"Life is a Battlefield," part III

We rounded out our trip to Pennsylvania last weekend with a visit to one more Civil War Battlefield. This time, we visited the battlefield mother lode: Gettysburg. Over 50,000 people were killed over the three-day battle in July of 1863, making Gettysburg the bloodiest battle of the Civil War (not to be confused with the bloodiest single day of the war, the Battle of Antietam).

One of the first parts of the battlefield we visited was McPherson Ridge, pictured in the photos below. The battle began here when the Confederate army pushed against the Union forces all day on July 1st. The Union held their ground for much of the day, but were ultimately pushed out.
80 years later, President Franklin D. Roosevelt dedicated an eternal flame peace memorial on McPherson Ridge. The memorial can be seen to the far right of the photo above and in detail in the photo below.

The battle continued on July 2nd with some of the bloodiest few hours ever fought on American soil. We were parked right in the middle of "The Wheatfield," where soldiers were fighting mere feet from each other. The field was so littered with bodies that the wheat was completely hidden from view. After the battle ended, neither side wanted to venture back to collect the bodies. So the few survivors hid themselves under fallen soldiers to keep from being eaten by the pigs who had escaped from the neighboring farm.

On July 2nd, the armies were nearly a mile apart on two parallel ridges. The Confederate armies fought all day to push through the Union strongholds, but they were unable to successfully do so. The view of the Union's view of this part of the battlefield was breathtaking, but sobering.

On July 3rd, the Confederates made one more valiant attempt to overtake the Union forces. Major General George E. Pickett led a mile-long line of 12,000 Confederate troops across the open field below to the waiting Union forces. The effort ended in disaster for the Confederates, but "Pickett's Charge" is still one of the most memorable moments of the Civil War.

My favorite part of our battlefield visits has been learning the individual stories that are such an important part of real history. At Gettysburg, for example, the 1st Minnesota, a relatively small group of untested men, performed one of the most critical actions of the battle during a Confederate assault on July 2nd. The Union line had been dangerously thinned, and the commanding Union General ordered the 1st Minnesota, the only organized Union troops at hand, directly into the fire of the advancing Confederates. Their sacrificial charge against overwhelming odds halted the Confederate advance and bought time for the Union line to reform, forcing General Lee into one last desperate gamble with Pickett's Charge the next day. A memorial to the fallen soldiers of the 1st Minnesota stands at the site of the assault:

Not far from the memorial to the 1st Minnesota stands a memorial statue to Rev. Father William Corby, C.S.C. Legend says that Rev. Corby prayed with Catholic and Protestant soldiers alike shortly before they headed for The Wheatfield. He offered absolution to the whole brigade, reminding them of their duties and warning them not to waver. A copy of this same memorial statue stands outside Corby Hall at the University of Notre Dame, where Rev. Corby was president from 1866-72 and 1877-81.