“It should be added that Gettysburg, small town as it was, had already furnished its quota to the army. Moreover, on the first day of the battle, hundreds of the unfortunate men of Reynolds’s gallant corps were secreted, sheltered, fed, and aided in every way by the men and women of the town.” The First Soldier Killed at Gettysburg George W. Sandoe, the first Union soldier killed at Gettysburg, was a member of Company B Independent 21st Pennsylvania Cavalry. Upon arriving at Gettysburg, June 26th, 1863, General Gordon sent out a picket line on the Baltimore Pike. As these pickets reached the Nathaniel Lightner property, George W. Sandoe and William Lightner, also a member of Company B, approached the pike, coming across the McAllister field from the direction of Rock Creek. Owing to a growth of bushes and trees along the fence, they did not discover the Confederate pickets until they were ordered to halt. Lightner at once jumped his horse across the fence and escaped by riding rapidly down the pike. Sandoe’s horse fell in making the leap, and in attempting to escape by riding back in the direction from which he came, Sandoe was shot. He lies buried at Mount Joy Church, in Mount Joy, Adams County. A Mysterious Letter Having passed through Gettysburg on June 28th, General John B. Gordon, of Lee’s army, went on to York and Wrightsville before returning on July 1st. In his “Reminiscences of the Gettysburg Campaign” he tells the following story: “We entered the city of York on Sunday morning. Halting on the main street, where the sidewalks were densely packed, I rode a few rods in advance of my troops, in order to speak to the people from my horse. As I checked him and turned my full dust-begrimed face upon a bevy of ladies very near me, a cry of alarm came from their midst; but after a few words of assurance from me, quiet and apparent confidence were restored. I assured these ladies that the troops behind me, though ill-clad and travel-stained, were good men and brave; that beneath their rough exteriors were hearts as loyal to women as ever beat in the breasts of honorable men; that their own experience and the experience of their mothers, wives, and sisters at home had taught them how painful must be the sight of a hostile army in their town; that under the orders of the Confederate commander-in-chief both private property and non-combatants were safe; that the spirit of vengeance and of rapine had no place in the bosoms of these dust-covered but knightly men; and I closed by pledging to York the head of any soldier under my command who destroyed private property, disturbed the repose of a single home, or insulted a woman.