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THIS CONSECRATED GROUND
Nearly 20,000 wounded and dying soldiers occupied its public
buildings and many of its houses.
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After the battle, the Gettysburg area was a tragic place. Dead
horses, the bodies of soldiers, and the debris of battle littered its
trampled fields. Many of its buildings were damaged, its fences gone,
and its air polluted with the odor of rotting flesh. Nearly 20,000
wounded and dying soldiers occupied its public buildings and many of its
houses; Union and Confederate hospitals clustered at many of its farms.
Medical authorities transferred the wounded to general hospitals in
nearby cities as soon as practicable. Dr. Henry Janes, the surgeon in
charge of medical activities at Gettysburg, established a general
hospital along the York Pike a mile east of the town in mid-July. The
last of the wounded did not leave Gettysburg until November 23—over
four months after the battle.
Although the armies had hurried many of their dead before marching
away, many bodies remained above ground, and heavy rains that began on
July 4 washed open the shallow graves of others. Many Union dead were
embalmed and sent to their homes, and survivors of a few purchased lots
for them in Evergreen Cemetery. Confederate dead were buried as
individuals or in mass graves near the places of their deaths. After the
war, the bodies of some of the known Confederate dead were exhumed and
taken to home cemeteries.
Most, however, remained at Gettysburg until the early 1870s, when
southern Ladies Memorial Associations had the remains of 3,320
Confederate soldiers exhumed and taken south. They reburied 2,935 of
them in Hollywood Cemetery in Richmond. Virginia.
Northern states with units in the battle sent agents to Gettysburg to
look after their dead and wounded soldiers. Governor Andrew G. Curtin of
Pennsylvania visited Gettysburg soon after the battle, saw its problems,
and named David Wills, a Gettysburg attorney, as Pennsylvania's agent.
Soon Wills and other agents decided that a cemetery should be
established for the Union dead. With Curtin's permission, Wills soon
purchased seventeen acres on the northwest slope of Cemetery Hill for a
cemetery and hired the noted landscape architect William Saunders to
create a cemetery plan.
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THE CIVILIAN COST OF BATTLE
The path of the battle was like a violent storm that left a wake
of destruction wherever it traveled. The farmers, upon whose land the
majority of the battle took place, suffered severely. In some cases,
nearly everything was lost. This photo of the Catherine Trostle farm was
taken on July 6, four days after the fighting had raged around her
farm. Some sense of what the battle cost her can be realized in the
claims shown below that she filed for damages with both the state and
federal government. There were dozens of other farmers whose circumstances
mirrored those of Catherine Trostle. Few of them, including Mrs.
Trostle, were ever compensated for their losses.
To the Board of Commissioners appointed to assess the damages
occasioned by the rebel invasions of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania,
under the act approved April 9, 1868. The petition of Catherine Trostle
on behalf of Abram Trostle, respectfully sheweth that he was a resident
of Cumberland township, Adams County, Pennsylvania, in the year 1863;
that on or about the 1st to 4th of July, 1863, he sustained loss and
damage to his property situate and being in Cumberland township, in said
County of Adams, by the causes referred to in said Act of Assembly . . .
. as follows, viz:
| 27 acres wheat destroyed, worth | $600.00 |
| 9 acres Corn | 360.00 |
| 8 acres Oats | 80.00 |
| 4 acres Barley | 50.00 |
| 1 acre Flax | 15.00 |
| 1 acre Potatoes | 50.00 |
| 32 acres Grass | 650.00 |
| 20 tons of Hay out of the barn | 300.00 |
| 6400 Rails destroyed | 512.00 |
| House and Barn injured by shells, and used for hospital | 200.00 |
| 3 Cows killed in the battle, @40.00 | 120.00 |
| Heifers @ $20 | 40.00 |
| 1 Bull, | 20.00 |
| 1 Large Hog | 15.00 |
| 1 Sheep. | 5.00 |
| 50 Chickens | 12.50 |
| 2 Hives of Bees | 14.00 |
| 1 Saddle & 2 bridles | 20.00 |
| 2 Barrels of Ham & Shoulders say 200 lbs. @ 20cent | 40.00 |
| Beds and Bedding | 50.00 |
| Clothes of family | 20.00 |
| Household and Kitchen goods and Queensware | 15.00 |
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That her husband, Abraham Trostle, has become insane, and is now in
the Lunatic Asylum, that their farm was near Round Top, and was fought
over two days, and the crops and fences were totally destroyed. The
fences were burned.
The cows and other stock and cattle, and fowls, were partly killed
on the field, and some driven away, the farm being between the two
armies, in part was fought over several times; that the family was
driven from the house, which was taken possession of by the soldiers,
and nursed for wounded men, and it was also struck by shells and
balls, and much injured. There were 16 dead horses left close by the
door and probably 100 on the farm. She believes the property was damaged
and lost to the amount claimed.
That her husband had 15 barrels of flour in Myers Mill which was
taken by the rebels, and was worth $120.00.
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VIEW OF TROSTLE FARM WITH DEAD HORSES FROM 9TH MASSACHUSETTS BATTERY (GNMP)
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The interment of Union dead in this, the Soldiers' National Cemetery,
began almost at once, and by the spring of 1864 3,500 bodies were buried
there. They interred the battle dead known by name or state in state
plots and the 979 unidentified dead in plots for the unknown at each end
of the arc of graves. Now 3,706 Civil War dead are buried in the
cemetery along with approximately that many dead of later wars.
Wills invited the Honorable Edward Everett to deliver the main
address at the cemetery's dedication on November 19, 1863. Everett had
been president of Harvard, governor of Massachusetts, a senator, and a
secretary of state and was one of the leading orators of his time. The
commissioners invited President Lincoln to the ceremony, and after the
president accepted the invitation, asked him to participate in the
program.
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CHRISTIAN COMMISSION TENTS AT UNION 2ND CORPS HOSPITAL (LC)
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President Lincoln took this invitation seriously, and before leaving
Washington he prepared a brief but thoughtful address. He made revisions
to his original draft before the dedication while a guest in the Wills
home on the square in Gettysburg.
The dedication ceremonies began at noon on November 19, 1863. The
program included music by the Marine band, prayers, and hymns. Everett
gave an address that reviewed the course of the battle and lasted
nearly two hours. The president's remarks required only a few minutes,
but they have become immortal.
There are five autograph copies of President Lincoln's Gettysburg
Address. The first two drafts (Lincoln's address on the 19th probably
followed the text of the second) are in the custody of the Library of
Congress, but one is on display at Gettysburg National Military Park
part of each year. The third copy, which the president wrote to be sold
at the Sanitary Commission Fair in New York City in 1864, is in the
Illinois State Library. The fourth copy was written to be published in a
book, Autograph Leaves of Our Country's Authors, which was to be
sold at the Soldiers' and Sailors' Fair in Baltimore in 1864, but could
not be used for this purpose because Lincoln had copied it on both sides
of the paper. Lincoln gave this copy to George Bancroft, the historian,
and now this "Bancroft Copy" is in the Cornell University Library. The
copy written to replace it, which was owned by Col. Alexander Bliss,
publisher of Autumn Leaves and called the "Bliss Copy," is in the
White House.
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GETTYSBURG: A WOMAN'S STORY
Cornelia Hancock was a 23-year-old woman from Hancock's Bridge,
New Jersey, who sought to aid the war effort in some way. The battle at
Gettysburg offered her the opportunity, and she made her way to the
field, arriving on July 7th. She described the scene she encountered at
the Union Second Corps hospital, where she served as a volunteer
nurse.
Learning that the wounded of the Third Division of the Second Corps,
including the 12th Regiment of New Jersey, were in a Field Hospital
about five miles outside of Gettysburg, we determined to go there early
the next morning, expecting to find some familiar faces among the
regiments of my native state. As we drew near our destination we began
to realize that war has other horrors than the sufferings of the wounded
or the desolation of the bereft. A sickening, overpowering, awful stench
announced the presence of the unburied dead, on which the July sun was
mercilessly shining, and at every step the air grew heavier and fouler,
until it seemed to possess a palpable horrible density that could be
seen and felt and cut with a knife. Not the presence of the dead bodies
themselves, swollen and disfigured as they were, and lying in heaps on
every side, was as awful to the spectator as that deadly, nauseating
atmosphere which robbed the battlefield of its glory, the survivors of
their victory, and the wounded of what little chance of life was left to
them.
As we made our way to a little woods in which we were told was the
Field Hospital we were seeking, the first sight that met our eyes was a
collection of semi-conscious but still living human forms, all of whom
had been shot through the head, and were considered hopeless. They were
laid there to die and I hoped that they were indeed too near death to
have consciousness. Yet many a groan came from them, and their limbs
tossed and twitched. The few surgeons who were left in charge of the
battlefield after the Union army had started in pursuit of Lee had begun
their paralyzing task by sorting the dead from the dying, and the dying
from those whose lives might be saved; hence the groups of prostrate,
bleeding men laid together according to their wounds.
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CORNELIA HANCOCK (PHOTOGRAPH AND LETTER REPRINTED FROM "WOMEN AT
GETTYSBURG 1863," BY E. F. CONKLIN, THOMAS PUBLICATIONS, GETTYSBURG,
PA.)
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There was hardly a tent to be seen. Earth was the only available bed
during those first hours after the battle. A long table stood in this
woods and around it gathered a number of surgeons and attendants. This
was the operating table, and for seven days it literally ran blood. A
wagon stood near rapidly filling with amputated legs and arms; when
wholly filled, this gruesome spectacle withdrew from sight and returned
as soon as possible for another load. So appalling was the number of the
wounded as yet unsuccored, so helpless seemed the few who were
battling against tremendous odds to save life, and so overwhelming was
the demand for any kind of aid that could be given quickly, that one's
senses were benumbed by the awful responsibility that fell to the
living. Action of a kind hitherto unknown and unheard of was needed here
and existed here only.
From the pallid countenances of the sufferers, their inarticulate
cries, and the many evidences of physical exhaustion which were common
to all of them, it was swiftly borne in upon us that nourishment was one
of the pressing needs of the moment and that here we might be of
service.
Our party separated quickly, each intent on carrying out her own
scheme of usefulness. No one paid the slightest attention to us,
unusual as was the presence of half a dozen women on such a field; nor
did anyone have time to give us orders or to answer questions. Wagons of
bread and provisions were arriving and I helped myself to their stores.
I sat down with a loaf in one hand and a jar of jelly in the other:
it was not hospital diet but it was food, and a dozen poor fellows lying
near me turned their eyes in piteous entreaty, anxiously watching my
efforts to arrange a meal.
... It seemed as if there was no more serious problem under Heaven
than the task of dividing that too well-baked loaf into portions that
could be swallowed by weak and dying men. I succeeded, however, in
breaking it into small pieces, and spreading jelly over each with a
stick. I had the joy of seeing every morsel swallowed greedily by those
whom I had prayed day and night I might be permitted to serve. An hour
or so later, in another wagon, I found boxes of condensed milk and
bottles of whiskey and brandy. I need not say that every hour brought an
improvement in the situation, that trains from the North came pouring
into Gettysburg laden with doctors, nurses, hospital supplies, tents,
and all kinds of food and utensils: but that first day of my arrival,
the sixth of July, and the third day after the battle, was a time that
taxed the ingenuity and fortitude of the living as sorely as if we had
been a party of shipwrecked mariners thrown upon a desert island.
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The Soldiers' National Cemetery was incorporated by the Commonwealth
of Pennsylvania in March 1864 but was turned over to the United States
government as a national cemetery on May 1, 1872. Apart from its
headstones and memorials to units that were posted in the cemetery area
during the battle, the national cemetery contains four memorials of
note. The principal memorial, the Soldiers National Monument,
was ordered by the cemetery's Board of Commissioners for placement at
the center of the arc of graves. James G. Batterson provided its design,
and it was dedicated on July 1, 1869. The statue of Maj. Gen. John F.
Reynolds, "one of the finest portrait statues ever created to honor the
heroes of the Civil War," was done by John Q. A. Ward and
unveiled on August 31, 1872. Caspar Buberl did much of the artwork on
the New York State Monument, located near the plot of New York's dead
and unveiled on July 2, 1893. The Gettysburg Address Memorial, which
stands near the west gate of the cemetery, includes a bust of Lincoln
sculpted by Henry K. Bush-Brown and was dedicated on January 24,
1912.
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CSA DEAD GATHERED FOR BURIAL (GNMP)
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Immediately after the battle, as Wills worked to establish the
Soldiers' National Cemetery, another Gettysburg attorney,
David McConaughy, purchased tracts of
land on East Cemetery Hill, Culp's Hill, and Little Round Top. He did
this to ensure their preservation and in doing so launched one of
America's pioneer efforts in historic preservation. In September 1863
McConaughy and other Gettysburg citizens formed the Gettysburg
Battlefield Memorial Association, and in April 1864 the Commonwealth of
Pennsylvania incorporated the association to "hold and preserve" the
battlefield and, with memorials, commemorate the deeds of "their brave
defenders." The association added to the holdings acquired by
McConaughy, and in 1880 a Union veterans' organization, the Grand Army
of the Republic, took control of the association. In 1878 the Strong
Vincent G.A.R. Post of Erie, Pennsylvania, erected a memorial on Little
Round Top to mark the place where Col. Strong Vincent was killed.
The Vincent memorial was the first erected outside of the national
cemetery, but many followed as northern states erected memorials to their units
that had fought in the great battle. In the meantime Gettysburg became a
popular site for veterans' reunions and a mecca for tourists.
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PHOTOGRAPH OF VETERANS OF 23RD PENNSYLVANIA AT MONUMENT DEDICATION
(GNMP)
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The Memorial Association had performed a great service in initiating
the preservation of the field as a great memorial, and in 1894 its
holdings included over 600 acres dotted with over 300 monuments and
seventeen miles of roads. In 1895 these holdings were turned over to the
War Department as the nucleus of Gettysburg National Military Park. The
park, which became a part of the National Park System in 1933, now
preserves much of the battlefield and honors the men of both armies
that fought at Gettysburg.
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THE DEDICATION OF THE NATIONAL CEMETERY NOVEMBER 19, 1863
(From Indianapolis Daily Journal of 2l November 1863)
Cemetery Hill occupies the bend of the hook. On its crest is the very
handsome little cemetery belonging to the town, which lies a half mile
or so to the north, and formed part of the battle ground. Just below
this cemetery, on the slope facing the broad valley, lies the National
Cemetery. It looks out upon the blue mountains into which they
retreated.
I do not know the exact size of it, but should suppose there were
some fifteen or twenty acres in it. The graves are arranged in a
semi-circle, the convex side toward the valley, of probably six or eight
hundred feet diameter. They are completed, so far as to show the general
plan, but not so far as to show the arrangement of the various States
upon it fully.
The dead of Indiana are not yet all reburied. There are thirty-one
now here. They lie in two lines, filling the extent of our section, with
a third still incomplete. The exterior of the three has every grave
marked, with the head boards made, as I judge from the worn and defaced
appearance, when the bodies were first buried, under some tree, or some
hillside, by their companions.
I was more interested in the grounds, and the brave dead resting in
them, than the ceremony, inspiring as it was, as full of great names
come to honor great deeds. I could not see very much of it. Few did, I
fancy, though full 20,000 came for nothing else. The procession and the
ceremonies were appropriate and admirable.
The platform for the President, Cabinet, Foreign Ministers,
Governors, and other magnates, was erected nearly on the line of the
diameter across the semi circle of the Cemetery, and the crowd filled
the interior.
In the procession to the Cemetery were long glittering lines of
troops headed by Generals with dashing staffs and interspersed with
scarlet-colored and plumed bands and grouops of civilians, regiments of
Odd Fellows and Masons with their gay trappings, all moving to the sound
of cannon from that knob of Cemetery Hill, where our guns played so
frightfully in earnest on the 3d of July. James Blake of our city was
one of the two Chief Marshals, and never looked so well before as at the
head of that really grand procession.
Mr. Lincoln rode on horseback—nobody used cartridges—and
his deeply cut features looked hard and worn. Mr. Seward and Mr. Usher
rode on each side of him with a long string of attendents behind. Gov.
Morton at the head of some Indiana delegation, rode on horseback.
The procession was a long time getting itself placed around the
stand. As soon as it could be silenced out a few hundred feet into the
throng, leaving the outside still rushing and rustling and grumbling
because everybody else wouldn't be still, the band played a solemn,
grand air, and Rev. Thomas Stockton prayed I couldn't hear one word.
Nor did one-tenth of the crowd. But it is no matter, it will be
published. The President's speech I couldn't hear either and it closed
the ceremony.
Berry Sulgrove, Editor
Indianapolis JOURNAL
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PRESIDENT LINCOLN AS HE APPEARED ON NOVEMBER 8, 1863,
ELEVEN DAYS BEFORE THE GETTYSBURG ADDRESS. (USAHMI)
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(click on image for a PDF version)
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Gettysburg
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Back cover: Photograph of Cemetery Hill by Russ Finley.
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