Gettysburg readies for 150th anniversary of battle

Yahoo ^

[Java4Jay]

The commemoration of this year's milestone anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg will include amenities that soldiers would have relished 150 years ago.

[Java4Jay]

There were about 51,000 casualties — historical estimates put the total dead around 7,500 — at Gettysburg, considered a major turning point of the war after Northern forces turned away a Confederate advance.

[SWAMPSNIPER]

The reenactors are going to be hard put to find enough black powder this year.

[SunkenCiv]

GGG managers are SunkenCiv, StayAt HomeMother & Ernest_at_the_Beach	join list or digest view topics view or post blog bookmark post a topic subscribe
Thanks Java4Jay. To all -- please ping me to other topics which are appropriate for the GGG list.

[prisoner6]

an invitation has been extended to President Barack Obama to attend November's event.

Well. There goes the neighborhood.

Besides, didn't the sequester put an end to all this sort of thing?

[Pelham]

My great-grandfather’s eldest brother was one of the casualties at Gettysburg. He was killed on the second day of the battle in Barksdale’s charge through the Peach Orchard and was buried in the field. He was a private in the 13th Mississippi and had fought at First Manassas, Second Fredericksburg, and a few other battles I can’t recall at the moment. I have a picture of him in his uniform, he was in his early 20s.

[Vanders9]

Wow wow! Its good to have a link to the past like that.

[timestax]

[75thOVI]

In ‘98 I participated in the 135th anniversary reenactment. At that time, with over 15,000 re-enactors, it was billed as the biggest meeting of the Blue and Gray since the war itself. I went with our local company of the 14th Brooklyn regiment. (In the movie Gettysburg you can see them passing behind Gen Reynolds as he lay dying.) They were able to stage Pickett’s charge full scale. That was a sight not soon forgotten. The sound of musketry was like storm waves on a beach. There were 135 artillery pieces, which I believe was also something of a record.

[X Fretensis]

Actually considerably larger than 15,000. Picketts charge
on Sunday had right at 11,000 Rebs. Union opposition was
about 9,500. Added to that were 700 artillerymen to man
the guns and over 2000 mounted cavalry. Some estimates
place the number of participants at over 30,000. During Picketts charge my company was part of the 14th Conn.
just down the line from the “angle”. It was a magnificent sight to be sure.

[nomad]

Oh, you lucky..., are you going? Those guys are great! Reenactors, that is. I`ve been to a few here in Ohio! What an awesome tribute to American history and valor, pity so many now a days don`t give a crap about freedom anymore, certainly not like that.

[sauropod]

.

[0.E.O]

Strategically the fall of Vicksburg the day after Gettysburg was probably the more important victory since it split the Confederacy in half. But all in all it wasn’t a banner week for the Confederate war effort.

[EternalVigilance]

“But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate, we can not consecrate, we can not hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

— Abraham Lincoln, Gettysburg Address

[0.E.O]

As great as his Gettysburg Address is, I’ve always been more partial to his Second Inaugural Address. But in an era when speeches ran hours long, Lincoln could say more with fewer words than anyone else.

[EternalVigilance]

Indeed.

[EternalVigilance]

It just seemed appropriate to this thread. And to this day.

[0.E.O]

Lincoln saved the country 150 years ago. It’s up to us to save it again today.

[EternalVigilance]

"The preservation of the sacred fire of liberty, and the destiny of the republican model of government, are justly considered deeply, perhaps as finally, staked on the experiment entrusted to the hands of the American people."

--George Washington, First Inaugural Address, 1789

[0.E.O]

“They were the pillars of the temple of liberty; and now, that they have crumbled away, that temple must fall, unless we, their descendants, supply their places with other pillars, hewn from the solid quarry of sober reason. Passion has helped us; but can do so no more. It will in future be our enemy. Reason, cold, calculating, unimpassioned reason, must furnish all the materials for our future support and defense.—Let those materials be molded into general intelligence, sound morality, and in particular, a reverence for the constitution and laws: and, that we improved to the last; that we remained free to the last; that we revered his name to the last; that, during his long sleep, we permitted no hostile foot to pass over or desecrate his resting place; shall be that which to learn the last trump shall awaken our WASHINGTON.” — Abraham Lincoln, 1838

[napscoordinator]

God Bless Abe Lincoln, the Northern Soldiers and the United States of America!!!!