It is a hot July afternoon and a soldier pauses for rest.
"We dozed in the heat, and lolled upon the
ground, with half-open eyes. Our horses were
hitched to the trees munching some oats.
A great lull rests upon all the field.
Time was heavy, and for want of something to do,
I yawned,
and looked at my watch.
It was five minutes before one o¹clock.
I returned my watch to my pocket,
and thought possibly that I might go to sleep,
and stretched myself upon the ground accordingly."
The writer is
Lt. Frank A. Haskell
of the
6th Wisconsin Infantry.
He is describing the early afternoon of
July 3, 1863,
and he is about to become a part of history.
Haskell is part of the Iron Brigade
of the Union located on Cemetery Ridge
outside the small Pennsylvania town of
Gettysburg.
He and his fellows
on both sides of the battle
have already been through
two days of vicious fighting,
but the worst is to come.
As Haskell tries to doze,
the afternoon explodes in an artillery barrage.
It is the
preliminary
to the assault we know as
Pickett¹s charge.
Here¹s how Haskell describes the
early moments
of the battle
in an
extraordinary letter
to his brother.
"Who can describe such a
conflict
as is raging around us?
To say that it was like a
summer storm,
with the
crash of thunder,
the glare of
lightning,
the
shrieking of the wind,
and the
clatter of hailstones,
would be weak.
The thunder and lightning
of those
two hundred and fifty guns and their shells,
whose smoke darkens the sky,
are incessant, all pervading,
in the air above our heads,
on the ground at our feet,
remote,
near,
deafening,
ear-piercing,
astounding;
and those hailstones are massy iron,
charged with exploding fire.
The projectiles shriek
long and sharp.
They hiss,
they scream,
they growl,
they sputter;
all sound of life and rage;
and each has a different note,
and all are discordant."
After 2:30,
Haskell describes a
"slacking of fire"
and the implacable advance of Confederate forces.
"The red flags wave,
their horses gallop up and down;
the arms of eighteen thousand men,
barrel and bayonet,
gleam in the sun,
a sloping forest of flashing steel.
Right on they move,
as with one soul,
in perfect order,
without impediment of ditch,
or wall or stream,
over ridge and slope,
through orchard and meadow,
and cornfield,
magnificent,
grim,
irresistible.
"The field has fallen nearly silent.
"The click of locks as each man
raised the hammer
to feel with his fingers
that the cap
was on the nipple;
the sharp jar as a
musket touched a stone upon the wall,
and the clicking of the
iron axles
as the guns were rolled up by hand
a little further to the front,
were quite all the sounds that could be heard."
Even as the
Union soldiers
begin their defense of the ridge,
the
advancing soldiers
continue in silence.
In spite of
shells,
and
shrapnel,
and
canister,
without wavering or halt,
the hardy lines of the
enemy
continue to move on.
The Rebel guns make no reply to ours,
and no charging shout rings out to-day,
as is the Rebel won't;
but the
courage
of these
silent men
amid our
shots
seems not to need the
stimulus
of other noise."
At last
the battle is fully met
with both sides
firing at near point-blank range.
And Haskell
records its
humanity and inhumanity.
"No threats
or expostulation
now,
only example and encouragement.
Individuality
is drowned in a sea of clamor,
and timid men,
breathing
the
breath
of the
multitude,
are
brave.
The frequent
dead and wounded
lie
where they
stagger and fall
, there is
no humanity
for them now,
and none can be spared to care for them.
Webb,
Hall,
Devereux,
Mallon,
Abbott
among the men where all are heroes,
are doing deeds of note.
Now the loyal wave rolls up
as if it would overleap its barrier,
the crest.
Pistols flash with muskets.
" My Forward to the wall"
is answered by
" Steady, men"
and the wave swings back.
Again it surges,
and again it sinks."
Chaos and courage.
Hailstones and horror.
Silent slaughter.
Through the
three days
of the
battle of Gettysburg,
158,000
soldiers battled.
When Lee began his withdrawal
140 years
ago today
more than 7,000 men lay dead.
More than
33,000
more were wounded,
many mortally so.
Nearly another
11,000
were listedas missing. Total casualties:
51,000.
It was not the
Fourth of July
John Adams
predicted
when he wrote to his wife on
July 3, 1776,
That the anniversary of the
Nation¹s Independence
should be marked with
"pomp and parade,
with shows,
games,
sports,
guns,
bells,
bonfires,
and illuminations,
From one end of
this continent
to the other
From this time
Forward
forevermore."
Today,
as we grill hot dogs
and peel potatoes for salad,
as we watch the kind of fireworks
Adams foresaw,
let us remember
Haskell and his fellows
and the
innumerable flames of battle
fought to secure a
free and united nation.
Let us remember the words
Abraham Lincoln
spoke at the
dedication
of a
military cemetery
at
Gettysburg.
"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.
It is for us,
the living,
rather to be
dedicated to the unfinished work
which they have,
thus far,
so nobly carried on.
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
shall have a new
birth of freedom;
and that this
government
of the people,
by the people,
for the people,
shall not perish
from the earth."
Haskell survived the
battle at Gettyburg
but fell a year later in
fighting at
Cold Harbor, Virginia.
Lincoln was
assassinated
April 14,1865
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