Manchester

Manchester. Meade's Pipe Creek Plan. , On June 29, 1863, Union Gen. George G. Meade ordered the Army of the Potomac to Pipe Creek to counter any move toward Washington or Baltimore by Gen. Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia and to engage the Confederates in battle. Meade was uncertain of Lee’s strength or location., The Federal right flank rested here at Manchester, the center at Union Mills and the left at Middleburg. Gen. John Sedgwick’s VI Corps, Meade’s largest, occupied the position with 15,000 men on June 30, after marching from New Windsor through Westminster. Soon the landscape here was dotted for miles with tents and campfires. Manchester’s kind citizens brought bread, cakes, pies, and milk to the exhausted and footsore soldiers, some of whom lacked shoes. The next day the men rested, cleaned their weapons, and drew sixty rounds of ammunition each. Late in the evening, the order came to march again. VI Corps retraced its steps in the direction of Westminster to intersect Littlestown Turnpike and then marched north. The 34-mile march from Manchester in darkness and then under a scorching sun to Gettysburg was one of the longest and fastest marches of the Civil War.