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Social Studies-Battle of Gettysburg

Social Studies
Battle of Gettysburg

One weekend last month, my Boy Scout Troop camped in a state park near Gettysburg. On Saturday morning, we drove to Gettysburg National Park and started our tour in the cemetery. This is the site where President Abraham Lincoln delivered his famous "Gettysburg Address" when he dedicated part of the battlefield as a cemetery. After the cemetery, we hiked the Union Army Trail. We saw lots of historic places like Devil's Den and Little Round Top. When we finished the Union Trail, we were very tired and did not hike the Rebel (Confederate) Trail. We still enjoyed our trip to this historic place.

See below for a copy of Lincoln's Gettysburg Address

   Gettysburg is in Pennsylvania. This is where General Lee, from the South, and General Meade, from the North, met and battled during the Civil War. The battle lasted three days, from July 1 - 3, 1863, and was the bloodies battle of the Civil War. General Robert E. Lee had decided to move into the North territory and attack the Union army. The small Northern Army held the first day while more men arrived. On the second day of battle, the Confederate army tried to attack both ends of the Union defense, but the Union held on at Devil's den and kept the hill known as "Little Round Top" for the North.
     On the third day, General Pickett tried a mass attack on the North by running all his men through nearly a mile of open field! Some of his men managed to reach the Union line, but they weren't able to move the Union back. It was a disastrous idea! The Confederate army had lost so many men that they had to retreat. This attack became known as "Pickett's Charge."
     The Battle of Gettysburg was over and was won by the North. General Lee retreated his army back toward the south on July 4th. This battle is considered the turning point in the war for the North. The south had lost so many men and supplies that they never really recovered. The Civil War still lasted for two more years, but the south never attacked in the North again. In the end, the Union Army of the North could claim victory in the war. Both sides lost many thousands of lives.

You don't have to hike through Gettysburg to find out more. You can go to your local library and learn all about this famous battle.

Here is a copy of the speech that President Abraham Lincoln gave at the dedication of The Gettysburg Cemetery on November 19, 1863. It has become known as
The Gettysburg Address

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.

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