Lincoln letter on Gettysburg found at U.S. archives

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - An optimistic two-sentence note that Abraham Lincoln penned to his top general after the Civil War's decisive battle was unveiled on Thursday at the National Archives where it was undetected for nearly 70 years.

The note from Lincoln to Maj. Gen. Henry Halleck was written on July 7, 1863, four days after the defeat of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, and three days after the city of Vicksburg on the Mississippi River fell to Union forces.

A misspelling showed the rudimentary education of the 16th U.S. president, who was largely self-taught.

The brief missive to Halleck, the commanding general of the Union Army, remarked on the two major victories after a series of crushing Union losses in the four-year war fought to prevent the then-fledgling union from splitting apart.

Lincoln had repeatedly replaced his generals for failing to be aggressive enough.

Gen. George Meade, who led Union forces at Gettysburg, had taken control of Lincoln's Army of the Potomac just a week before the battle, which came to be seen as the turning point of the Civil War.

The note was found three weeks ago at the archives among documents long open to researchers and was known to have existed because Halleck cited it in a telegram, said archivist Trevor Plante, the Civil War specialist who found it.

The discovery cleared up the mystery of whether Halleck had summarized or interpreted Lincoln's message, Plante said. He quoted Lincoln's message exactly.

"We have certain information that Vicksburg surrendered to General Grant on the 4th of July. Now, if Gen. Meade can complete his work so gloriously prosecuted thus far, by the literal or substantial destruction of Lee's army, the rebellion will be over," the note says.

The document, signed "Yours truly, A. Lincoln," was written on War Department letterhead. Plante said in other writing Lincoln sometimes misspelled the word "literal" and sometimes spelled it correctly.

DISCOVERY CHANNEL DOCUMENTARY

Plante found the document while collecting information for a documentary on Gettysburg being produced by the Discovery Channel.

"I was looking for something else and frankly where I found it was in an obscure place," he said.

The letter was in a collection known as the Generals' Papers, a hodgepodge of documents. The papers were transferred to the National Archives from the War Department in 1938. Before 1938 they had been held in a government garage.

"I was going through and just seeing kind of every day stuff and then turned the page and there was the Lincoln document," Plante said.

"The note expresses Lincoln's optimism that if Meade could destroy Lee's army, the war would be over," Plante added. "For the next several days both Halleck and Lincoln implored Meade to fight Lee's army before it crossed the Potomac River."

One telegram fired off by Halleck prompted Meade to offer his resignation, but Halleck eased up on his demands and Meade stayed on. But Lincoln's frustration with Meade continued to grow.

Meade's cavalry harassed the Confederates but the main Union Army took two days to begin pursuit, and maneuvered to protect Washington and Baltimore, so by the time they caught up with Lee, the Confederates were fording the Potomac.

With Lee's army across the river by July 14, Lincoln wrote a harsh letter to Meade saying he could have easily have stopped the Confederates and his failure to do so would prolong the war indefinitely.

Lincoln famously thought over the letter and never delivered it, leaving it sealed in an envelope marked "To Gen. Meade, never sent, or signed." The war continued nearly two more years before ending with Lee's surrender at Appomattox Court House in Virginia on April 9, 1865.