gettysburg: 150 years later

 

I crossed something off my bucket list yesterday as I walked the actual fields and woods where the battles of Gettysburg took place. The grass is long and dry and rustles inconspicuously in the breeze, while split-rail fences meander in a zigzag pattern between the peach orchard and the road. Trees line the horizon in every direction. Throughout the wide open space, various stone monuments are scattered, rising with dignity from the ordinary pastureland to commemorate the many soldiers who fought and bled and died on it.

None of these pictures were taken there—all of them are from the reenactment grounds on the opposite side of Gettysburg. I took pictures at the real battlefield as well, but they just didn’t quite capture the character of the site somehow. The quiet humbleness seemed to get lost in translation—the subtle sense of awe, not in a breathtaking vista, but in the sober reality of what this piece of ground witnessed 150 years ago. It became the signature location of a turning point not merely in a war, but in United States history. Its soil drank the blood of thousands of young Americans in the span of a few days. It is a place that softly reminds us that our “indivisible” nation was once torn from one end to the other in the most violent of possible ways—but only because both sides were on a quest to achieve liberty and justice for all, and neither would give up easily.