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Our trip to Gettysburg combined a
visit with Lila’s family, Harry and Diane, as well as an
opportunity to learn about the fierce Battle of
Gettysburg that took place during the Civil War. We
also visited the new visitor center at the battlefield
and the home of President
Dwight Eisenhower after he left the White House.
We stayed at a recently opened inn …the Federal Point
Inn, which we would recommend very favorably and was
walking distance to the many fine restaurants in the
center of Gettysburg. Two full days enabled us to tour
the battlefield and some of the small museums in the
area on the first day and the visitor center and the
Eisenhower farm on the second day. We also visited the
National Cemetery at Cemetery Hill Ridge where President
Lincoln gave the famed Gettysburg address and where the
remains of many of the soldiers killed during that three
day battle are buried.
I will not talk about the tragic events of that
battle……books and articles have been written for one
hundred and fifty years on the subject……It is well
documented. The battlefield surrounds much of the city
from the northwest to the south and southeast.
So much is now known about what happened during those
three days, but the state of mind of these soldiers
waiting to go into battle truly must tell the story of
how fifteen thousand died and thirty-five thousand were
maimed and wounded. The hatred that existed
between the north and the south at that time tore the
fabric that defined our society and left us unable to
unite once again for decades. |
