He at once sent for Pleasonton and gave him orders to collect his cavalry with a view to cover the retreat of the army.

Indeed, in an article on the "Secret History of Gettysburg," published in the "Southern Historical Papers," by Colonel Palfrey, of the Confederate army, he states that the movement to the rear actually commenced, and that Ewell's pickets heard and reported that artillery was passing in that direction.

After a short time the noise of the wheels ceased.

He also says that in a conversation he had with Colonel Ulric Dahlgren of our cavalry, who had lost a leg, and was a prisoner in Richmond, he was told that while the battle of Gettysburg was going on he (Dahlgren) captured a Confederate scout with a despatch from Jefferson Davis to General Lee, in which the former wrote of the exposed condition of Richmond owing to the presence of a large Union force at City Point.

Dahlgren said a retreat had been ordered, but when Meade read this despatch, he looked upon it as a sign indicating the weakness of the enemy, and perhaps thinking it would not do to supplement the probable capture of Richmond by a retreat of the Army of the Potomac, countermanded the order.