His army had never known a panic. The men quietly fell into line and cheered their Commander.
To an English officer on the field Lee quietly said:
"This has been a sad day for us, Colonel—a sad day; but we can't expect always to gain victories."
Lee had lost twenty thousand men and fourteen generals. Meade had lost twenty-three thousand men and seventeen generals. Lee withdrew his army across the swollen Potomac, carrying away his guns and all the prisoners he had taken.
General Meade had saved the North, but Lee's army was still intact, on its old invincible lines in Virginia, sixty-five thousand strong.
The news from Gettysburg crushed the soul of Davis. He had hoped with this battle to end the war, and stop the frightful slaughter of our noblest men, North and South. His Commissioner, Alexander H. Stephens, was halted at Fortress Monroe and sent back to Richmond with an insulting answer.
So bitter was Lee's disappointment that he offered his resignation to Davis.
The President at once wrote a generous letter in which he renewed the expressions of his confidence in the genius of his Commanding General and begged him to guard his precious life from undue exposure.
Gettysburg was but one of the appalling calamities which crushed the hopes of the Confederate Chieftain on this memorable fourth of July, 1863.
On the recovery of Joseph E. Johnston from his wound at Seven Pines he was assigned to the old command of Albert Sidney Johnston in the West. His department included the States of Tennessee, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and North Carolina.