Voices of Gettysburg

At the dedication ceremonies…I had a seat on the platform within a few feet of the speakers, and could hear not only every word, but could mark every expression on the face of America’s most polished orator, Edward Everett, as he delivered that masterly oragion, and could see every lineament in the sad, earnest face of Mr. Lincoln as he pronounced his immortal “Dedication.”

….To say that Mr. Lincoln arose, can only be appreciated by those who have been near him when he got up to speak; but he had never before seemed to me to be so tall as he did on this occasion. He appeared to continue to arise, as it were, until when he finally stood up I thought that he was the tallest and most awkward man I had ever seen.

….I thought then and still think, it was the shortest, grandest speech, oration, sermon, or what you please to call it, to which I ever listened. It was the whole matter in a nutshell, delivered distinctly and impressively, so that all in that vast concourse could hear him. My own emotions may perhaps be imagined when it is remembered that he was facing the spot where only a short time before we had had our death grapple with Pickett’s men, and he stook almost immediately over the place where I had lain and seen my comrades torn in fragment by the enemy’s cannon-balls.

Think, if you please, how these words fell upon my ears….If at that moment the Supreme Being had appeared with an offer to undo my past life; give back to me a sound body, free from the remembrance even of sufferings past, and the imminence of those that must necessarily embitter all the years to come, I should have indignantly spurned the offer, such was the effect upon me of this immortal ‘Dedication.’

(J)ust at dusk we reached Hanover Junction, the station where we were to change for the train that would take us to Gettysburg. When our train stopped we immediately boarded another that was standing on the Gettysburg track. We had barely gotten inside when a guard that was placed at the entrance to each car to prevent outsiders from crowding into it, as it was a special train carrying the governors of the several States who were the guests of Governor Curtin, of Pennsylvania. Being locked in, as it were, we concluded not to try to break out, and proceeded to find the delegation from our native State, Ohio….In introducing me, the general told the governor (of Ohio) that I had a better right to be there than any of them….The governor then told me that he would like to arrange it so that I could see and hear everything that transpired at the dedication ceremonies, and theat he could best insure that if I and my friend were to accept the position s of aides-de-camp on his staff, which he then tendered….

When we arrived at the station, though it was nearly eleven o’clock at night…(n)early everyone in the village was up, their houses illuminated and open in anticipation of their being called up to entertain the immense crowds of incoming visitors.

I was in the National capital, partly convalescent but still not permitted to rejoin my regiment. While awaiting a decision of the surgeons in my case, the ceremonies that were to take place on the occasion of the dedication of the proposed monument were announced, and I resolved to be present.

Finally, on the last of the month, two attendants placed me on a stretcher, and while my father held an umbrella over me to keep off the rays of the midsummer sun, they carried me to the village.

When I entered upon the third week of my enforced detention I began to have a great longing to be removed to my native State. The surgeons held a consultation and concluded that the change could not materially hasten or delay what appeared to them to be the inevitable. So they promised me that if, at the end of the next week, I was still alive, they would give their consent to my removal.

(My clergyman friend’s) throat was bare of necktie, the collar thrown wide open, and great beads of perspiration stood on his broad forehead; but what a prayer! Like his works it was fervid, earnest, and apropos. Nothing seemed to have been forgotten, and yet it appeared to be such a short prayer. A wounded Confederate soldier was lying in one corner of my tent, and knowing what firm friends we now were, our advocate at the bar of God used that circumstance as the basis of an appeal that these two whilom enemies, between whom there subsisted no real ground for enmity, might both live to see their country at peace.

(E)very breath I drew was like the thrust of a dozen daggers.

(T)he first volunteer attendant I saw on the field of Gettysburg was a woman. I find that she wrote her name in my diary on July 7, 1863, “Miss Cornelia Hancock, New Salem, N.J.” She carried writing materials, envelopes, and postage stamps, and wrote letters to the friends of those who were too desperately wounded to do so themselves. She took down just what each wanted to say, without abridgment, and in this manner many a mother, sister, and sweetheart received their first, last, and only message from their loved ones, whose lives ebbed out on this fatal field.

Toward morning I was seized with an awful thirst. Though the rain was pouring down my face and over my now totally unprotected body, I wanted water as I had never before wanted it. I called and called again, but no one came….the stream, swollen to an unusual height, did soon overflow its banks, and sweeping through our dismal ranks, drowned many helpless fellows before the few attendants there could get them out of the way.

When Lee’s batteries reopened fire to cover the retreat of Pickett’s broken columns, the shells coming from the right rear and front enfiladed the position, and appeared to cover every foot of ground. Men lying near me were cut in two and others torn in pieces by the jagged missiles. I thought a change of location, no matter how slight, might take me out of their immediate range. Certainly it could not be worse, so I dragged myself a short distance only to find that I was in a worse place, if possible, than where I had been. Then, by a supreme effort, for I had been shot through one arm and through the lungs, I struggled to my feet and started to run. I had taken but a few steps when the blood gushed from my mouth in a torrent, and I fainted and fell.

It did not seem as though our eyes were fully closed before we were aroused, and day had not yet broken when we moved down to the front and took our position in line of battle with our right resting on Cemetery Hill and our left extending toward Round Top. Here, all day long on the 2d, we supported our batteries and watched the manoevres of our comrades and the enemy on our left, until at about four o’clock P.M., when they joined in the series of fierce struggles in front of Round Top, now known as the “Peach Orchard,” “Devil’s Den,” etc.

As we drew nearer to the scene of the overture to America’s Waterloo, though still some distance away, we could see the wreaths of smoke curling up over the hills, and occasionally there came to our ears the dull roar of the guns that were covering the retreat of the First and Eleventh Corps, as they fell back into their new positions on Cemetery Hill….it was very late when we finally halted, stacked arms, and laid down for a brief rest.