GDG- Re: Guns captured by Wright have been Identified.

[James Cameron]

<< Indeed, and this is where the historian must, by necessity, become like a
crime detective.  And like the reporter's adage - you don't go to press
unless you have two corroborating sources.  Now, often the latter is not the
case, but a case in point is the Federal claim that it seemed at one time
"as if we were surrounded" or words to that effect.  If you take this one
quote in a vacuum, it's difficult as hell to deal with or make sense of.
Does the soldier mean that he was awash in a sea of gray - literally
surrounded by the enemy?  Then when you take it in context with all other
evidence, you quickly realize that he's talking about the sounds of combat
over at Culp's Hill... from the position at CR it would sounds as if it were
behind you, behind your line.  The soldier is NOT speaking of being
literally surrounded and threatened by the enemy, but that the general sound
of battle made it appear, for a time, that the ANV had the AOP surrounded. 
 >>

J.D.

Likewise, taking it in context helps explain the other part of Reichert's 
diary entry, about Cushing's guns being reversed, ready to fire to the rear. 
This was done as a precaution, "ready to fire", not actually firing, due to 
the potential for a threat fron that direction in the event of an enemy 
breakthrough in that area.  Here too, context helps us understand.  The 
reversal to be ready for a threat from the rear implies no immediate threat 
to the front requiring the guns be directed in that direction.  The guns 
never do fire to the rear.  Despite Chuck's characterization of Reichert's 
account as indicating "distress" or a "dire" situation, read in total, and 
in context, Reichert's account is actually a rather moderate, 
straightforward description of the two batteries actions during the day.  It 
contains nothing to suggest they were ever overrun, or for that matter, 
recaptured.

Jim Cameron