Gettysburg's East Cavalry Field: Stopping Jeb Stuart

On July third, eighteen sixty-three, while Pickett's Charge was being shattered on Cemetery Ridge, a separate cavalry battle was unfolding about three miles east of Gettysburg. Confederate General J.E.B. Stuart, Robert E. Lee's famed cavalry commander, led a force toward the Union rear, intending to strike behind the Federal lines at the same moment as the infantry assault.

Standing in his way was Union General David Gregg, whose cavalry division met Stuart here in a series of fierce mounted charges and countercharges. George Armstrong Custer, then a young brigadier general, led some of the most aggressive Union charges of the afternoon. Gregg's force held, driving the Confederates from the field and blocking Stuart's flanking movement. Had Stuart broken through, the Union rear would have been vulnerable at the very moment Pickett's men were already collapsing the front. The East Cavalry Field, often overlooked, helped seal the Union victory at Gettysburg.