There is something edifying about seeing the throngs of people, of all ages, races and creeds, flocking to this nation's most popular and well-known Civil War site. I've watched as Boy Scout Troops hiked across West Confederate Avenue, stopping traffic. I've been stopped as horseback riders walk their mounts across the Emmitsburg Road. I've stood at the back of a crowd of school students listening to a Ranger tell about the fighting around the Devil's Den. I've had to park nearly a quarter of a mile away from the Pennsylvania Monument and hoof it. And all of those things are fine. In fact, they are encouraging. I love to see others eyes' opened to my passion and to feel the import of those things that happened here.
But also, I am impatient. I don't like crowds. And when on a battlefield, I really just want to find a place where I can sit quietly and think about things. Where I can be absorbed into the atmosphere around me. And Gettysburg isn't exactly a place where it is easy to do that.
This summer, however, the stars were aligned and my long day of exploration finally paid off. It was late when I finally drove my car up to the top of Little Round Top. The sun was low in the sky and it was the time of the early evening known as "the golden hour", where the sun's low rays paint everything with a soft golden glow highly conducive to photography. If I was lucky, I told myself as I wended my way to the top of the hill, there wouldn't be too many people at the top milling around aimlessly and making it difficult to get that perfect photo of the broad battlefield below.
Imagine my surprise when I found Little Round Top, possibly the single most popular destination at the single most popular battlefield, nearly deserted.
Almost giddily, I circled the area's sole resident, General Gouverneur K. Warren, the "Saviour of Little Round Top" cast in bronze, gazing westward with binoculars in his right hand and saber in his left. He has been photographed often, but I had found the perfect photo of him elusive until that day. Now, I clicked away, grinning and mumbling to myself, careful not to sprain my ankle again (that's a tale for another time) or trip over my own two left feet and take a tumble down the boulder strewn face.
And then, in the bliss of silence, I sat on top of a nearby boulder, drew my knees up and followed Warren's gaze.
This slope, cleared of trees well before the battle, and strewn with boulders was just such a vantage point during the battle. The view below is by and large the same that Warren had when, after a "mis-diployment" of troops by Union General Sickles, who was commanded to defend the left flank of the Union line, he was sent to this undefended high ground and called for nearby troops to rush to its defense.
The attacks here on Day Two were fierce, but the most famous of the many assaults came up the slope on the southwest side of the hill. To the left and behind this position, the 20th Maine held the extreme left of the Union line. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain's troops had held off multiple Confederate charges by the 15th Alabama and, when running low on ammunition, were ordered to fix bayonets and, with guns and bayonets leveled, charged the oncoming Confederates. The move beat back the Confederate attack, secured the Union left flank, and thrust the professor and orator into American lore. A short walk on a well-marked path to the southeast commemorates their valiant efforts.
And from this vantage point, it is easy to hear the echo of Chamberlain's words as I sit to ponder and to dream.
No comments:
Post a Comment