00:00 - Okay folks

00:01 - welcome to the 2013

00:04 - preservation battle walk

00:06 - my name is John winkelman i'm a licensed battlefield guide here at gettysburg

00:10 - and what we're going to do today our topic for this preservation walk

00:13 - is the 1913 reunion

00:17 - okay this was fifty years after the battle

00:19 - this is one hundred years ago oh

00:21 - this year

00:22 - now of course if you've been reading anything in the paper you know that the

00:26 - anniversary this year is going to be something special

00:29 - the park service the foundation various groups in town

00:33 - has spent a lot of time maybe the last two years preparing their various events

00:37 - and activities that are going to curb

00:39 - definitely have

00:40 - a large event coming up here this July

00:43 - however if you look back one hundred years at the

00:46 - anniversary of 1913

00:49 - it was huge.

00:51 - 53,407 civil war veterans attended

00:56 - that reunion

00:57 - so it was big

00:58 - and to house that many people

01:00 - these fields right out here would be the site of the great camp

01:05 - alright.

01:06 - Now this whole thing came about as kind of the brainchild of a civil war veteran

01:11 - general

01:12 - Henry Huidekoper

01:13 - now general Henry

01:15 - Huidekoper

01:15 - was a lieutenant colonel during American civil war he was here at gettysburg

01:20 - and on July the first he was wounded in the arm

01:22 - and his arm would

01:24 - be amputated at st Francis catholic church in town

01:27 - he survived the amputation in the war

01:30 - and after the war he goes on to become a general in the Pennsylvania national guard

01:35 - and he figures it's 1913 it's

01:37 - fifty years after the battle we should have

01:40 - a reunion of the veterans now there had been

01:42 - other reunions here at gettysburg prior to this

01:46 - matter of fact in 1906 they had a reunion

01:49 - with Webb's Philadelphia brigade

01:51 - and the veterans of pickets division and it went off very well

01:55 - matter of fact the veterans of webbs brigade

01:57 - returned the sword

01:59 - of general Louis armistead

02:01 - to the Virginia veterans at that

02:03 - and i guess they figured it was such comradery and went

02:05 - over good nobody got into a fight or anything like that

02:09 - Huidekoper decides we should do something for the fiftieth

02:12 - he brings his idea to the governor of

02:14 - Pennsylvania

02:15 - and explains this is something we should do and the governor agreed with him

02:19 - so in 1909 they establish a commission

02:22 - to

02:23 - look into

02:24 - the fiftieth anniversary of the battle of gettysburg

02:28 - and what they're going to do they are going to

02:29 - invite representatives from

02:31 - all forty eight states

02:33 - and four territories

02:34 - to you know

02:35 - be the state representative on this commission.

02:39 - Some of the names of

02:41 - these representatives might be very familiar to you people

02:44 - for example who would be the representative from Maine.

02:49 - Got it Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain

02:52 - for new York we had Daniel Sickles

02:54 - from Rhode island Elijah Hunt Rhodes

02:56 - and from Minnesota

02:58 - John Bigelow

02:59 - if you go down the

03:00 - Wheatfield road there's Bigelow's battery

03:02 - during the battle of gettysburg

03:04 - in 1910 they started putting things together the events they wanted to have

03:08 - and one of the things they put on the schedule was

03:11 - a peace jubilee

03:13 - and the plan was that on July the third

03:15 - they would lay the cornerstone

03:17 - of a peace memorial.

03:20 - Unfortunately when the federal government was appropriating funds

03:23 - for this anniversary

03:25 - they did not provide any for the memorial

03:28 - so the peace memorial would have to wait another

03:30 - twenty five years till 1938.

03:34 - Now.

03:35 - you're going to have this

03:37 - influx of people

03:38 - who is allowed to come well

03:40 - the commission went to the grand army of the republic the union veterans

03:44 - and the united confederate veterans

03:46 - and basically the invitation was extended to those men who had an honorable discharge

03:51 - they would be allowed to come and stay in the camp

03:54 - now if you had a dishonorable discharge i guess you

03:56 - could still come but you couldn't go in the camp

03:59 - at least that was the rule okay

04:01 - so now you've got a lot of the veterans a lot of invitations are out there

04:05 - and pretty soon the numbers start coming in and this thing is going to be huge

04:09 - so what they're going to do they are going to actually get the.

04:12 - Gettysburg national park

04:14 - service.

04:15 - They are going to get the federal government involved

04:17 - and actually even the united states army the war department be involved.

04:21 - And what they are going to do is establish a large

04:28 - camp

04:29 - out in these fields

04:30 - Dan and Teresa if you could

04:32 - come forward please.

04:36 - Okay folks.

04:37 - This will give you an idea the size of this camp

04:41 - right now you are standing

04:44 - right about here.

04:46 - Along emmitsburg road

04:48 - this camp will start

04:50 - almost at across from the Codori house

04:52 - that's where the great tent is located

04:55 - and this will extend into town

04:57 - to give you an idea of folks

04:59 - this is breckenridge street

05:01 - here south street right here okay

05:04 - this is long Lane

05:06 - gettysburg hospital is here today.

05:09 - Here is west confederate Avenue

05:11 - there is the MacMillan house up on the Ridge

05:14 - so this can give you an idea the extent of this

05:17 - five thousand

05:18 - twelve-man tents

05:20 - and of course if you're going to have that many people you need water

05:23 - so in February of 1913 they're digging

05:25 - wells out here to provide water for the veterans

05:28 - they would have a temporary post office

05:31 - they would have latrines they even had a field hospital out here.

05:35 - When they finally start putting everything together you're going to have fifty three

05:38 - thousand four hundred and seven veterans

05:40 - about

05:41 - fifteen hundred u s army personnel to take care of things

05:45 - twenty two hundred cooks

05:47 - three hundred and fifty boy scouts

05:49 - and members of the press

05:50 - fifty seven thousand people

05:53 - will be living in that camp out there.

05:56 - Now if we look at another one if we could put that away

05:58 - a Dan and Theresa and we got a panoramic view here.

06:02 - We hope this is the one i want

06:04 - this is perfect.

06:10 - These are two panoramic views of

06:13 - these photographs by the way

06:15 - are in Pennsylvania at gettysburg volume three

06:18 - now they're taken this one right here is taken from

06:22 - the old hancock tower

06:23 - or sometimes referred to as the meade tower

06:25 - that actually stood where the old cyclorama

06:27 - building was right up there on cemetery Ridge

06:30 - so it's a great panoramic view

06:32 - here you're looking south

06:34 - there's big round top in the distance

06:36 - but if you look off to the west here there's the Codori house

06:39 - and there is the great tent

06:41 - okay

06:42 - and now you're seeing the southern end

06:44 - of the great camp.

06:45 - If we look at here now we are looking west so we're looking right across this way

06:50 - and here's the extent of the camp there's the great tent again

06:53 - and here all those tents in the field.

06:57 - the most of the monument to the eighth Ohio is right here.

07:01 - That's the monument

07:02 - right back there so here's this the eighth Ohio

07:04 - now you can see how far this camp stretches

07:08 - way past that

07:09 - to the outskirts of town

07:11 - and almost up to west confederate Avenue out there.

07:15 - So this gives you an idea of the size and the complexity this place right here

07:19 - what we're going to do now folks

07:21 - we're going to walk from this site

07:23 - we're going to head down.

07:24 - By the codori house just across the emmitsburg road from the codori house

07:28 - and what we're going to do is talk about the events

07:30 - that occurred here during the anniversary

07:33 - and thank you.

08:16 - Okay folks right now we are right across from the codori house of course a

08:20 - that house was here at the time the battle

08:22 - the barn is

08:24 - not the original one there was a white barn here in 1863

08:28 - that was torn down and they put this new barn on its site so

08:32 - but the house.

08:33 - Is original was here in 1863

08:36 - the orchard here was the codori orchard you notice we're on a little plateau

08:40 - right about here

08:41 - and this plateau is where they would put the great tent

08:44 - like i said

08:45 - two hundred feet wide four hundred and fifty feet long

08:48 - tent that could sit

08:50 - thirteen thousand people

08:52 - was right here on this plateau this had been the southern end of the great camp.

08:56 - Now.

08:58 - The first veterans are going to start arriving here on June 29th

09:02 - that evening they will serve their first supper at the camp

09:05 - now they were

09:06 - expecting six thousand veterans

09:09 - that night

09:10 - twenty one thousand showed up

09:12 - so you can imagine they were a little bit overwhelmed on day one

09:16 - the reason

09:17 - most of these

09:18 - veterans were probably Pennsylvania boys because

09:20 - Pennsylvania had just had a state reunion

09:23 - hear that concluded on June the twenty eighth

09:26 - so the pennsylvanians are here already and it's probably the most of them

09:29 - who were here

09:30 - on the twenty ninth for supper

09:32 - on June 30th they're going to have a dedication

09:35 - of the base of the Virginia memorial

09:38 - out there in the distance is the Virginia memorial Robert e Lee on top of course

09:42 - and they will dedicate the base

09:44 - of that monument

09:46 - on June 30th

09:47 - of course the official the final

09:49 - dedication will come

09:51 - in 1917 when the bronze.

09:54 - Figures and the statue of Robert e Lee

09:56 - is put on the monument so June 30th they had some events.

10:00 - July the first though.

10:02 - Will be the opening day that is veterans day okay

10:06 - and what they're going to do here at 2PM in this

10:08 - great tent is have the commencement exercises the big

10:11 - speeches

10:12 - welcoming the people

10:14 - and one of the persons who is going to be here for that welcome.

10:17 - Would be this man

10:18 - right here

10:19 - that is general Daniel sickles

10:22 - the last surviving corps

10:24 - commander of

10:25 - either the union or the confederate army here at gettysburg

10:28 - and there he is being greeted by a union and confederate veterans.

10:32 - On July the second they're going to have what they called military day

10:36 - here in the great tent there will be speakers talking

10:38 - about how america should keep its military strong

10:42 - one man said that the united states should build two battleships

10:45 - for every one that Japan builds

10:47 - remember we're on the Eve of the first world war

10:50 - Europe is becoming a

10:51 - tinderbox

10:52 - and a lot of people are saying we should start maybe

10:55 - ramping up for this one here

10:57 - so a lot of speeches here on veterans day

10:59 - ah there's also going to be a number of veteran reunions.

11:03 - Sixty five units will have reunions here on the battlefield

11:07 - and up we do have another picture here thanks Teresa

11:10 - this one is a group of union veterans

11:13 - this was their GAR post down here

11:15 - so you'd have this all over the battlefield

11:18 - as veterans are getting together having

11:19 - reunions and of course there are official events

11:22 - occurring here

11:24 - in the camp and in the great tent

11:26 - but there's a lot of informal

11:28 - reunions

11:29 - lotta times union and confederate veterans would walk through the camps talking to

11:33 - people where were you at where you from

11:35 - and there's even one guy who found the guy that shot him here fifty years ago.

11:40 - The Missouri

11:41 - the contingent though they had a request

11:44 - before they came to gettysburg they sent a letter

11:47 - to the mayor of gettysburg

11:48 - and they asked him

11:50 - if he could provide.

11:52 - Some photos of a few good widows or old maids

11:55 - good housekeepers but not too young

11:57 - to go west with them after the reunion

12:00 - and

12:01 - so the mayor of gettysburg J A Holtzworth

12:05 - agreed he would forward them some photos if anybody was interested

12:09 - this would be operation cupid.

12:12 - So

12:13 - yeah i guess they were looking for wives on July the third

12:17 - would be governors day now what's going to happen here in the great tent

12:20 - a number of governors from the states that are here

12:23 - are going to be

12:24 - giving speeches to their veterans in the great tent

12:28 - also.

12:30 - There's going to be a lot more

12:31 - reunions things like that about the park.

12:34 - Another thing that was going to happen on the governor's day is.

12:38 - There are going to actually

12:39 - walk the fields they were going to actually have a.

12:43 - Another

12:44 - big

12:45 - party here

12:46 - and they actually said there was a raid that night

12:48 - union troops raided the confederate camp.

12:51 - So they were still playing games and remember of the average age of these men is

12:55 - seventy two years old and they're raiding each other okay

12:58 - so they're having a good time

12:59 - there was no outbreaks any fistfights or anything like that that I've come across

13:03 - however it was reported that one fellow was arrested

13:06 - in gettysburg

13:07 - he was the son of a confederate veteran

13:10 - and they arrested him because he was making

13:12 - disparaging remarks about president Abraham Lincoln

13:15 - the they pulled him off to hoosegow

13:18 - July the third

13:19 - is going to be

13:21 - i guess civic day here

13:22 - and what they're going to do here.

13:24 - Is

13:25 - actually have some fireworks more reunions and everything else

13:29 - and finally on July the fourth would be national day

13:32 - now on national day what's going to happen is president woodrow Wilson will come here

13:37 - now Wilson initially

13:39 - decided that he did not want to come to this he had just been elected president

13:43 - and he had a

13:44 - a

13:44 - policy that he would not leave Washington

13:48 - while congress was in session

13:50 - but luckily for him congress was going to go on vacation it was hot it was July

13:55 - and on June 28th Wilson notified the commission

13:58 - that he would be available

13:59 - to come and make a few remarks here

14:02 - now

14:02 - Wilson might have been a little hesitant about this

14:05 - because he did not want to be compared to Abraham Lincoln.

14:09 - If you're following Abraham Lincoln it's a tough act to follow

14:12 - and Wilson was probably worried whatever speech he gave

14:15 - would be compared

14:16 - to his predecessor okay

14:18 - but he does come

14:19 - he gets here at 11AM arrives by train at the train station

14:23 - they will bring him by automobile from the town right down here to the great tent

14:27 - he will come in

14:28 - he will make a twenty minute speech

14:31 - they will play the national anthem

14:32 - he will get back into the automobile

14:34 - and head right back to gettysburg to the train station and he is gone

14:38 - Wilson was here

14:39 - about an hour

14:41 - he shook no hands talked to no veterans he came he saw he went and that was it so

14:47 - i guess he really didn't want to be compared

14:48 - to Lincoln and he left.

14:51 - also on

14:52 - July the third.

14:54 - Excuse me July the fourth

14:55 - there were going to have a moment of silence now Wilson leaves

14:59 - but at noon time

15:00 - there was

15:00 - a five minute

15:02 - silence a solemn period

15:04 - where everybody stopped talking there was a hush

15:06 - in town the bells and the churches

15:09 - were ringing

15:10 - at the noon hour

15:11 - and after they were done.

15:13 - The silent period still continued and off in

15:15 - the distance they were firing artillery pieces

15:18 - so in the distance you hear the boom of artillery as they

15:21 - were honoring the fallen dead

15:23 - with this a moment of silence with artillery booming in the background.

15:28 - Now what we're going to do now folks we're going to kind of

15:30 - head

15:31 - off to the opening in the fence

15:33 - we're going to go up to cemetery Ridge and kind of conclude the program up there.

15:38 - Going to show you some more pictures

15:39 - and.

15:41 - Kind of finish the program up there and also

15:43 - some more words from president Wilson as well.

16:08 - Okay.

16:10 - Okay folks are right now we are on cemetery Ridge we are on

16:14 - the angle right here

16:15 - and an event is going to occur here on July 3, 1913

16:19 - there is actually going to be a way Webb

16:22 - Pickett flag ceremony right here in the bloody angle

16:25 - veterans of Webbs Philadelphia brigade

16:28 - and veterans of Picketts division will meet right here

16:31 - and have a flag ceremony

16:33 - at the exact hour of pickett's charge

16:35 - 3PM they would meet right here

16:37 - also

16:38 - that same day there were some dedications going on down at the Pennsylvania monument

16:42 - it had been dedicated in 1910 however

16:45 - the statues the

16:46 - statues on the columns the one of Lincoln, Curtain, Meade

16:50 - and such

16:50 - they didn't go in until April of 1913 so they're having a little

16:54 - dedication ceremony down there for them as well.

16:58 - A lot of people ask what kind of impact this had on the town of gettysburg while

17:02 - gettysburg in 1913 had a population of 4500 people

17:07 - so you can imagine a projected one hundred thousand people come here.

17:10 - We've seen that

17:12 - over fifty three thousand veterans were here.

17:15 - They said all the hotels

17:17 - in Hanover chambersburg surrounding areas they were all booked you couldn't get a room

17:22 - and they said actually there was only maybe about

17:24 - fifty thousand visitors who were not veterans

17:26 - i think maybe the the idea of all this mighty scared some of the crowds away.

17:31 - Something that

17:32 - who knows might even happen this year as well

17:33 - you know a lot of people don't like big crowds

17:36 - and that could have happened

17:37 - they did have to open some spaces at the lutheran seminary at gettysburg college

17:42 - to accommodate some of this overflow as well

17:44 - but the town was pretty well

17:46 - inundated

17:47 - they had to put comfort stations throughout the

17:49 - town for the people there was first aid stations

17:52 - they had some boy scouts out by Cashtown

17:55 - helping people coming in on the Lincoln highway.

17:58 - Traffic directions and such

18:00 - so you had a lot of volunteer groups taking part in all of this

18:03 - now during this

18:04 - three day especially the beginning of this

18:06 - anniversary it was very hot

18:08 - we're talking over one hundred degrees

18:10 - super hot temperatures

18:12 - these men are seventy two years old average age

18:16 - so you can imagine the heat affected some of them

18:18 - over three hundred and fifty cases of heat exhaustion

18:21 - one case of heat stroke

18:23 - but with all of this

18:25 - only nine veterans died here

18:27 - during the reunion

18:29 - and they thought they were amazed because of the temperature one man said it's amazing

18:32 - there wasn't more of them because of the excessive heat.

18:36 - Also if you've got all these people here you want some entertainment

18:40 - so what they did

18:41 - in

18:42 - 1912

18:43 - they built a cyclorama building

18:46 - on Baltimore street

18:47 - over where the tourist center the gettysburg tourist center sits today

18:51 - they would put that building in

18:52 - and what they were going to do is bring

18:55 - bring to gettysburg

18:56 - the Boston cyclorama painting

18:59 - now that is the painting that is in the visitor center today

19:02 - it was first displayed here at gettysburg in that new building

19:05 - and would actually stay in that building

19:08 - to the nineteen sixties

19:09 - because in 1960

19:12 - they started building what they call the new

19:14 - cyclorama building of course that is the building

19:16 - that sat over there for decades

19:18 - and has just been demolished

19:20 - this year

19:21 - so that was the the cyclorama over there so the Boston cyclorama painting

19:27 - is still here still on display in the visitor center

19:30 - of course it's

19:30 - as you know if you're a member of the friends that just underwent a nine million

19:34 - dollar restoration before they put it up

19:37 - also

19:38 - there was a movie.

19:40 - I didn't even know this movie existed. It was a silent

19:42 - film the battle of gettysburg black and white

19:45 - and they were showing that in the theater in town

19:47 - unfortunately there are no copies or prints of that movie available today so we don't

19:52 - really know what it's like.

19:54 - by July the fifth

19:56 - they were closing down the camp

19:58 - most of the veterans

20:00 - Were leaving that day some had left actually before events concluded and the last

20:05 - veteran would be gone by July the eighth

20:08 - and they would start taking down the camp

20:11 - now

20:11 - of course this camp out here is going to

20:13 - give some inspiration because four years later

20:16 - the army he will establish Camp Colt out there

20:20 - that's where they will train the new

20:21 - tank units for the united states army

20:24 - and that training will be done by a young

20:26 - army captain Dwight D Eisenhower so again out in those

20:30 - fields that we had just walked there and if you look across

20:33 - that is where Camp Colt would be

20:35 - During the first world war.

20:37 - During the 2nd world war there'll actually be a German POW camp over there as well

20:42 - so the fields of pickett's charge have seen

20:45 - quite a lot of

20:47 - activity other than the civil war

20:49 - but i think probably one of the most momentum events

20:51 - that occurred here

20:53 - probably something you've read about

20:54 - it was when the southern veterans decided to come across the fields

20:58 - reenacting pickett's charge

20:59 - and we do have a

21:01 - picture of that right here here's some of the old

21:03 - civil war veterans coming across those fields.

21:07 - Probably a lot different than it was in 1863

21:08 - nobody was shooting at them of course

21:11 - but they will come up here

21:12 - to the stone wall at the angle

21:14 - okay.

21:16 - So that pretty much concludes my program today our battle

21:19 - walk across the fields does anybody have any questions.

21:24 - Okay

21:25 - well thank you for coming taking part in the

21:27 - preservation walk i know the foundation appreciates your

21:30 - your donations your time especially members of the friends

21:33 - and we hope to see you next year

21:35 - thank you.