Day 58 - Harpers Ferry, West Virginia to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania

What can you say, and how do you act, when you finally get to visit what is arguably the most sacred battlefield site in America? From the time I was just a little kid, and my 7th grade math teacher introduced me to the Civil War, I have dreamed about coming to gaze out at the rocks and fields and orchards surrounding the town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. There are over 5,989 acres of land within the protection of the Gettysburg National Military Park. Hundreds more acres are protected around the park by historical covenants which prevent development and maintain the 1863 appearance. The place is just an amateur historian's dream come true.

Once, when I was about 21 years old, I got close to coming to Gettysburg. I was stationed for a short time during my tenure in the U.S. Naval Air Corp at a place called NAS Willow Grove here in Pennsylvania. The NAS stood for Naval Air Station. I had been assigned to NAS Willow Grove to complete my military training in aviation antisubmarine warfare. I think there were perhaps twenty of us in my incoming class.

I remember that some of the sailors in the outgoing class had managed to pool their money and purchase a 1953 or 1954 Cadillac sedan that they used to tour the surrounding countryside in their free time. Preparing to leave and go on active duty, the group asked several of us if we'd like to buy the car from them when they graduated, which would allow us to have transportation as well. I actually had my own car at the time, but I had dropped it in New York State, where my brother was living, so that he could do some body work on it. He had given me an old beater station wagon to drive that I didn't want to trust too far away from civilization.

There were about four of us as I remember it, who went in on that Cadillac, and boy did we have some high times traveling all over the Pennsylvania countryside on our off times. I remember that I had tried to convince the guys to ride over to Gettysburg and tour the battlefield, but they opted instead for touring Valley Forge. Valley Forge was interesting, of course, but it wasn't Gettysburg.

The next time I got close to Gettysburg was the time I attended the conference for the newly formed Lincoln Highway Association that was holding it's very first conference in central Pennsylvania about twenty years ago. The tour buses traveled right through Gettysburg as we traced the old route of the Lincoln Highway, now Pennsylvania Route 30. I got to watch the front gate sail right by my window and quickly disappear from sight. Since I had no transportation other than the tour bus, I could not return to visit very easily, and besides I was on a pretty strict time allowance from my job, and probably wouldn't have been able to spare the extra day.

Which brings us to today. We almost didn't make it to Gettysburg this time, either. After inflicting quite a few Civil War sites on Concetta, I was ready to give up coming as far north as Pennsylvania and we discussed instead the idea of begining our westward journey back to Nevada from Virginia. At the time we had visited Appomattox Court House, the battlefield site dedicated to the surrender of General Lee to General Grant. I told her then that she wouldn't have to endure any more battlefields and I would be content to visit Gettysburg on another trip.

Fortunately for me, our tour of the Appomattox Court House grounds, and the nearby Confederate Museum in the town of Appomattox, were both extremely interesting and exciting. Concetta was moved to concede that just maybe one more battlefield wouldn't be the straw that broke the camel's back.

So we started north from Virginia with my avowed promise to turn west after Gettysburg and not try to slip any more Civil War, like the camel's nose under the tent flap, into the schedule when she wasn't looking. Of course, I did accidentally choose a route that just happened to deposit us in the neighborhood of Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, by day's end yesterday. But what the heck, you do need to stretch your legs after a long day of driving in the rain, don't you?

During the course of this vacation we found that there are a tremendous number of things wrong with Civil War museums, no matter what state of the Union in which you find them. And ALL of those things are called children. For some reason, it is now SOP to give fourth graders a check-off sheet of Civil War facts that they must find in the museum in order to get a good grade for their field trip. That is, of course, wonderful if you're trying to foster an interest in the

Civil War in at least one or two of the little creatures. But that's where the word wonderful ends. The kids run from exhibit to exhibit, shouting at each other with unrestrained glee, and pay not the slightest attention to the older folks who are trying to comprehend the various displays. The noise level borders on deafening. The commotion is completely distracting. If you search the room for the chaperones, they appear to be either shell-shocked into insensibility, or they have tuned out the whole thing and are texting their boyfriends or girlfriends with not a thought of where their charges are or who they might be terrorizing.

This situation was repeated at the Gettysburg Museum today. Thank goodness, we had budgeted our time primarily in other directions and we were willing to retreat until the invaders had withdrawn. The best thing we did today was sign up for the battlefield tour handled, in our case, by a retired army officer who, we could tell, just lived and breathed the battle of Gettysburg. Tour guides must go through a period of rigorous training and testing before they are turned loose on the public. Let's just say that this guy, with the unlikely name of Kavin Coughenour, could have done no better job explaining the three-day battle than if he had participated in the event himself. He was, in short, absolutely wonderful.

Kavin shepherded us around the battlefield, stopping at significant points to explain the the day's events for July 1, 2 & 3, 1863. We learned how the battle started against the expressed orders of Robert E. Lee, but came about because one General decided to visit Gettysburg for supplies. We learned about Generals who made disastrous blunders that resulted in the deaths of thousands. General Daniel Sickles earned this distinction when he advanced his 8,500 troops too far in advance of his left and right flank and lost half of his men before reinforcements could reach him. We learned about heros like Joshua Chamberlain who was charged with defending the Union left flank, and whom, when his men ran completely out of ammunition after repeated rebel attacks, ordered them to fix bayonets and charge the enemy force that hugely outnumbered them. Astoundingly, Chamberlain was successful in pushing the Confederate forces back, saving the Union flank, and perhaps the battle. He was later awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor.

Those are only two stories we heard today, and in truth they came faster than we could remember them all. But just being able to stand in the woods where the Confederates grouped to charge the Union center on the morning of July 3rd, 1863 was totally humbling. Famously known as Pickett's charge, this is the event that scholars believe marked the high water mark of the Confederacy. Roughly 13,000 troops marched across the fields in front of where we stood today and were mowed down by not only thousands of rifles, but dozens of cannons, loaded like giant shotguns, with canisters full of iron spheres the size of golf balls.

In the end, only 400 Confederate soldiers made it to the Union line, and they were quickly killed or captured. When our bus tour moved on from the Confederate staging area, our guide took us to the other end of "Pickett's Charge" and we got to see the terminus of the failed Confederate advance. We could easily see what a terrible distance those Confederates had been in the open and suffered that murderous fire.

We were also taken to Little Round Top, where Joshua Chamberlain famously withstood those repeated rebel attacks, and looked out at the whole battlefield. I would never have guessed that you could see over so wide an area from up there. It was like looking at a giant game board where you could almost SEE the various units and players as described to you by the guide.

There were lots of other descriptions and discussions on our ride, but you get the idea. I have never been anywhere that comes so close to capturing the feeling of the Civil War. Everything is laid out just as it was. They're even planting peach trees in the old peach orchard that existed in 1863. Most of the houses in Gettysburg that were around during the three-day battle are still there. The Park Service has arranged over 400 cannons where the two sides had their cannons arranged. Most impressive, there are over 1700 monuments to virtually every important aspect of the battle. If you were able to spend a few days walking the battlefield, I think you could really gain an understanding of what those boys in blue and gray were faced with. Maybe next time.

Gettysburg is the place you have to come if you love the Civil War, or any aspect of it. The museum is top notch. The narrated coach tours are fantastic. They have a cyclorama on the second floor which gives you a 360 degree look at the battle in progress (see photo above left). This feature alone cost them millions of dollars, much of it from privately raised monies. The movie that they encourage you to see before you do anything else is so sobering and moving that almost everyone left with tears in their eyes. You can also tour the battlefield by yourself using maps, or using their narrated tour on CD that you can insert in your car CD player and that is available in the bookstore.

Anyway, that's it for the Civil War for now. We've visited each and every one of the sites on my long-time "must visit" list. From Harpers Ferry where John Brown tried to force a Civil War in 1859, to Fort Sumter where the first shots were fired, to Appomattox where Lee's Army of Northern Virginia finally gave up. We've walked the heights near Fredericksburg, Virginia, where one of the worst military disasters for the Union occurred, and traveled the road near Chancellorsville where the great Stonewall Jackson was shot by his own troops. We've been from one end of the Civil War to the other. Thanks to my understanding wife, all my goals have been met. Well, maybe not all my goals.....

I've been thinking about buying one of those blue suits like the guy at right. Now I didn't have any direct ancestors in the Civil War. The Davis family didn't arrive from England and Wales until 1873, and I think all my mother's folks were Mormons and Quakers and non-violent folks. But I did have two distant uncles who fought for the 61st Illinois Volunteer Infantry. Guess that should qualify me for a re-inactor's birth somewhere. What do you think?