Gettysburg Battlefield

We left the lovely Bed and Breakfast at Oakland Green and headed for Gettysburg.

The Gettysburg battlefield is so big that you have to take a 2 hour bus tour just to see it all.

 The town of Gettysburg remains mostly unchanged since the days of the civil war.

If you look closely you can see the musket ball and canon ball holes in the sides of the buildings.

Sorry this picture is blurred. I took this from the bus. I loved the old streets of Gettysburg. It's a very pretty place.

We were whisked to the outskirts of town to all the strategic points of the three-day battle that took place here.

  

 Just like at Anteitam, the peaceful, picturesque farmlands hide the tragic events of the past.

We had a wonderful guide who was an ex-military strategist and archaeologist. He was able to explain how the battle progressed and the reasons why this strategy or that failed or succeeded. He lined us up in places to demonstrate in real terms how it would have been.

 These canons are not replicas, by the way. They've long since been disabled, but they stand as reminders of the smoke and noise of the battlefield.

 Geoff posed by this statue and then we discovered the "Please do not touch the statue" sign right in front of it. Oops!

Now here's an interesting photo. I was standing on the spot where quite a few young soldiers died. The photo was clear when I took it, but look how it turned out. Wow! It looks like I was moving fast and there's a plasma flash - a ghost in other words. 

Beautiful stone and bronze monuments are dotted around the landscape in honour of all those who fought and died here.

We were bussed back to the main complex after our extensive tour. There's a museum there and the most spectacular circlarama. The circlarama is a magnificent oil painting something like 30 feet high and hangs right around the circular room. 

We stood in the centre and watched the painting come to life with the light and sound show depicting the entire Gettysburg battle. It was astounding, spectacular... words fail me. I've never seen anything like it.

At the end of the tour, after seeing the museum and the circlarama, and after buying copious amounts of souvenirs, Geoff found a familiar looking gentleman to sit and have a chat with.

Antietam - Bloodiest Day in the History of America

As I said in the correction to my last blog, I wanted to devote one separate entry to Antietam. As we travelled around Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, and later Kentucky, we crossed uncountable numbers of civil war battlefields. They are everywhere out here. You can't travel around over here and not encounter them.

We'd heard about the famous battle at Antietam creek and decided to go there. It was the single most bloody one-day battle in America's history.

"The Army of the Potomac, under the command of George McClellan, mounted a series of powerful assaults against Robert E. Lee’s forces near Sharpsburg, Maryland, on September 17, 1862. The morning assault and vicious Confederate counterattacks swept back and forth through Miller’s Cornfield and the West Woods."

 The old Dunker Church that survived the battle, just on the edge of the west wood.
The people were called Dunkers because they  believed in full immersion into the river at baptism.

  Me standing at the edge of the west wood. The little Dunker Church is in front of me.

Oh how deceiving is the peace and beauty of this gently rolling Miller's farmland, cornfields and woodlands.

Who would now guess the horrors these trees saw, and the blood that seeped into this land?

A mock soldiers' camp. This would have been a common sight here.

  The sunken roadway nicknamed "Bloody Lane" because of all the bodies and the blood of that dreadful day.

Geoff walks along the other side of the sunken roadway, so peaceful and green now.

 Click on this writing to read the real historical account of this battle.

View across the battlefield from the Observation Tower.

The extent of this battlefield was astounding.

"Late in the day, the third and final major assault by the Union army pushed over a bullet-strewn stone bridge at Antietam Creek."

I wonder... if the night is still enough... if the breeze blows in just the right direction... if all is quiet... do you still hear the moans and cries of the wounded and dying...?