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sharp lesson he had administered the previous year had not been heeded bythe Federal War Office; an opportunity now offered to repeat it, and he tookhis measures accordingly. In case his Government would not consent to abolder offensive, he could at least clear the valley of Virginia of the enemy,— adistinct operation, yet a necessary preliminary to an invasion of the North-This work was assigned to Lieutenant-General Ewell, an able officer, in everyway qualified for such an enterprise.
In anticipation of the new campaign, Lee ’s army was strengthened andreorganized into three army-corps of three divisions each. Each division con-sisted of four brigades, except Rodes’s and Anderson’s, which had five each,and Pickett’s, which had three at Gettysburg, —in all, thirty-seven infantrybrigades. The cavalry were the select troops of the Confederacy. Officersand men had been accustomed all their lives to the use of horses and anus,“ and to the very end the best blood in the land rode after Stuart, Hampton,and the Lees.” They were now organized as a division, under Major-GeneralJ. E. B. Stuart, consisting of the six brigades of Hampton, Robertson, FitZ'hugh Lee, Jenkins, W. E. Jones, and W. H. F. Lee , and six batteries of horse-artillery under Major R. F. Beckham. To these should be added Imboden’scommand, a strong brigade of over 2000 effective horsemen and a battery othorse-artillery, which had been operating in the mountain country and wasnow near Staunton, awaiting orders. The artillery had recently received anexcellent organization under its commandant-in-chief, General Pendleton. ^consisted, besides the horse-artillery, of fifteen so-called “battalions,” each offour batteries, with one lieutenant-colonel and a major. To each army-corpswere attached five battalions, one for each division and two as a reserve, th ewhole under a colonel as chief of artillery. The total number of batteries was 69,of guns 287, of which 30 were with the cavalry. With few exceptions the bat-teries were of four guns each. The army was commanded by a full general, eacharmy-corps, except the artillery, by a lieutenant-general, each division by amajor-general, each brigade, except two, by brigadier-generals. Nearly all theseofficers were veterans of proved ability and many had served in the Mexican war-
In the Army of the Potomac the discharge of 58 regiments had reduced-its strength since Cliancellorsville by 25,000 effectives, partly replaced by ^brigades numbering less than 12,000 men. At the battle of Gettysburg the ‘army-corps consisted of 19 infantry divisions, 7 of which had 2 brigades, Idhad 3, and 1 had 4; in all 51 brigades. [See lists of organizations and coin-manders in “The Opposing Forces in the Gettysburg Campaign,” to follow-JThe army and army-corps were commanded by major-generals, the divisionsby 3 major-generals and 16 brigadier-generals, the infantry brigades bybrigadier-generals and 29 colonels. The average strength of army-corp sand divisions was about half that of the Confederates, a fact that should bekept in mind, or the terms will be misleading. The cavalry had been raiseunder disadvantages. Men accustomed to the use of both horses and ai'm swere comparatively few in the North and required training in everythin??that was necessary to make a trooper. The theater of war was not considei e .favorable for cavalry, and it was distributed to the various headquarters