George Gordon Meade (December 31, 1815 – November 6, 1872) was a career United States Army officer and civil engineer involved in coastal construction, including several lighthouses.
He fought with distinction in the Second Seminole War and the Mexican-American War.
During the American Civil War he served as a Union general, rising from command of a brigade to the Army of the Potomac.
He is best known for defeating Confederate General Robert E. Lee at the Battle of Gettysburg in 1863.

Meade was born in Cádiz, Spain, eighth of eleven children of Richard Worsam Meade (1778–1828) and Margaret Coats Butler (1782–1852).
His brother, Richard Worsam Meade II, was a future naval officer.
His father, a wealthy Philadelphia merchant serving in Spain as a naval agent for the U.S. government, was ruined financially because of his support of Spain in the Napoleonic Wars and died in 1828 while Meade was not yet a teenager.
His family returned to the United States in 1817, in precarious financial straits.
Young George attended the Mount Hope Institution in Baltimore and entered the United States Military Academy (West Point) in 1831, chosen primarily for financial reasons.
He graduated 19th in his class of 56 cadets in 1835.
On December 31, 1840, he married Margaretta Sergeant, daughter of John Sergeant, running mate of Henry Clay in the 1832 presidential election.
They had seven children together (John Sergeant Meade, Col. George Meade, Margaret Butler Meade, Spencer Meade, Sarah Wise Meade, Henrietta Meade, and William Meade).

General Meade died in Philadelphia, while still on active duty, from complications of his old wounds, combined with pneumonia, on November 6, 1872.
He was buried in Laurel Hill Cemetery.[25]

There are memorial statues of him throughout Pennsylvania, including statues at Gettysburg National Military Park and one in Fairmount Park in Philadelphia by Alexander Milne Calder. The United States Army's Fort George G. Meade in Fort Meade, Maryland, is named for him, as are Meade County, Kansas, and Meade County, South Dakota. The Old Baldy Civil War Round Table in Philadelphia is named in honor of Meade's horse during the war. In World War II, the United States liberty ship SS George G. Meade was named in his honor.

One-thousand-dollar Treasury notes, also called Coin notes, of the Series 1890 and 1891, feature portraits of Meade on the obverse. The 1890 Series note is called the Grand Watermelon Note by collectors, because the large zeroes on the reverse resemble the pattern on a watermelon.

The General Meade Society of Philadelphia gathers annually on December 31 to celebrate the anniversary of the general's birth.
Since 2001, the Society has sponsored activities that include tours of Meade-related sites in Philadelphia; seminars with speakers on the theme of Meade's life, services, and career; adoption and maintenance of the Meade Monument and headquarters site at Gettysburg; a scholarship drive for the General George G. Meade school in Philadelphia; a project to issue a commemorative stamp; and an annual birthday commemoration at his gravesite in Philadelphia's historic Laurel Hill Cemetery.[26]