157 years ago today

[Daveboone]

The battle of Gettysburg started...If you have never been there it is a worthy destination for a day or a week.If you cant make the trip the movie"Gettysburg" is quite accurate historically with great actors.

[Chef]

The battle of Gettysburg started...If you have never been there it is a worthy destination for a day or a week.If you cant make the trip the movie"Gettysburg" is quite accurate historically with great actors.

I went there when I was a kid and we did a self driving tour that you followed while listening to a cassette tape. I saved that tape and would listen to it at night when I was a kid


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[wolc123]

We did the auto tour of the  battlefields with CD's last year and it was good.   I like it that you can do it at your own pace and spend as long as you want at any of the stops.   Our girls liked the tower monument, that they could climb up in, by little Round top.  I think that marks the spot where the boys from Main turned the tide on the 2nd day.  They also liked the Jenny Wade house tour.  

 My favorite attraction in that town is the Eisenhower farm, which we have visited nearly every year for the last 18.    One of these years I am going to talk the tour guide into letting me take a picture of our girls sitting on miss Mamie's pink "French Poof" round couch in the formal sitting room.   In 2015, I three-putted on Ike's private green, using a cane for a putter and a golf ball I carried in in my pocket.   I pretended to have a limp (needing a cane) and oddly enough I was stricken by a bad case of Siatica shortly thereafter.   That hobbled me up so bad thru deer season, that I got skunked that year. A year or two prior to that, I checked out his Trap and Skeet range, which looks good from a distance, but needs lots of work when you look up close.   

The show barn, at the back of the farm, is usually a tough walk under the hot sun but well worth it, especially if one of the wise volunteers is back there to answer my questions about Ike's prize winning beef operation.  They actually raised Angus cattle for taste back then, and he really had that process down, almost as well as he handled leading the European theater of operations during the big one.   I am still trying to find out what caused the big dent in the hood of the Allis Chalmers in the back stall.    

Last but not least, O'roarks has the best corn-beef and cabbage that I have ever tasted.  We are headed back there soon, and I can't wait.  We always stay in a hotel that is a short walk from that fine establishment.  

My interest in that battle was peaked by a story from a couple of my former coworkers (both who have now passed away).  The father and son's lives resulted from a real life "Saving Private Ryan" which began on the first day of that battle in 1863.  That was the day when their grand/great grandfather's three brothers (all from the 142 PA) were hit by Confederate fire.  Two were killed outright, and the third lingered for a few days at the make-shift hospital in the Lutheran Seminary.  A fourth brother (my friend's patriarch) was released from service due to that day's tragedy.  

You can still find the brother's name in the patient registry at the Seminary museum.  A few years ago, my daughter and I located his gravestone, and we left a fresh shiny Lincoln penny on it.  We also left a couple more on stones marked "unknown" for the other two brothers.  

 Ted Turner did a great job on his movie.   Running low on ammo, fix bayonets, charge down hill and keep the Rebs from turning the flank. That was the instant that the South's back was broken and the Union was saved.                

     

Edited July 1, 2020 by wolc123

[Daveboone]

A lot of folks who go to Gburg are unaware that Antietam is only about 45 minutes away. It is considered the best preserved of the battlefields, and is a beautiful area. Much smaller area. Gettysburg is always worth a return trip, so much to see.

[Pygmy]

15 minutes ago, Daveboone said:

A lot of folks who go to Gburg are unaware that Antietam is only about 45 minutes away. It is considered the best preserved of the battlefields, and is a beautiful area. Much smaller area. Gettysburg is always worth a return trip, so much to see.

Antietam is awesome....Fewer casualties total, but most in a single day, since it was a one day battle, while Gettysburg was three..Much of the battlefield can be viewed from a single location..

[Daveboone]

I got major goose bumps walking the "sunken road". 

as Marlo said.....The Horror......