Pickett's Charge today

[nikimcbee]

American history could have changed today. One of America's key crossroads in history. Today was the third day of the Battle of Gettysburg.

(my favorite part)




(high water mark)


(park today)

[dean_acheson]

the day was going so well, until this came up.

Faulkner used to say that it was possible for every southern boy to go back in their minds to a time when the flags were unfurled, but the charge hadn't started yet.... maybe that is why it took so long to implement the 14th amendment...

[The Avon Lady]

So much in so relatively few words:

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation,
conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation, so conceived and so
dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to
dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that
nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

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. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never
forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work
which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. 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, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and
that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

Wow.

[Iceman]

A deep man believes in miracles, waits for them, believes in magic, believes that the orator will decompose his adversary; believes that the evil eye can wither, that the heart’s blessing can heal; that love can exalt talent; can overcome all odds.

Ralph Waldo Emerson - The Conduct of Life {Beauty}

[Lord_Kitchener]

Faulkner used to say that it was possible for every southern boy to go back in their minds to a time when the flags were unfurled, but the charge hadn't started yet........Yep, every real southerner wishes we had clobbered them that day! Guilty as charged..lol. However we all know slavery was wrong and a huge mistake...still...

52,000 Americans lost their lives between July 1 and July 3 1863. That isn't a typo, 52,000!

What would this country be like if they had given up the fight on July 4?
As hard as it is, and I have no allusions, sometimes you have to fight.

Edit
The Battle of Chickamauga may have been worse, September 19-20, 1863 (two days), 34,624.

[Heibges]

Originally Posted by dean_acheson

the day was going so well, until this came up.

Faulkner used to say that it was possible for every southern boy to go back in their minds to a time when the flags were unfurled, but the charge hadn't started yet.... maybe that is why it took so long to implement the 14th amendment...

That sounds like the drunken antebellum version of "all real Americans love the sting of battle".

But serioulsly, going to the Gettysburg battlefield is a very sobering experience. Folks always says the WWI was the first modern war, but in many respects I think that honor goes to the American Civil War. If you look at the old pictures of the Southern cites ruined by the Union, you won't see pictures of cities like that until WWII.

It's very strange going to the South as a Yankee, but you can understand why so many folks are P.O.'d and you hear that "The South will Rise Again."