The Battle of Gettysburg was fought over 3 days between July 1st and 3rd in 1863. Considered the turning point of the civil war, it is also the civil war battle that saw the largest number of casualties on both sides. The Gettysburg campaign saw a number of individual engagements whose names have became infamous - Little Round Top, The Wheat Field, Devils Den, Cemetery Ridge, The Slaughter Pen and the most famous of all - Pickett's charge to "the high water mark" on cemetery ridge, considered the furthest point the Virginia army (the confederates) actually penetrated during the Gettysburg battle. While not the furthest north Lee actually advanced geographically, this was probably the closest he advanced strategically that could have seen the south win the war. But in incredibly fierce fighting, the union forces beat them back.

The Union Army was commanded by George Meade and they successfully repelled Robert E Lees Virginia army, ending Lees invasion of the North. Over the 3 days the Union army had 3100 killed, 14500 wounded and 5300 captured or missing, while the confederate casualties amounted to 4700 killed, 12700 wounded and some 5800 missing or captured.

The casualty numbers of the entire civil war are staggering, especially considering it was countryman against countryman and brother against brother. The civil war raged for 4 years and saw 185000 men and boys directly killed in battle. About half the bodies were never identified. A further 620,000 died of disease and injury, while 569000 were wounded but lived. At the population of the US in the 1860's this was the equivalent of 6 million men being killed in a war today. The South came off far worse - nearly 1 quarter of Southern white men were dead while about 50000 civilians had been killed. 40% of Southern livestock had also been killed and it would take the southern economy almost a century to recover.

The Gettysburg National Military park covers a huge area and winds all through and around the town and active working farms. Thousands of monuments, statues and memorials dedicated to individual heroes and commanders, and different groups, states, units and regiments line the roads. Most people drive or bike around the battlefields, pulling off in the numerous laybys to soak in the history and the emotion of the place. It is a truly beautiful area which makes the horror of the killing fields all the more sobering...

 

 

(ABOVE) This is one of the more interesting monuments. According to battlefield legend, during the fighting on the first day, an artillery shell crashed into a large oak tree scattering pieces of branch and tree down onto the soldiers below, A soldier with the 90th Pennsylvania regiment (Union Army) spotted a nest full of baby robins that had fallen to the ground. Right there in the middle of the battle, he picked up the nest and placed it back into the shattered tree. This monument includes a sculpture of the mother Robin sitting over her babies - and represents the regeneration of life and the dawn of a new era of peace following the civil war..(this photo will get bigger when you click on it)