Upon finding out that I would represent Gettysburg College as a Brian C. Pohanka Intern at Petersburg National Battlefield, I was ecstatic though a little wary. The Petersburg Campaign was one on which I had never truly focused. I had heard of the Crater, the battles of White Oak Road and Five Forks, but I did not fully understand the scope and magnitude of the campaign. However, as a student whose passion is the experience of the common soldier, I quickly realized what a perfect fit the Petersburg Campaign is for my interests.
In a July 4 letter to his father-in-law, General Alexander Hays expressed reserve. “Yesterday was a warm one for us,” he wrote. “The fight of my division was a perfect success […] We are all sanguine of ridding our soil of the invaders.”
The “perfect success” for Hays was his command’s role in the repulse of Pettigrew’s division in what has become known as Pickett’s Charge. It was an unquestionable victory for his division and the Army of the Potomac. Yet Alex Hays’s matter-of-fact letter was not buoyant with the egoism so easily ascribed to generals after their victories. Hays does not mention, in any detail, his actions of July 3, where he remained in the saddle under artillery fire, inspiring his troops with his personal bravery so that his example would assuage their own fears of the looming Confederate assault. Nor does he detail the fight itself – the laying down of a wall of brutal fire by his men against their attackers – the melting away of enemy brigades to his front, the rebels falling dead and wounded as his men cheered for their destruction. Perhaps the greatest moment of Alex Hays’s life, certainly the pinnacle of his career as a soldier, his famed dragging of a Confederate battle standard in the dirt in front of his cheering men (and also in front of dying enemy soldiers) is also unmentioned, though, to do so in a after-action letter to his father-in-law would have been viewed, perhaps, as gauche.
Edwin Forbes drawing of Pickett’s Charge (Library of Congress)
When our great victory was just over the exultation of victory was so great that one didn’t think of our fearful losses, but now I can’t help feeling a great weight at my heart. Poor Henry Ropes was one of the dearest friends I ever had or expect to have. He was one of the purest-minded, noblest, most generous men I ever knew. His loss is terrible. His men actually wept when they showed me his body, even under the tremendous cannonade, a time when most soldiers see their comrades dying around them with indifference.
When twenty-one year old Henry Livermore Abbott penned these words on July 6, 1863, I highly doubt he expected his letter to be reconsidered by twenty-one year old Becky Oakes on July 6, 2013. Aside from being the same age, the Henry Abbott of 1863 and I have very little in common. He was a Harvard graduate from Massachusetts, and an officer in the Army of the Potomac. I am a graduate of Gettysburg College, originally from Ohio, and I study the Civil War. He wrote these words for his father, I type these words for a blog.
However, Henry Abbott and I happened to be standing at the exact same spot on July 3rd, one hundred and fifty years apart.
Becky Oakes, ’13, next to the 20th Massachusetts monument
At the time of writing this piece I have just completed my third week interning at George Washington’s Mount Vernon. Up until my first day of work I had no idea how amazing this internship would truly be. I assumed that it would be very similar to my internship from last summer with the Richmond National Battlefield Park Service. My assumption has been proven very wrong. Continue reading “Living History at George Washington’s Mount Vernon”
The saying “you learn something new every day” has always held true for me, but little did I know at the commencement of my internship at Appomattox Court House National Historical Park just how true that could be. As a student of the Civil War, I believed that I had a firm understanding of the surrender at Appomattox Court House, not in the sense that I pompously believed that I was an expert, but rather, that I grasped why General Lee was in a little town in South Central Virginia. However, from the first days of my training at Appomattox Court House, it became clear that my knowledge was greatly lacking. Continue reading “The Appomattox Campaign: A Lesson in What You Know and What You Don’t”
Individuals from around the world travel to the region punctuated by suburban sprawl nestled between Dulles Airport and Washington, D.C. They weave their way through the abundant traffic to reach a piece of ground that somehow managed to remain preserved. While some seek knowledge, or a way to entertain their children for the afternoon, others come merely to stand in the places where great armies and famous commanders stood 152 years ago. This is the essence of Manassas National Battlefield Park.
Three weeks of training. Just the thought of what awaited me in my first days as an intern at Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park made me want to groan. Yes, yes, I realized that we all needed to be introduced to the National Park Service and walked through the policies of the park, working the information desk, assisting visitors, and other administrative trivialities. But could that not be accomplished in a few days? When would we get to what I was really interested in, what I couldn’t wait to do and what (I thought) I didn’t need any preparation for? When would I start giving walking tours? Continue reading “Interpretation and Revelation: A Training Odyssey”
As the Pohanka summer intern at the Andersonville National Historic Site I had the immense honor of taking part in Memorial Day at the Andersonville National Cemetery. Let me just tell you, there’s just something about 20,000 U.S. flags rustling in the breeze. The cemetery was ablaze with red, white, and blue this past weekend, both on flags and on visitors’ clothing, as our way of paying homage to our fallen troops. The cemetery was at its most jubilant and colorful as hundreds of citizens celebrated this holiday at the stone rostrum among green grass and blue skies. On Memorial Day weekend, the national cemetery becomes Andersonville’s crown jewel, but in addition to the cemetery, the five hundred acres that make-up the park also includes the ground upon which Camp Sumter Military Prison operated during the Civil War. Continue reading “Memorial Day at Andersonville”
In her book War Stories,Frances Clarke outlines the importance of being seen as a man in Victorian society. For a soldier and his family it was important to know that if he should meet a tragic end, his death would be seen as a triumphant one. These concepts can be found in the story of Frederick H. Kronenberger, a young clerk who enlisted in the Second New Jersey Volunteer Regiment during the Civil War.
“I came here for the history department and the conservatory, but I didn’t know much about the Civil War,” admitted CWI fellow Gabby Hornbeck. Four years later, Hornbeck has interned at two National Military Parks on Civil War battlefields, has reenacted in battles as a civilian and soldier with the Pennsylvania College Guard, and is actively involved with other Civil War groups on campus including the Civil War Club, the Civil War Theme House, and the Civil War Institute. Continue reading “Profile of Senior CWI Fellow Gabby Hornbeck”
