In the 1850s, Sickles had received a commission in the 12th Regiment of the New York Militia, and had attained the rank of
major. He insisted on wearing his militia uniform for ceremonial occasions while serving in London, and caused a minor diplomatic scandal by snubbing
Queen Victoria at an
Independence Day celebration. At the outbreak of the Civil War, Sickles worked to repair his public image by raising volunteer units in New York for the
Union Army. Because of his previous military experience and political connections, he was appointed
colonel of the
70th New York Infantry, one of the four regiments he organized. He was promoted to
brigadier general of volunteers in September 1861, where he was notorious before beginning any fighting. According to author Garry Boulard's
Daniel Sickles: A Life, Sickles not only refused to return runaway slaves who escaped to his Union camp in Northern Virginia, he put many of them on the federal payroll as servants, while also training male slaves to be soldiers. It was a policy that won for him the approval of the influential
Congressional Committee on the Conduct of the War. In March 1862, he was forced to relinquish his command when the U.S. Congress refused to confirm his commission. He lobbied his Washington political contacts and reclaimed both his rank and his command on May 24, 1862, in time to rejoin the Army in the
Peninsula Campaign. Although the U.S. Senate did not confirm the promotion until March 9, 1863, and the President did not formally appoint Sickles until March 11, 1863,
Gettysburg The
Battle of Gettysburg was the occasion of the most famous incident and the effective end of Sickles' military career. On July 2, 1863, Army of the Potomac commander Maj. Gen.
George G. Meade ordered Sickles' corps to take up defensive positions on the southern end of
Cemetery Ridge, anchored in the north to the
II Corps and to the south, the hill known as
Little Round Top. Sickles was unhappy to see the "Peach Orchard," a slightly higher terrain feature, to his front. Concerned over his position and uncertain of Meade's exact intentions, a little after 2 p.m. he began to march his corps out to the Peach Orchard, almost a mile in front of Cemetery Ridge. This had two effects: it greatly diluted the concentrated defensive posture of his corps by stretching it too thin, and it created a salient that could be bombarded and attacked from multiple sides. Soon thereafter (3 p.m.), Meade called a meeting of his corps commanders. Meade refused Sickles' offer to withdraw because he realized it was too late and the Confederates would soon attack, putting a retreating force in even greater peril.
Stephen W. Sears wrote that "Dan Sickles, in not obeying Meade's explicit orders, risked both his Third Corps and the army's defensive plan on July 2." However, Sickles' maneuver has recently been credited by
John Keegan with blunting the whole Confederate offensive that was intended to cause the collapse of the Union line. Similarly,
James M. McPherson wrote that "Sickles's unwise move may have unwittingly foiled Lee's hopes." His leg was amputated that afternoon. He insisted on being transported to
Washington, D.C., which he reached on July 4, 1863. He brought some of the first news of the great Union victory, and started a public relations campaign to defend his behavior in the conflict. On the afternoon of July 5, President Lincoln and his son, Tad, visited General Sickles, as he was recovering in Washington. , along with a cannonball similar to the one that shattered it, on display at the National Museum of Health and Medicine Sickles had recent knowledge of a new directive from the Army Surgeon General to collect and forward "specimens of morbid anatomy ... together with projectiles and foreign bodies removed" to the newly founded
Army Medical Museum in
Washington, D.C. He preserved the bones from his leg and donated them to the museum in a small coffin-shaped box, along with a visiting card marked, "With the compliments of Major General D.E.S." Upon his first visit to the limb, Sickles allegedly berated the museum for not preserving his foot as well. For several years thereafter, he reportedly visited the limb on the anniversary of the amputation. The museum, now known as the
National Museum of Health and Medicine, still displays this artifact. Sickles ran a vicious campaign against General Meade's character after Gettysburg. Sickles felt that Meade had wronged him and that he deserved credit for winning the battle. In anonymous newspaper articles and in testimony before a congressional committee, Sickles falsely maintained that Meade had secretly planned to retreat from Gettysburg on the first day. He also claimed to have occupied Little Round Top on July 2. While his movement away from Cemetery Ridge may have violated orders, Sickles always asserted that it was the correct move because it disrupted the Confederate attack, redirecting its thrust, and effectively shielding the Union's real objectives, Cemetery Ridge and
Cemetery Hill. Sickles's redeployment took Confederate commanders by surprise, and historians have argued about its ramifications ever since. Sickles eventually received the
Medal of Honor for his actions, although it took him 34 years to get it. The official citation accompanying his medal recorded that Sickles "displayed most conspicuous gallantry on the field, vigorously contesting the advance of the enemy and continuing to encourage his troops after being himself severely wounded." ==Postbellum career==