Road Trip – Two Civil War Battle Sites
Just rolled back in from a road trip. Think of this as a snapshot rather than a dissertation.
Gettysburg and Antietam.
If you don’t know about either there are many resources available on-line.
I won’t bore you with MY pictures, again there are plenty available. Some are moving and horrible, but capture moments simply impossible before the camera was invented.
What I CAN do is offer an impression or two based a first visit after a fair amount of reading and studying.
Gettysburg: Standing on Little Round Top looking down into The Devil’s Den… Surprising! Pictures and maps do NOT make clear the proximity.
Antietam: Looking down at Burnside’s Bridge from the position of the Confederates… Shocking.
Overall that was the surprise for me at both. My minds eye was expecting some epic scale at both places to justify the number of casualties, but no!
I’ll be reflecting on this trip for years.
Category: Historical, Pointless blather, Real Soldiers
I submit that looking across Burnside’s Bridge from the 51st New York’s and 51st Pennsylvania’s position (actually about 100 yards of open field and incoming fire from the bridge) is much more shocking.
I was just about further revisit some books to make certain that the references points extant jibe with the period records on that specific issue. There are places the current tour calls ‘woods’ that aren’t wooded now, for instance.
What IS easily confirmed is that while Burnsides was trying to cross that bridge 500 or fewer confederates repeatedly rebuffed him.
From the current Confederate position (as indicated) The Rebs could have held him off with slingshots. That’s IS hyperbole, admitted. The History is clear. It took another to ford Antietam Creek at another location before the tide turned.
People often have the misconception that these battles took place on long sweeping fields, and then when you stand on them and walk them and see just how close these actions were you can almost smell the powder and hear the screams. All you can do is say to yourself…Jesus, what bravery!! On both sides.
I havent been to either Antietam or Gettysbeard, but I visited Shiloh as a 12 year old. At that age I knew the Civil War was important to the story arc of the country but thats about it.
I didnt know Ball’s Bluff from a minie Ball.
But standing on the bluffs of Pittsburgh Landing, one can easily feel the ghosts,
and it was a shocking and moving experience.
Antietam and Gettysburg are on my “if you dont visit here before you die God will send you to Hell” list.
I do have a Bruce Catton autographed copy of Stillness at Appomattox. It is my most prized literary possession.
GruntSgt #3: Exactly my point. As to the bravery… No question! However, I stood at The Bloody Angle thinking about leaders and those they led.
The best way to visit the Civil War Battlefields is to get out and walk them. I’ve done this on numerous occasions, Gettysburg, The Wilderness etc. You get a feel for what the actual battle was like and what the soldiers were looking at and why they set up like they did that you can not get any other way. Research the battles, where the lines were, where the defences and attacks were and walk around.
GruntSgt; no place is that clearer than at Yorktown. The siege cannons were 50 yards from the British redoubts on a front that would be covered by two modern squads of infantry. The amount of lead flying through that fifty meters between the armies must’ve been horrendous. But it didn’t stop American Rangers from storming Redoubt #10.
I’ve not had the opportunity to visit any battlefields, but I did have a chance to go to Appomattox Court House on a business trip to Virginia. On a separate occasion, I visited Valley Forge. You learn those names in school, but you don’t really get the significance of them. I had never previously realized no battle was fought at Valley Forge…
I have been to both places. I will never ever understand how those men did what they did, ever.
I think about the sunken road and the Irish Brigade slowly advancing on the confederate line.
I also think about the wide open field for Picket’s charge.
I think it might be impolitic, but we are still awarding the Medal to Union vets (long since dead) I think there are plenty of Rebels that were just as Valorous. I believe we should show them the same honors, they were, after all, Americans.
I had the privilege of growing up in Gettysburg. The best way to see it the first time in my opinion is to get the self guided car tour (ok..they were cassettes back then) a map, and follow the battle chronologically. I lived in two places…off the Chambersburg Rd which was the line of march and retreat, and Biglersville Rd…looking south towards Seminary Ridge, the scene of the first days fighting. No matter how many times we covered the battlefield when we had guests, it never got old. Our HS CC meets were held on the back side of Little Round Top. Simply an amazing and pivotal point in our history…. you can feel it all around you.
I agree about standing on the Confederate side of Burnside Bridge. It tears you up inside to think of those good men charging into the fire from the hillside.
My big “aha moment” was at Gettysburg when, on my second visit, I stood at the treeline by the Virginia Monument and really got a sense of what artillery on the Round Tops would do to the lines of infantry crossing the field. Bruce Catton’s description of the charge and the battle’s aftermath still get to me even after reading it dozens of time.
I’ve been to Gettysburg three times. The last time was in 99′, my father an I tried to visit as many of the battlefields as we could, in I think a four day weekend. Touched on Gettysburg first, could not find Sharpburg(Antietam), hit Fredericksburg, can’t remember if we hit Chancellorsville, saw the Wilderness, and I think Spotsylvania.
Gettysburg you can understand. Thems that controlled the high ground had a significant advantage [duh]. Antietam was mostly fought in a hollow with cannon lines on opposing sides. If there has ever been a better physical definition of madness, I don’t want to see it.
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