The Battle of Gettysburg: The Country, the Contestants, the ResultsStorrick, W. C. (William Clayton)
History
The Battle of Gettysburg: The Country, the Contestants, the Results
Storrick, W. C. (William Clayton)
Gettysburg National Military Park (Pa.); Gettysburg, Battle of, Gettysburg, Pa., 1863
Gettysburg has two railroads: the Philadelphia & Reading, and the
Western Maryland, affording service from all points. Ten roads radiate
from the town like the spokes of a wheel, and these provide ample
approaches. The Lincoln Highway, entering via the Chambersburg Pike and
continuing on the York Pike, gives a through route from west to east,
and the Harrisburg Road leads directly to the State Capital. The
Emmitsburg Road runs southwest to Emmitsburg, and thence to Frederick
and Washington. The Baltimore Pike is a through route to Baltimore and
the South. The Hanover Road runs to Hanover on the east. There are also
the Taneytown and Hagerstown roads, the latter the line of General Lee’s
retreat.
A uniformed guide service with an established schedule of rates was
authorized by the Secretary of War in 1916. No person is allowed to act
as guide for pay without being examined and licensed by the
Superintendent of the Park. There are interesting collections of Civil
War relics at the Jennie Wade House, the Lee Museum, and other places. A
single year has brought 800,000 visitors to the field. The average
yearly number is 700,000.
THE SOLDIERS’ NATIONAL CEMETERY
Of the eighty-three cemeteries in the United States dedicated
exclusively to the burial of soldiers, that at Gettysburg was the first.
A few days after the battle, Governor A. G. Curtin, of Pennsylvania,
solicitous for the welfare of the soldiers, came to Gettysburg and
appointed David Wills, a leading attorney, to act as his agent in the
work of establishing a cemetery. Correspondence with the governors of
other States was begun. Grounds were selected by Mr. Wills, and by the
direction of Governor Curtin purchased for the State of Pennsylvania, to
provide a burial-place for soldiers who fell in the battle.
Lots in the cemetery were tendered without cost to each State having
dead upon the field. The expense of removing the bodies, laying out,
ornamenting and enclosing the grounds, erecting a lodge for the keeper,
and erecting a suitable monument to the memory of the dead, was to be
borne by the several States, assessed in proportion to their population.
The seventeen acres of land which were purchased lie on Cemetery Hill
adjoining the Citizens’ Cemetery, at the apex of what had been the
triangular battle-line of the Union Army, and an important tactical
position on July 2nd and 3rd. At the time of the battle this land was a
cornfield, divided by stone fences which were used to great advantage by
the infantry of the Union Army. The most elevated portions had been
points of vantage for many batteries of artillery.
The land was surrounded on the west, east, and north by a substantial,
well-built wall of native granite, topped by a heavy dressed coping. A
division fence of iron was erected between the Soldiers’ National
Cemetery and the Citizens’ Cemetery.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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