This year’s visit to the Civil War
Institute at Gettysburg College was an exciting week in every possible way. It
seems as if you read that same comment here annually, but this year’s CWI and
the accompanying visits to the battlefield were richly rewarding.
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| On the shelves at CWI. |
Among the books on sale at the CWI
this year was That Bloody Hill:
Hilliard’s Legion at Chickamauga. That’s my book and it sold a few copies
during the run of the Institute. I signed some autographs and got some
unsolicited praise for the book. It was a wonderful moment to visit the supply
of copies on the shelf (I did that several times a day) and it was really
exciting to count one short every once in a while. I am indebted to everyone at
the @CWI and to the @GettysburgCollege bookstore.
Amy and I made this year’s trip to
Gettysburg with our great friend Bucky Weber, the recently retired educator. Amy
was forced to spend much of the trip with her leg on top of ice packs. She has
an issue which has yet to resolve itself and, while I have been unable to fix
the thing with my power drill or wrenches, Bucky and I were at least able to
squire her around to her favorite eateries and ice cream shops. Even my
daughter, Regan, recently married and happy as heck, made an appearance. Our
stay was shortly after Father’s Day.
The company was pretty darn good,
you’d have to agree: My beautiful wife, a friend of long standing, my daughter
(in the company of her dog) and 350 fellow Civil War enthusiasts. Oh, did I
mention my book? It was there, too.
When we weren’t busy at the CWI, Bucky
and I roamed the Gettysburg battlefield. We spent a great deal of time in
locations commonly associated with the first day of the battle, trying for a
better understand of how things developed. One of the CWI tours led us to another
first-day location and Buck and I returned to that spot a few days later to
better photograph and understand the flow of the fighting and how the location
fit in.
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The top of the McPherson barn can be seen from at Iron Brigade
monument neat Willoughby Run.
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It is common for me to go home with a
better understanding of some aspect of the battle. All the traipsing around and
eyeing the vistas should lead to learning
and this time it was a better appreciation for what has come to be called the
Union fishhook defensive formation. Buck and I looked for Culp’s Hill from
several perspectives and even climbed to the top of the Eisenhower Tower (which
I had previously promised myself to never do again). By concentrating on Culp’s
Hill, the fishhook became more evident to my eyes. Previously I knew about the
fishhook, could have drawn it on a map and understood it. By concentrating on looking
for Culp’s Hill from all around the battlefield, I came away with a better
appreciation. I saw it more clearly, so to speak.
Buck and I completed a walk we’d
started two years earlier, down a pathway in the area where Barksdale’s
Confederate attack sputtered to an end on the second day of fighting. We pretty
much knew where the pathway might lead, but we had to be sure. Buck did not
make it to Gettysburg last year and I did not want to complete the walk without
him, so we did it this time.
No trip to Gettysburg is complete
without a visit to The Angle, the spot where Confederate General Armistead fell
at the end of the third day. Your loyal blogger always spends sunset there
because the photographic opportunities are usually very good. This time it was
a little different. Buck and I looked for slightly different viewpoints because
the sky was full of low clouds that blocked the setting sun from our view.
Finally found something and had some fun. The results are here.
Little Round Top attracts visitors of
every sort almost 24 hours a day. It has a number of very nice photograph
locations and the history is a huge draw. The fighting on LRT was no more
important or desperate than the struggle on Culp’s Hill, but a very
well-written and researched fictional account, The Killer Angels, popularized
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| The monument to the 16th Michigan offers a view of The Devil's Den. |
Joshua L. Chamberlain and his 20th
Maine regiment for their brave and determined stand at LRT. Little Round Top
has the added benefit that you can see much of the battlefield from its crest
and you can get a good understanding of the ebb and flow of the fighting from
its vantage points.
People
come to see that little hill 24 hours a day. It is important to be very careful
when walking there at night, but the people come anyway.
Hope
you get a chance to see the place yourself someday. Until then please enjoy
this selection from this year’s wanderings.
Thanks for reading.
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