Tuesday, September 10, 2013

Gettysburg

Oct 22, 2012 Gettysburg

This is an awesome place. The fighting lasted for 3 days, and occurred over a wide area, involving thousands of soldiers on both sides, from nearly every state. Almost 8,000 died, over 25,000 wounded.

We spent two days on the self-guided tour of the battlefields, seeing where the different armies were encamped and where the fighting took place. There were several separate encounters between various units. Walking on the hills and looking across the valleys you can get a very clear idea of how the fighting went, how the tactics were adapted to the terrain, and how each side exploited their advantages and overcame their disadvantages.

This is the view from Northwest of the town, where the Confederates first arrived and pushed the Union forces back.



One of the monuments. Confederates camped and set up artillery on this hill.



Views from Cemetery Ridge, where the Union repulsed the Confederate attacks from Seminary Ridge, on the other side of the valley.



The Cemetery where the soldiers from both sides are buried, and where Lincoln gave the famous speech.




One of the Union Generals was Abner Doubleday, who later went on to invent baseball.




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