Pennsylvania in the Civil War

Pennsylvania in the Civil War

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Pennsylvania furnished not only manpower but also ample military leadership to the Union cause, including two army commanders, four admirals, twelve major generals, and forty-eight brigadier generals. Pennsylvanians George B. McClellan and George G. Meade both led the Army of the Potomac.

McClellan whipped t he army into a capable fighting machine, while Meade won the climatic battle at Gettysburg and remained in command until the war's end. Major generals of importance from Pennsylvania include Winfield S. Hancock and John F. Reynolds. To the naval war Pennsylvania contributed Admiral David Dixon Porter, who helped capture New Orleans and batter open the Mississippi with his gunboat fleet, Rear Admiral John Dahlgren, and Montgomery C. Meigs, termed "the unsung hero of the Civil War" by one historian, served as the Union's energetic and efficient quartermaster-general.

Pennsylvania ranked second only to New York in the number of troops it f urnished the Union, but faced additional burdens because of its proximity to the fighting. Many towns served as supply depots or staging areas, while troop trains rumbled through the Commonwealth constantly. Soldiers passing through to the front as well as returning wounded needed sustenance and aid. Much more troublesome was the fact that war itself sometimes crossed the border into Pennsylvania.

Each time the war entered Pennsylvania it arrived through the Cumberland Valley, a natural avenue from the South. In an October 1862 lightning raid, Confederate General J.E.B. Stuart surprised an unwary citizenry by galloping into Chambersburg, the site of a Union supply center. Stuart burned a Union storehouse, stole 1,200 horses, and escaped with $150,000 worth of supplies.

Nearly two years later in July, 1864 three thousand Confederate cavalry again swept into Chambersburg. The Confederates threatened to burn the town in retaliation for Union vandalism in Virginia, unless they received $100,000 in gold or $500,000 in currency. Forewarned of the raid, many Chambersburg citizens fled with their property, and left empty bank vaults behind. When the ransom failed to appear, the troopers applied the torch, leaving two-thirds of Chambersburg's inhabitants homeless.

In the summer of 1863, Confederate General Robert E. Lee shifted the entire theater of war into Pennsylvania. Riding the crest of recent victories, Lee hoped his invading army might encourage demoralized northerners to demand an end to the war. With its infrastructure of industries, agriculture, railroads, and Susquehanna River bridges supplying the Union life blood, Pennsylvania seemed a prime target.