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NOTES AND QUERIES Edited by Boyd B. Stutler 517 Main Street Charleston, West Virginia this department is designed as an open forum for researchers into Civil War themes and for readers of Civil War History in general. It is open for questions on and discussions of phases of the Great Conflict and its personnel. Also, we welcome notes on newly discovered, little known, or other sidelights of the war. Contributions are invited: address Notes and Queries Editor. QUERIES No. 68—What Do You Know about General George Pickett? The life of George Pickett is one of the many inexplicable oddities that came out of the Civil War. Mention that great American conflict to a man in the street and his first reaction is likely to be Gettysburg. Ask him then what first comes to his mind about Gettysburg and he will probably answer, Pickett's Charge. Go a step further and inquire what he knows about Pickett, the person, and you will draw a blank stare. How is it that the man is almost unknown whose name is intimately linked with the most famous charge of the most famous battle of the most dramatic conflict ever fought on this continent? Dr. Douglas Freeman could only say, evasively, "He was a good soldier." Other historians have treated him with disdain, some with calumny; most handle him with the cautious kindness deserved by an unresearched subject. For one who has spent nine years collecting scraps of information with which to piece together a biography of this man, there is unlimited frustration and precious little to go on. What we do know about George Pickett can be sketched in broad strokes: Born into the yeoman class amidst the dying splendor of James River plantations, he received a gentleman's upbringing. He attended West Point, graduating anchor-man in the class of 1846, and immediately plunged into the gallant activities that brevetted him 304 Captain during the Mexican War. Thereafter he served unhappily on the dust-dry, boring Texas frontier for some nine years without further promotion. Then he was transferred to the Ninth Infantry and shipped off to the Pacific Northwest; while there he achieved a measure of elusive, personal glory by supposedly standing off a British fleet with a platoon of regulars in the generally misunderstood San Juan affair. In 1861 he resigned to return to Virginia and the Confederate States. As a brigadier, he was seriously wounded at Gaines' Mill, but he returned the following October as major general, commanding what was considered to be the finest division in the Army of Northern Virginia —Pickett's Division; however, it was relatively untried in battle. At Gettysburg he firmly grasped what fate could have made the grandest of all possible opportunities for everlasting renown, and came out of it not only with a shattered division but also with near disastrous ruin to his military and personal reputation. Why this happened no one knew better than George Pickett. After this highwater mark for himself and the Confederacy, Pickett rode steadily downhill. He was passed over for succession to Longstreet 's stars, and was present but hardly acounted for at the final denouement at Five Forks. Having been the central figure at the height and depth of Confederate military fortunes, he faded from the scene, a broken man. This is the skeleton of his story and it sounds uninspiring—but with the flesh of astounding detail added to the bones, his life was exciting, fulsome, and highly adventurous. The mystery lies in why there is so very little documentary evidence of his life and activities. To be sure he pops in and out of the Official Records; two books have been written about him (both unfortunately by his overly romantic wife), and the writer has collected transcribed copies of some 200 pieces of his correspondence, all of which is routine, and none of which is particularly revealing. His grandsons have assisted mightily in the search for more bits of information, but to little avail. A part of the answer to this abnormal void lies in the word fire. In 1864 his ancestral home was demolished—a deed attributed to a spiteful Ben Butler. Phil...

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