What Happened to Me.

PICKETT, Lasalle Corbell [George Pickett].

$500.00

Item Number: 145582

New York: Brentano's, 1917.

First edition of the autobiography of LaSalle Corbell Pickett, wife of Confederate General George Pickett. Duodecimo, original cloth, top edge gilt, frontispiece portrait of the author dated January 17, 1917. Lengthily signed by the author on the front pastedown, “Over the great world tragedy of today the star of Bethlehem shines with divine radiance and lights the way to a brighter day when peace and love shall reign forever – Faithfully from LaSalle Corbell Pickett.” In very good condition with light rubbing to the extremities.

Graduating last in the West Point Class of 1846, Lieutenant George E. Pickett rose through the ranks of the Confederate Army, eventually being promoted to major general. He is best remembered in history for the disastrous Confederate offensive attack on the third day of the Battle of Gettysburg which came to be known as Pickett's Charge. He married his wife, LaSalle "Sallie" Corbell, in 1863 when she was 20 and he was 38. LaSalle Corbell Pickett died on March 22, 1931, having outlived her husband by more than 55 years. After his death, she became a well-known writer and speaker on "her Soldier," resulting in the creation of an idealized Pickett who was the perfect Southern gentleman and soldier. There is a great deal of historical controversy surrounding LaSalle Pickett's lionizing of her husband, which played a part in Pickett becoming a tragic yet heroic figure in the "Lost Cause" mythology.