A German Immigrant Woman’s Gettysburg Address

Long Island Wins ^ | Nov 13 2013 | Patrick Young, Esq.

[euram]

On November 19, 1863, Abraham Lincoln headed on horseback through the streets of Gettysburg to deliver his most famous speech. He rode past the impressive gatehouse at the Evergreen Cemetery to the newly dug graves of Union soldiers that lay beyond it. The gatehouse was the home of a German immigrant family that had endured the battle and spearheaded the first burials after it ended.

[Cloverfarm]

Brings tears to your eyes to think of that poor lady digging graves. While pregnant. I guess there are two kinds of people in the world — the ones who help others, build, create, improve — the “makers” and the others, the “takers.”

[lightman]

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[IrishBrigade]

‘The gatehouse was the home of a German immigrant family’

supervising the Evergreen cemetery was one of the most coveted positions in Gettysburg, and the Thorn’s were indeed fortunate to obtain the position; the best perk was living in the stately house at the entrance to cemetery...the gatehouse still stands today, though additions have been made, on Baltimore Road; contemporary photographs show an immense poplar tree across the street that stood as a prominent Gettysburg landmark until struck by lightning in the early 1880’s...

[yellowroses]

To me, being born and raised in Gettysburg, the battleground is sacred, holy ground. At Pickets charge, they stepped out of the trees, formed up in formational rows, with flags, pipes, and drums, and marched 1 mile across the fields towards the High Water Mark of the Confederacy. The Union was formed in Philadelphia, PA, and the Union was preserved at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.

[piasa]

Amusing how the author makes a huge deal of anti-immigrant fervor when writing a story on a German immigrant woman about whom there is no evidence she ever experienced any anti-immigrant hatred.

Really? Was there nothing else known about the woman, her family, her husband, than she “may have” experienced hostility from the Know-Nothings?

[Shady]

My Wife and I visited a couple of years ago and lodged at the Baladerry Inn. It was incredible to go on this old 1932 bus tour of the Battlefield, the Guide explained the battle chronologically and is was overpowering. The next day we explored all of the areas that we wanted to visit. I stood by the Wheatfield and just couldn’t fathom what happened in that parcel..