Feeding his army was a major part of Lee's decision to go north after Chancellorsville. There simply wasn't any food left for his army or his horses in Northern Virginia. The reason Lee's army was so small at the time of Battle of Chancellorsville (and so much larger at the time of Gettysburg) was because Longstreet's entire Corps spent the winter and spring of 1863 in Coastal Carolina driving Union forces back to their bases and requisitioning supplies in the areas he reoccupied. In this manner, Longstreet was able to feed his own men and horses on local supplies in Coastal Carolina while Lee had fewer mouths to worry about feeding over the winter in Northern Virginia. Moreover, whatever supplies Longstreet seized that were not used by his own men were sent north to Lee. That was how the Army of Northern Virginia was (barely) able to sustain itself over that winter. The supply situation wasn't any better after Chancellorsville, and crops wouldn't ready for harvest for months.... and then only if Lee could keep northern armies from burning/stealing everything before harvest. Lee figured that, by going north, he could feed his army and fatten his horses on northern supplies while keeping Union armies at bay up north where they wouldn't be able to pillage Confederate farms. Then, he could return to Virginia in time for the harvest. Of course, he also hoped to win a signal victory while up north, but it was the supply situation that weighed heavily on him and had him looking north to begin with.
For the record, I agree about the silliness of, on the one hand, strictly forbidding his army from just seizing supplies from civilians in the north, but, then, paying them for those supplies in worthless Confederate script, which was literally not the slightest bit different in end result.
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indy_go_blue44
9 years ago
Well at least the Confederates made an effort to pay for their requisitions (and had they won the war the money wouldn't have been worthless) unlike the Union troops in Mississippi under Grant, and later of course Sherman's march which either took or destroyed just about everything in its path.
The UNITED States of America. July 4, 1776-June 26, 2015.
RIP.
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mlbroberts
9 years ago
I don't recall the ANV paying anybody for the black people they rounded up in Pennsylvania and carried off. But all of this is irrelevant. It was a war. War is hell, and there is no refining it. Pointing out "this was nice" or "this was awful but that was worse" is a worthless exercise. In the end it is all destruction.
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indy_go_blue44
9 years ago
War is hell is the bottom line. The point of my post was that both sides were guilty of very bad and selfish things that (I hope) can only happen on a large scale during war.
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