Sunday, August 31, 2014
Sunday Reflection: Gettysburg
Not long ago, I was driving through Pennsylvania, and found myself spending the night in Gettysburg, site of the crucial Civil War battle and Abraham Lincoln's masterful Gettysburg Address. The battlefield surrounds the little town; it is maintained as a national historic site.
At first, I was underwhelmed. A battlefield after the battle, of course, is just a field, and that is what I saw. But there was… something, and in the quiet I could sense it. It isn't quite what I would call sacred ground, but there was a strong sense of place, an overwhelming feeling of sadness.
Tens of thousands died. After the battle, mothers picked their way through the bodies, looking for what was left of their sons. In a side yard, limbs were stacked like wood. You can't think about such tragedy without feeling it, and I did.
Lincoln wrote this:
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
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Beautiful haunting words. The newish visitor's center is quite nice. Glad you could stop and spend some time there.
# posted by 
: 7:03 AM
: 7:03 AM
Yes.
Everyone who has an opportunity to visit a Civil War battlefield should do it, particularly if they can trace back to an ancestor who fought there.
My wife and I have walked Gettysburg, also several battlefields in the Western Theater where my great granddaddy and his two brothers fought in Company C, 19th Louisiana. At Shiloh, we walked the site of three bloody assaults into the Hornet's Nest. At Chickamauga we walked over the route they took in routing the Union forces. And at Missionary Ridge we walked the ground where they were in turn routed and great grand daddy was wounded and captured.
The excellent Civil War Museum in New Orleans has some tree trunks from Chickamauga in which are embedded balls, minie balls, shells and other missiles. They give a telling tale of the ferocity of the fight, and the amount of metal each army threw at the other.
What a terrible four years!
Interesting side note. After getting skunked in the War Between the States, it is reported that white Southerners were over represented in the ranks during the World Wars. When folks in Prague reeneact the liberation of that city in 1945, they dress in American WW II uniforms, ride American WW II jeeps, peeps and trucks with
American rifles and side arms, and when we saw the event in 2007,the last vehicle in the parade sported a Confederate Battle Flag.
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Everyone who has an opportunity to visit a Civil War battlefield should do it, particularly if they can trace back to an ancestor who fought there.
My wife and I have walked Gettysburg, also several battlefields in the Western Theater where my great granddaddy and his two brothers fought in Company C, 19th Louisiana. At Shiloh, we walked the site of three bloody assaults into the Hornet's Nest. At Chickamauga we walked over the route they took in routing the Union forces. And at Missionary Ridge we walked the ground where they were in turn routed and great grand daddy was wounded and captured.
The excellent Civil War Museum in New Orleans has some tree trunks from Chickamauga in which are embedded balls, minie balls, shells and other missiles. They give a telling tale of the ferocity of the fight, and the amount of metal each army threw at the other.
What a terrible four years!
Interesting side note. After getting skunked in the War Between the States, it is reported that white Southerners were over represented in the ranks during the World Wars. When folks in Prague reeneact the liberation of that city in 1945, they dress in American WW II uniforms, ride American WW II jeeps, peeps and trucks with
American rifles and side arms, and when we saw the event in 2007,the last vehicle in the parade sported a Confederate Battle Flag.
# posted by : 6:03 PM
: 6:03 PM << Home
