GDG- Gettysburg The second day

[Chet Diestel]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "keith mackenzie" <bluzdad at yahoo.com>
To: "GDG" <gettysburg at arthes.com>
Sent: Tuesday, September 05, 2006 5:04 AM
Subject: Re: GDG- Gettysburg The second day


Esteemed GDG Member Keith MacKenzie Contributes:

hey, come on, cut the guy some slack! He was ill, possibly a flare up of the 
VD he picked up at West Point when he was a cadet. I think.
   K.

   Cutting Hill  "some slack" as a human being is one thing, but cutting him 
"some slack" as a corps commander with the lives of thousands of men resting 
on his shoulders when he was chronically ill was something else.
   Hill's "delicate constitution," to use the phrasing of the day, was 
certainly known to Lee when he promoted him to command of the new III Corps 
less than two months before Gettysburg. Indeed, Hill had a long history of 
illness dating back to his cadet days at West Point where he was infected by 
gonorrhea, the effects of which resulted in a chronic infection which 
severely impaired his renal functions as well as causing uremia and all the 
disabilities associated with it.
  In short, Hill, given his state of health --- which, in effect, was that 
of a dying man --- by the summer of 1863 had no place commanding troops in 
the field. Medical surgeons were not blind or ignorant of the obvious 
symptoms and given the smallness of the Old Army, his ailment and the 
treatment it can be assumed was well known, at least in passing. After all, 
it delayed his graduation from West Point by a year.
  And one would assume the general commanding the ANV would be aware of 
this, especially an officer as close to him as A.P. Hill was --- perhaps 
much too close.
  It would seem he got the promotion and kept it more for what he had 
been --- a good and efficient brigade and division commander --- than what 
he was capable of doing two years into the war.
  But then that raises the whole question of the reorganization of the ANV 
and why Lee chose as he did.
    With regards,
              Chet