 March 2017 (UTC)

The next line starts with "About Noon" and ends with "Did not get into position until 1pm". It is written chronologically. The following section talks about attacks in the afternoon. Do we really have to cite the fact that an order for an attack needs to precede the attack itself? Moreover this is near the beginning of the 2nd day section, if it was at 11pm the fact that Lee would order an attack on the second day an hour before midnight would be noteworthy and need to be explained. I have no horse in the game here, but as written it is patently incorrect.

 Done - as per the request rationale - correcting obvious errors does not need an RS - Arjayay (talk) 14:14, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 31 March 2017

"Calvary" should be "Cavalry" throughout 104.129.196.54 (talk) 08:49, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

Done. Thanks. BusterD (talk) 09:43, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 12 April 2017

I am so confused. The 11 pm to 11 am revision on Lee's order on the second day was undone with no explanation or discussion. The original change was done because it was obvious in context. Isn't this something that should be discussed before a change is undone? 207.131.251.19 (talk) 20:18, 12 April 2017 (UTC)

Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format. Sakuura Cartelet ^Talk 01:22, 13 April 2017 (UTC)

Also ideally such an edit should be discussed. However the requested edit template is really only supposed to be used when you want (with sources) a specific change be made to the article and not to elicit discussion on whether a previous edit was or wasn't okay under policy. Sakuura Cartelet ^Talk 01:25, 13 April 2017 (UTC)

My apologies, I am very new to editing wikipedia articles. I am requesting that the edit make by Arhayay in response to the Semi-Protected edit request on 13 March 2017 and reverted by Doncram be un-reverted. The justification by Arjayay is that correcting obvious errors does not need an RS. The request is that the line in the 2nd day section that states that Lee did not give the order until 11pm should instead read 11am. Apparently the cited work only says "11 o'clock" but in context, and with no explanation on why Lee would give orders for an attack on the second day at the end of the second day, it is clear this is meant to be 11am. Doncram reverted the edit with no explanation and did not write anything here on the talk page. Thank you in advance. --207.131.251.19 (talk) 21:06, 14 April 2017 (UTC)

This is from the source, p. 365:

“ At the intimation that the battle would be opened on the right by part of the First Corps, Colonel Alexander was asked to act as director of artillery, and sent to view the field in time to assign the batteries as they were up. It was eleven o' clock when General Lee's order was issued, but he had ordered Law's brigade to its division, and a wait of thirty minutes was necessary for it to get up. Law had received his orders at three in the morning, and had marched twenty three miles. The battle ground was still five miles off by the route of march, but Law completed his march of twenty eight miles in eleven hours,--the best marching done in either army to reach the field of Gettysburg. ”

I believe that Doncram may have have thought the 11 pm time was correct. Law had original orders which had been received at 3 am and then he marched 23 miles before resting. After receiving Lee's new orders (made at 11 am), it took half an hour to rouse the troops and then they completed the last 5 miles to their assigned position. That is how I read it. Longstreet bounces around chronologically in his writing frequently and creates such confusion.
 — Berean Hunter (talk) 03:27, 15 April 2017 (UTC)

I recall thinking:

1) it is conceivable that a) Lee came to his decision as to how the day's actions should go at 11 pm the night before, and b) that could have been a very late hour to be making such a decision and it would have been difficult to get everyone informed and organized, and that could explain something not happening until 3 pm the next day. Frankly i feel bad for visitors to the battlefield in the 1970s trying to coordinate any kind of meeting up, without cell phones.

2) it seemed like the editor saw 11pm and assumed that was wrong, applying 21st century sensibilities. Then made a leap that not only was 11pm wrong but the correct answer was 11am, based on nothing but assuming that would have been a plausible typo by someone else. I have seen lots of incorrect edits about coordinates of places in Wikipedia, where one editor correctly observes that a set of coordinates is wrong but then assumes incorrectly what the fix is (e.g. chooses to change it by one full degree of longitude, or changes latitude sign from S to N, when that was not the right guess for the fix, or when the original was correct after all). So while 11 a.m. has more plausibility here, apparently, because of the quote now provided, I am extremely skeptical of "fixes" based on assumptions of mistakes by others.

Here, I am not familiar with the sources and situation so I am not going to make a guess on what is correct based on just the quote provided. It takes a bigger, informed perspective from someone fully involved, and their judgment should not be based at all on what kind of mistake they think another editor might have made. It would be best to get someone completely independent, not aware of any previous interpretation, and point them to the sources, and ask them what date and time did Lee make whatever decision. --doncram 04:15, 15 April 2017 (UTC)

That was the gist of my thinking when I denied the original edit request, two threads up. Rivertorch^FIRE_WATER 12:16, 15 April 2017 (UTC)

Your reasoning makes sense, Doncram. However, leaving what is likely to be incorrect information is just as bad as changing it to something unsubstantiated based on a guess. Therefore, why not amend the text simply to "eleven o'clock," since that's what the source says, rather than keeping "pm," which is just as unsubstantiated as "am" and more likely wrong? (The idea that 11 pm orders cannot be carried out until 16 hours later stretches credulity.) Schoolmann (talk) 15:49, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

Edit request 8-22-2017

The last sentence of the first paragraph:

"Union Maj. Gen. George Meade's Army of the Potomac defeated attacks by Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia, ending Lee's attempt to invade the North."

"... ending Lee's attempt to invade the North." would be more accurate written "... ending Lee's invasion of the North."

Passing through one Union state (Maryland), circumventing DC and working into yet another Union state, 100 miles into Union territory, surely constitutes an invasion not an attempt. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.52.87.29 (talk) 19:02, 21 August 2017 (UTC)

 Done. I agree to the change, since it's true he did invade the North, so "attempt" is inaccurate. His plans were for a much farther invasion, however, so maybe some indication of his plans being cut short was intended by "attempt". Perhaps there's a better way to word this to capture both points. I'm leaving that for others to consider. --A D Monroe III (talk) 19:36, 21 August 2017 (UTC)

It's a reasonable request which I might have responded to in the same way, but I wouldn't say that that "attempt" is inaccurate. There are successful attempts as well as unsuccessful attempts, after all. Maybe something like "curtailing Lee's invasion of the North"? Rivertorch^FIRE_WATER 20:29, 21 August 2017 (UTC)

I agree that "attempt" is probably only technically inaccurate; that's why I invited more comments. On rewording, "curtailing" is also technically correct, but maybe not strong enough; might it imply that it was otherwise largely successful? I was considering "halting" instead. --A D Monroe III (talk) 21:48, 21 August 2017 (UTC)

Yeah, that's probably better. Rivertorch^FIRE_WATER 05:56, 22 August 2017 (UTC)

Done. --A D Monroe III (talk) 18:35, 22 August 2017 (UTC)

early exploitation and preservation efforts?

When touring the battlefield a few years ago, the guide I hired talked about how a significant area of the battlefield was actually turned into that era's version of a theme park in the years that followed the battle - with trains, rides, and more - that likely changed the nature of the site to some degree despite the preservation efforts that eventually followed. If anyone has credible information on this, I'd suggest this would be worth adding to the battlefield preservation section. I did find this article to support this story, () so there seems to be some truth to it. Vespid (talk) 05:13, 2 December 2017 (UTC)

Unverifiability of content: paragraph 2, line 3; and same, line 1.

In the passage, "Lee led his army through the Shenandoah Valley to begin his second invasion of the North—the Gettysburg Campaign," there is no record or evidence (any more or less than with Meade) that Lee had embarked into Maryland or Pennsylvania on a "campaign" with Gettysburg as his end objective. While it is true that an en-route confederate incursion for purpose of pilfering supplies (more particularly...shoes) was aimed at Gettysburg town, it was, in fact, little more than coincidental that the opposing forces would chance by accident upon Gettysburg (while Lee was likely intent upon heading farther abroad, perhaps to Harrisburg, the state capital) as the scene of a general engagement. Therefore recommend to strike the characters, "—the Gettysburg Campaign". Also, but less critically, Lee was not in the vanguard of the elements first arriving/clashing at Gettysburg, so the word, "led," could be more precisely replaced by the word, "commanded." Finally, having spent 10 years living nearby to Gettysburg in Maryland, I was impressed by Marylander consternation at the state's having historically been referred to as the South, albeit that Maryland was south of the Mason-Dixie line, a slave state within Dixie, but occupied as Federal sequestered territory. Accordingly, may I suggest that "the North" as used in the subject paragraph is overly "loose" and imprecise and should be replaced by the words, "Federal territory".172.56.39.66 (talk) 10:20, 11 January 2018 (UTC)