Monthly Archives: October 2011

October 21, 2011

Gettysburg

Since last I posted there have been several interesting moments in our journey toward A Resting Place. The most significant moment happened this past Monday in Gettysburg.

In my last post I mentioned connecting with a recent Lehigh grad named Zack. He did his thesis on the 153rd regiment, all out of Northampton county, and on Monday proved just how much he learned in college. Zack guided myself, our director, our project manager/ artistic director and our journalist in residency on a private tour through the battlefields of Gettysburg, paying specially close attention to where the Bethlehem Boys did the bulk of their fighting.

It was an excellent trip on a beautiful day. It was a chance to take photos and video of this most famous of battlefields and get first hand insight into what it was like on the front lines. It was hard to believe that nearly 150 years ago the beautiful and serene rolling hills of this fine city were packed with charging foes and bloody bodies. At the same time, seeing the place first hand helped me to understand why the Union chose the location to fight.

The more I learn about the Civil War, the deeper in the rabbit hole I fall. While the war only raged from 1861-1865, those years were so rich with stories of triumph, failure, and the complexity of human nature. I have been spending a great deal of time combing through The Moravain newspaper archives and would like to close this entry with an excerpt of a letter written by Alexander Selfridge about the battle of Gettysburg:

“One fellow rushed from the rebel line, risked both his own and our fire, scaled breastworks and jumped in among our boys. The first thing he did was distribute his cartridge among the boys urging them to give it to ’em. This happened only a few feet from where my company lay….When fighting was over we went into the woods and there beheld the horrid ghastly sight of men laying dead, mangled and cut every conceivable way. It is only at such times when one can fully realize what a terrible war this is.”