Wednesday, July 3, 2013

On this day - Gettysburg - July 3, 1863

150 years ago, the Battle of Gettysburg was fought July 1 - 3. Pickett's Charge is arguably the critical point of the 3 day fight that allowed the North to turn back the South.


Gettysburg: Confederate view
Southern view of Cemetery Ridge before Pickett's Charge
My wife and I visited Gettysburg in 2008 and captured these photos on the visit.

For more about the battle
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Gettysburg


Gettysburg: Cemetary 1
Gettysburg Cemetery
The remains of 159 MA soldiers are marked in the cemetery where Abraham Lincoln gave the historic Gettysburg Address.

You can find the text of the Gettysburg Address on the Civil War memorial along the main street side of the Town Common.

Franklin: Civil War Memorial
Franklin - Civil War  Memorial

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. 
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. 
But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate, we can not consecrate, we can not hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gettysburg_Address

TownCommon_CivilWarMemorial
Civil War Memorial - Franklin, MA - Town Common
Have a safe an enjoyable 4th of July!



FYI - Gettysburg is just one of the many sites to be explored on the National Park Service website as mentioned on the Dean College Library blog
to mark the 150th anniversary of this battleground, the National Park Service (NPS) is giving Gettysburg National Military Park the royal treatment this summer.  From programming for all ages, to remembrance ceremonies of all sorts, there will be an event to meet every need.  Just check out theNational Park Service website for details.

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