Experiencing Gettysburg

We departed our three-week Massachusetts mission project last Wednesday and hit the road south on Thursday. The mountains in northern Pennsylvania afforded the most beautiful autumn landscape of our journey. Nonetheless, it was a relief to reach more flat and open ground toward southern Pennsylvania, dotted with dairy farms and Holstein cows appearing along the highway. Honestly, we were happy to escape the crazy tangle of rough, narrow, and winding roads with angular intersections and dearth of road signage to guide outsiders. 

So on to Gettysburg!

I was not prepared for the emotional experience that lay ahead. We started at the Gettysburg National Museum and Visitor Center and began our visit with a film presentation titled, “A New Birth of Freedom.” To set the stage…some 88,000 Union troops and 75,000 Confederate troops clashed during the battle surrounding Gettysburg on July 1 – 3, 1863. 

We moved upstairs into the Gettysburg Cyclorama which was an amazing life-size work of art and staging. Standing up high overlooking the imagery surrounding us amidst the Cyclorama, the enactment of battle began. Flashes of light from cannon fire began along with the fiery sound of cannon balls flying.  Imagine tens of thousands of rifles and pistols joining cannon fire filling the air with so much smoke, visibility was like standing in a cloud. My eyes became moist with emotion as I imagined what it had to have been like for those soldiers facing mortal danger. 

We learned the names of new places: Cemetery Ridge, Seminary Ridge, Little Round Top, Big Round Top, Culps Hill, the Wheatfield, Peach Orchard, Plum Run and Devils Den; places littered with dead bodies and blood-soaked soil after the fighting ended. Every home and building in Gettysburg was turned into a hospital caring for the thousands of wounded and dying from both sides. 

Gettysburg is a heavily monumented landscape. Over 1,300 monuments honor the valiant soldiers, primarily those from the Union; fewer monuments mark the Confederate fallen. We visited the Minnesota monument. The First Minnesota Infantry Regiment played a pivotal and heroic role in the battle on July 2nd. Their courage was astounding. Please zoom in on the first picture below to learn of their valor.

New understandings of the full nature and ramifications of President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation were discovered. To my surprise, not everyone in the north was for this war. Fear of job competition stirred with the recognition that ultimately 4 million African slaves would be set free. The fear of job competition shouldn’t be surprising; think four million immigrants poised on our southern border heading north. 

To learn our history is important. To understand and appreciate the sacrifices that were made during the Civil War seems especially poignant as today we face our country becoming more and more divided. 

Lincoln stated to the nation divided, this house will not stand. 

Today we head to Texas for our final leg of the journey with a few more stops along the way. Tonight we’ll meet some alpacas; Anne is excited about that! What an adventure we have enjoyed!

Credit to Skip for authoring this marvelous post.