Sunday, June 30, 2013

Gettysburg at 150: Armistead at the High Tide

Via Billy

For my entire life, a letter has hung on the wall at the bottom of the steps of the old, elegant--but not grand--farm house where my mother grew up. The house sits on the western shoulder of Clark's Mountain in the heart of Virginia's Piedmont. Sitting on the porch looking west over the rock wall, you see why they are called the Blue Ridge Mountains. 

And you can see why, after the unthinkable carnage of Gettysburg, General Robert E. Lee marched his men south, through all the enemy territory he had gained, past the Mason-Dixon, around the federal city and on southward to this very mountain. His men crossed the Rapidan River and took ramparts on the high bluffs along the southern bank of the river. When General U.S. Grant finally caught up, he found himself taking cover some ways above the river, beyond the flat plains of the north bank that left his men little more than target practice for Lee's sharpshooters.

Sometimes, watching smoky storm clouds slide across the purple background under a rolling barrage of thunder, I imagine that I am sitting in this exact spot 150 years ago, watching the fire and mortar blasts of a titanic battle and listening to distant cannon fire rumble along the valley and bounce off hillsides.


*****************************


 "For every Southern boy fourteen years old, not once but whenever he wants it is the instant when it is still not yet two o'clock on that July afternoon in 1863, the brigades are in position behind the rail fence, the guns are laid and ready in the woods and the furled flags are already loosened to break out and Pickett himself with his long oiled ringlets and his hat in one hand and his sword in the other looking up the hill waiting for Longstreet to give the word and it's all in the balance, it hasn't happened yet, it hasn't even begun yet, it not only hasn't begun yet but there is still time for it not to begin against that position and those circumstances which made more men than Garnett and Kemper and Armstead and Wilcox look grave yet it's going to begin, we all know that, we have come too far with too much at stake and that moment doesn't need even a fourteen year old boy to think this time. 

Maybe this time with all this much to lose and all this much to gain: Pennsylvania, Maryland, the world, the golden dome of Washington itself to crown with desperate and unbelievable victory the desperate gamble, the cast made two years ago......"

William Faulkner 

4 comments:

  1. Watching now on Breitbart - is great for all of us that cannot be there! Tune in if you can!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Just saw this as Dixie's birthday party was today. A most wonderful movie indeed.

      Delete
  2. I would like to share with yall some words about my Gr. Gr. Grandfather Pvt. Elbert Cotton. He was a member of Co. E, 15th Alabama Inf. Regt. and was present for duty at Gettysburg. Namely the charge of Little
    Round Top.

    The appendix in Col. W. C. Oaters book, "The War Between The Union and The Confederacy" states that....
    "Elbert A. Cotton was 39 years old when enlisted March3, 1862. He was mustered "absent sick" for a good while after entering camp, but finally regained his health and fought well through to the surrender, and died at his home in Dale County after the war."

    I will paraphrase the Colonel here....
    The 15th fought in 48 battles where it suffered loss. Total Membership during the war was 1,612. Killed in battle .....279. Wounded in battle ..... 599. Died of disease ..... 459. Discharged for wounds ..... 140.
    At Appomattox there were 172 left to stack arms.

    It would be dishonest if I said I'm only a little proud of my ancestor.

    Deo Vindice!

    ReplyDelete