Mark Nesbitt's Blog, page 2

13 Hidden, Haunted, Hotspots of Gettysburg #9

The next three blogs about Spangler’s Meadow, Pardee Field and Culp’s Hill are grouped together because they are adjacent to each other on the National Park Service battlefield tour route.

Of all the controversies surrounding the Battle fought at
Gettysburg, perhaps none is as widely argued as the failure of the Confederates
to exploit their victory on the first day by taking Culp’s Hill that evening.

Major General Richard S. Ewell, commander of the Confederate Second Corps, which confronted Culp’s Hill after the fighting on July 1, is blamed for his inaction and resultant Confederate defeat. In Gettysburg: Culp’s Hill & Cemetery Hill former National Park Service Chief Historian Harry W. Pfanz draws a masterful tracing of field conferences among Confederate high command, orders issued and assumptions made, that changed at least my mind upon whom the blame lies.

Pfanz was the Chief Historian just a few years before I
worked there, so I know of him by reputation. He was not writing about
Gettysburg from a desk in Washington—he lived in Gettysburg, and that is
evident in his intimate knowledge of the streets, alleys, hills and gullies in
and around Gettysburg. No doubt he’d heard for years what we all heard after
visitors were told of Ewell’s failure to take Culp’s Hill on the evening of
July 1: “What if Stonewall Jackson (whose Corps Ewell had inherited after
Jackson’s death) had been here at Gettysburg?”

The assumption was that Jackson would have swarmed over
Culp’s Hill and Cemetery Hill and driven the exhausted Union soldiers back upon
their approaching columns in the night, sowing panic and reaping victory during
the one day Battle of Gettysburg,
thus securing Southern Independence.

But Jackson was dead and Ewell had to make the decisions.

First there were Lee’s orders. In spite of subordinates like
Brigadier General John B. Gordon claiming—in the passion of battle—that he
could take Cemetery Hill before dark, Ewell was aware of Lee’s last command for
him to march his corps to Gettysburg. Ewell did, finished a battle he didn’t
start, (perhaps knowing Lee’s earlier wishes not to bring on a general
engagement until the army was concentrated), and wanted to await further orders
from Lee.

Those soon came, telling him (by Ewell’s recollection) to
attack if he could “do so to advantage.” Carefully separating the sources,
Pfanz states that Lee himself wrote in his after-action report that he told
Ewell to take the hill held by the enemy “if practicable,” but also to avoid a
“general engagement” until the rest of the army was on the Gettysburg scene.
Lee’s aide Major Walter Taylor, who delivered the information to Ewell, got the
impression that Ewell wanted to continue his attack.

Ewell met some of his officers in the Square (then called the
“Diamond” by locals) and one, Major General Jubal Early, stated that Major
General Edward Johnson’s Division (of Ewell’s Corps) should go to Culp’s Hill
and position itself there. A courier reported to Lee what had transpired during
the meeting and returned with instructions to Ewell to do what he deemed
appropriate and take the hill with the Cemetery on it if possible. Lee would
support the move with Major General A. P. Hill’s troops. Ewell started
preparations but paused them after further inspection, seeing Union batteries
blocking their assault lanes. He was considering the readiness of his troops
when an aide from Confederate troops on the York Pike reported a large body of
the enemy was approaching Ewell’s rear.

It dramatically demonstrates the confusion on the battlefield
at that moment. Even though victorious, the Confederate Army was disorganized
and the troops tired from marching and fighting all day. Their troop-strength
after the day’s casualties was a guess. There were no distinct battle lines yet
and the exact whereabouts of all the Union Corps was unknown.

There was no enemy out the York Pike, but the rumor was
enough to postpone preparations for a Confederate attack in the opposite
direction.

Johnson’s Division finally reached Gettysburg around 6:00 p.m. By then darkness was rapidly
approaching. (Keep in mind that time during the Civil War era was all kept
locally and there was no daylight savings time, so it may have been that
darkness was closing in on Gettysburg
by the time Johnson got into position.)

Ewell sent a couple of aides to reconnoiter Culp’s Hill. They
reached the summit with no enemy contact and saw the Union line forming before
them in the distance. They realized the importance of Confederate occupation of
the hill and returned to Ewell with the information. Ewell’s subordinates were
split on whether an advance should be made, and Early told Ewell that if he
didn’t take Culp’s Hill that evening, in his opinion, it would cost “ten
thousand men” to take it the next day.

According to one of the scouts, Ewell told Johnson to march
to Culp’s Hill and seize it if there were still no Yankees on it.

While Johnson was moving into position closer to Culp’s Hill,
General Lee arrived to speak with Ewell. He talked of the several courses
available to him as dusk fell and made no mention of an assault later that
evening. Lee returned to his headquarters. A later visit by Ewell to Lee’s
Headquarters left troop dispositions intact.

Ewell, back at his headquarters, sent an aide to General
Johnson to tell him to seize Culp’s Hill if he hadn’t done so already and
remain until Lee formed his plans for the next day. The aide found Johnson not in possession of Culp’s Hill, but
preparing for an attack the next morning. Johnson had sent scouts to inspect
the ground and they ran into a large Federal force now in place there. In
accordance with Ewell’s orders, with Yankees on the hill, Johnson stood down.

So, the failure to occupy Culp’s Hill by the Confederates was
caused by a series of events: discretionary orders, unsubstantiated rumors, and
that pesky sun going down.

Considering the circumstances, it is doubtful Stonewall
Jackson could have done any better.

The immediate results of Confederates not taking Culp’s Hill
on the evening of July 1, was that they lost an opportunity to disrupt the famous
Union “fishhook” line, the compact interior line dug in on the hills and ridges
that many historians believe was the key to the Federal victory.

The delay resulted in creating one of the areas on the
Gettysburg Battlefield that saw some of the longest fiercest fighting in the
battle.

Lee’s plan on July 2 was to attack both ends of the Union
line simultaneously, so that the advantage of the “interior” line of being able
to move troops quickly between the endangered ends was nullified. The attacks,
however, were not simultaneous. Longstreet’s afternoon fighting through the
Peach Orchard, Wheatfield, and Devil’s Den still failed to dislodge the
Federals from Little Round Top. Since the attack on Culp’s Hill was delayed,
some troops were pulled from there to bolster the other flank.

When Ewell began his attack in the evening, his men ran into
something strange: Union field fortifications abandoned, with knapsacks,
cooking equipment, personal effects just lying around. Suspicious of a trap,
they halted, never knowing they were within a few score yards of the vulnerable
Yankee rear echelons and retreat route. When scouts returned with the news,
they were followed by the Union troops returning to their breastworks and
fighting broke out lasting into the night, finally dying down, for one reason,
because the men could not tell at whom they were firing in the dark.

With the first glints of dawn, fighting erupted again and
lasted until just before noon, nearly eight more hours. At the end, the
Federals recaptured and continued to hold their positions.

The following Hidden
Haunted Hotspots are part of the Culp’s Hill battle.

Spangler’s Meadow

“Spangler’s Spring” is one of the landmarks on the
battlefield. Early guides used to tell the tale of how, when the fighting died
down in the area, men from north and south fraternized around the cool
refreshing waters of Spangler’s Spring.

Getting water there, yes. Fraternizing, no. The fighting was
too hot in the area of Abraham Spangler’s spring for hanging out with the enemy
like it was a summer picnic. The following accounts of the fighting at
Spangler’s Meadow, just a hundred yards or so from the spring, proves that.

Since daybreak, Spangler’s once-peaceful meadow to the east
of his spring had been contested ground with rebels picking off the
Massachusetts men posted there when they could. One that was shot and unable to
crawl back to his lines caught the merciful eye of one of his officers, Capt.
Thomas R. Robeson who took it upon himself to enter the kill-zone, pick the man
up in his arms, and carry him, under fire, back to the relative safety of their
position.

Around 10:00 a.m.,
the 2nd Massachusetts Infantry was in a wooded area south of
Spangler’s Spring when they received an order to attack Confederates on the
southern-most slope of Culp’s Hill near Spangler’s Spring. Their commander was
Lt. Col. Charles R. Mudge, only 24 years old, a Harvard grad and a veteran of
the infamous bloody cornfield at Antietam the fall before.

Peering from the woods, he could see that he would have to
cross 100 yards of open field before striking the Confederate lines bristling
behind stone walls, a pile of boulders and a rock ledge.

To his staff he said ominously that it was “murder but it was
the order.”

The New Englanders were joined by the heartland’s 27th
Indiana, the two regiments totaling about 650 men.

Across the open field from them were over 1,000 Confederates
including Smith’s all-Virginia Brigade and Steuart’s Brigade.

The Massachusetts men advanced first, angling more toward
Spangler’s Spring. At first they took only skirmisher’s fire until they got
closer to the rock walls and jumble of boulders at the bottom of the hill. They
halted and fired a volley to clear the pesky riflemen. They continued their
advance. Suddenly the boulders and stone wall exploded in fire and the right
flank seemed to just melt away, in the recollections of one participant.

In the Civil War, the term “Rally ‘round the flag” was more
than just the catchy lyrics to a popular song. The regimental colors were the
heart and soul of the unit and to follow the colors when everything below them
was enveloped in battle smoke, often meant life or death or being captured and
sent to a horrid prison-pen. Members of the color guard were chosen for their
courage and their height. They often paid for the conspicuousness. So it was
for the color guard of the 2nd Massachusetts.

In the first fifty yards the color-sergeant went down with a
mortal wound. The corporal grabbed the colors and was shot dead. Another
corporal was shot carrying the flag. Private Stephan A. Cody snatched the flag,
stood on a rock, and waved the flag defiantly at the rebels before they killed
him. The fifth man to carry the flag made it through the maelstrom.

Compassionate Captain Robeson did not; nor did young Colonel
Mudge, shot in the neck. Both died.

The 27th Indiana followed the 2nd
Massachusetts to their right, centered more on Mr. Spangler’s meadow and the
bristling rock wall on the other side of it. No sooner had they left the woods,
when Confederate fire hit them. As they crossed, the men soon realized that the
open field was swampy boggy ground. Their advance was slowed to a crawl as a
second Confederate volley from the boulders and wall hit them. Major Thomas F.
Colgrove, who was mounted, had a good view of the battle from his dangerous
perch. To him his right three companies seemed to be knocked down all at once.
According to Pfanz, others thought it looked like “the earth had opened and
swallowed the regiment.”

Whenever the Confederates stopped to load, the Hoosiers
advanced a few steps, fired, and stopped to re-load. The difference was, the
rebels were concealed behind rock walls and boulders; the Midwesterners were
standing in an open field.

Again, the conspicuous color guard became the target.

The color sergeant went down. So did the next six men to pick
up the flag. A small block monument in the middle of Spangler’s now peaceful
meadow, recalls their unwavering dedication to duty. Having done as much as
they could, the men of the 27th Indiana withdrew from the
blood-spattered meadow.

The soldiers from the Bay-State were not done yet. For ten
more minutes they went toe-to-toe, as Mudge’s replacement wrote later, “at the
shortest range I have ever seen two lines engaged at.”

Finally they retreated from the killing ground, not back to
their original position, but to the west and a stone wall on the south side of
the meadow.

The Confederates, for some reason, decided to launch a
counter-attack across the meadow, but they too found it a field of slaughter
and retreated. Spangler’s Meadow was left to the dead and dying.

The 2nd Massachusetts lost 22 killed in action or
mortally wounded and 112 wounded. Those figures account for over 40% of their
original strength, a large loss for the short fight.

The 27th Indiana lost 18 killed or mortally
wounded and 93 wounded, about 30% of the men who began the fight.

Directions to Spangler’s
Meadow: Baltimore Pike (Route 97) South. Turn left onto Colgrove Avenue. This
will take you to Spangler’s Spring and Spangler’s Meadow.

[image error]Spangler’s Meadow

The area of Spangler’s Spring is the venue for one of the more famous ghostly legends of the post-battle era, which I wrote about in the first book of the Ghosts of Gettysburg series. On certain, usually hazy evenings, the figure of a woman—glowing in a distinctive bright light—can be seen roaming the fields around the spring. The “legend” has it that she was a jilted lover who committed suicide there—one more death in the fields so familiar with it.

[image error]

Another story in Ghosts of Gettysburg II, comes from a Gettysburgian of the present era who, as a young rebellious teen, “ran away” from home one evening on his bike. Turning off the Baltimore Road, he pedaled toward Spangler’s Spring. Suddenly his eye was caught by a movement off to his left. He described it in later years as a “glowing, phosphorescent specter” moving, pausing, bending down as if looking for something—or someone—acting far too purposefully than a wind-borne mist.

The “Woman in White” as she has come to be known, has another incarnation other than the jilted lover from a misbegotten romance. I recount two more sightings of her in Ghosts of Gettysburg III: one at the site where she has always been seen, and one in a house just a few hundred yards from Spangler’s Spring, which had become a hospital for the wounded on the Baltimore Pike.

A man and his wife approached me after I had given a speech
saying that they thought the Woman in White, although long dead, “lived” in
their house. I arranged a paranormal investigation with one of the prominent
mediums we used. The house had a central stairway that led to the upstairs
hallway. Both husband and wife had seen a wispy woman dressed in white cross
the hallway at the top of the stairs. Their children had seen her as well and
gave the same description.

After nearly an hour and several impressions of other ghostly
beings in the house the woman of the house finally asked our medium, “Do you
get an impression of a woman dressed in white here?” The medium answered
immediately. “Yes. That’s the nun.”

It struck me that some of the first to come to Gettysburg
after the carnage, as volunteer nurses, were the Sisters of Charity from the
convent of St. Joseph in Emmitsburg, Maryland. As many as 40 nuns, with their
distinctive white-winged head-coverings, came to tend to the wounded. The
owners of the house said that their woman in white wasn’t a constant presence;
I opined that was because she was splitting her time between here and
Spangler’s Spring a couple hundred yards away.

Later in the chapter, I recounted the story told me by two
nurses—appropriate, don’t you think?—who contacted me and told me the story of
how they had toured the battlefield after dark and had parked at Spangler’s
Spring, laughing about the silly legends of ghosts at Gettysburg. But as they
watched, a small glow formed behind one of the trees in the jumble of boulders
near the parking area. Slowly it grew until it took the shape of a young woman.
Both saw it; one was mesmerized, the other scared nearly to death. Later they
each wrote down what they had seen—the descriptions matched: a woman in a long
dress with shoulder-length hair and a heart-shaped, lovely face.

It wasn’t until the next day they picked up a copy of Ghosts of Gettysburg and realized they
had witnessed materializing what others had seen over the decades—the Woman in
White of Spangler’s Spring.

For those paranormal investigators who seek EVPs, you may
want to try the names of some of the heroes who died in Abraham Spangler’s
meadow.

From the 2nd Massachusetts: Capt. Thomas R. Robeson.
From the color guard: Color Sergeant Levitt C. Durgin; Cpl. Rupert J. Sadler;
Pvt. Stephan A. Cody.

From the 27th Indiana: Lt. Col. Charles R. Mudge. You
may try to get the names of the men of the decimated color guard, as well.

[image error]

13 Hidden, Haunted, Hotspots of Gettysburg #8

Afternoon, July 3, 1863. Gettysburg.

Historians focus on the Confederate assault on the center of
the Union line on Cemetery Ridge. An entire division, and parts of two other
divisions of Longstreet’s Corps of the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia,
after a two-hour artillery duel, began their ill-fated march across nearly a
mile of open fields.

While Pickett’s Charge gets all the attention when discussing
July 3 at Gettysburg, three other smaller, but significant battles took place
about the same time.

The cavalry battle three miles east of Gettysburg was discussed in Hidden, Haunted, Hotspots #2. There was also a Union cavalry charge against Confederate infantry on the south end of the battlefield. But it’s the cavalry battle at Fairfield I’ll be writing about today.

While Confederate cavalry leader Jeb Stuart gets the unwarranted post-war blame for leaving Robert E. Lee with no “eyes or ears” during the march northward in June, I believe I successfully defended Stuart’s actions in Saber and Scapegoat: Jeb Stuart and the Gettysburg Controversy. Stuart actually left Lee with more cavalry than he had taken with him in his “scout/distraction” to the east of the Union army. A brigade under Brigadier General William E. “Grumble” Jones was one of those several cavalry units he left directly under Lee’s command.

An 1848 graduate of the U.S. Military Academy, Jones served
with Jeb Stuart in the pre-Civil War Indian Wars where Stuart considered him
the best outpost officer in the Army. When his bride died tragically in a
shipwreck, Jones retired from the army and became a virtual hermit on his farm,
a changed man. Dour, mean-spirited, because of his loss, he received the
cognomen “Grumble” Jones. When the Civil War broke out, he raised a unit of
cavalry and served under Stuart at 1st Manassas.

After the Battle of Brandy Station (June 9, 1863) opened what
was to become the Gettysburg Campaign, Jones was ordered to guard the west
flank of the invading Confederate Army of Northern Virginia, while Stuart swung
wide to the east, distracting the northern command and drawing off northern
units to seek him out. Stuart especially panicked the bureaucrats in Washington,
worried about their own hides, as evidenced by their daily communications
concerning his whereabouts.

After operations against the railroads in West Virginia,
Jones was recalled by Lee to cross the Potomac and ordered to secure the
Hagerstown Road at Fairfield, Pennsylvania on July 3, as a precaution in the
event Lee needed a route to withdraw his army back to the Shenandoah Valley.

On that afternoon, the 6th United States Regular
Cavalry, about 400 strong, were sent after a large Confederate wagon train rumored
to be heading north from Fairfield toward Orrtanna and Cashtown. They received
confirmation from locals that the Confederate train was heading toward
Cashtown. Coming to within a couple of miles of Fairfield, the Yankees spotted
some Confederate pickets watching from the mountains. Major Samuel Starr,
commanding the Regulars, detached a squadron to the west to deal with any
larger Confederate contingent on that flank, thus decreasing his strength from
his original 400 troopers.

Riding through the countryside, the Union cavalrymen were
presented cakes, bread, pies and liquid refreshment by the locals. Starr sent a
small group of troopers under Lt. Christian Balder off to find the eight or so
wagons reported by the civilians.

Balder returned with a report that there was more Confederate
cavalry guarding the wagon train—enough to drive off his advanced force. Starr
decided to press on.

When the Regulars arrived east of Fairfield and turned north
on the road to Orrtanna, they saw a sight to make any cavalryman salivate.
About two miles up the fence-lined road was a slow-moving wagon train of
supplies and ordnance for the rebel army. It seemed like it would be easy to
capture the wagons, supplies and horses. But some Confederate cavalry was
riding south on the main road to rescue the wagon train.

Taking advantage of a narrow part of the valley down which
the Fairfield-Orrtanna Road runs, Starr positioned half his
troopers—dismounted—to the right of the road on a small ridge perpendicular to
the road. He left the others mounted at the road. Soon the rebels appeared, only
300 yards away near a farmhouse occupied by the Marshall family.

The 7th Virginia Cavalry attacked with sabers
drawn. They were no match for the Union cavalrymen armed with breech loading
carbines. As well, the Confederates were hindered by the patchwork of fields,
fenced with stout rail fences and fieldstone walls making mounted maneuvering
difficult.

According to historian Eric J. Wittenberg in his article “Battle of Fairfield: Grumble Jones’ Gettysburg Campaign Victory,” the men of the 7th Virginia felt they had blundered into an ambush, their unit entangled in the fenced-in fields. A Union trooper saw the fight as a cruel, close fight. Practically every shot left it’s mark in the packed whirl of Confederate horsemen, who finally withdrew.

Confederate horse artillery arrived from Cashtown, unlimbered
and opened on the Yankees from a ripe wheatfield. The Union line began to waver
and Starr decided to launch a charge to support the faltering line. The lines
were now so close together that the Union troopers could hear the rebel
officers ordering their men to draw sabers for the charge.

“Grumble” Jones, true to his nom de guerre cursed, asking his men if one damn regiment of
Yankees be allowed to rout his entire brigade. The men responded with a cheer
and a request to “let us try them!” A quick shouted order and the troopers of
the 6th Virginia Cavalry sailed into the fray.

Starr’s men, already on the verge of a disorganized retreat,
tumbled back from the saber-wielding onslaught and piled into their own
advancing men or escaped by maneuvering in small groups through the head-high
crops. Confederate sabers knocked Yankees off their mounts and dismounted Union
cavalrymen exchanged pistol-fire with their adversaries at only fifteen yards.

The fighting was often hand-to-hand, involving even the
officers. Starr was sabered in the head and shot in the arm. According to
Wittenberg, Lieutenant R. R. Duncan was the man who unhorsed Starr with his
saber, then turned to saber two more of Starr’s men, running one completely
through the body and knocking him off his horse with the force of the blow.

Confederates continued to press their advantage, riding down
dismounted Union troopers with the saber or shooting them with their pistols.
One high point for the Federals occurred when Sergeant George C. Platt saw the
regimental color-bearer pinned under his horse and a group of Confederates heading
toward him. Platt rode in, taking saber slashes, but saving the regimental
colors by ripping them from the staff. For his actions on July 3, 1863, outside
of Fairfield, he was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor.

Casualties—killed, wounded and missing—for the Confederates
this afternoon amounted to 34 troopers taken out of action. For the 6th
U. S., casualties were catastrophic: 6 killed, 28 wounded, and an astounding
208 missing or captured. The fact that Jones’s Brigade numbered about 1,000 and
Starr’s regiment had less than 400 was the tide-turner. But the battle was of
far more importance for the Confederates than capturing a wagon train was for
the Federals.

Jones not only saved the wagon train, he secured the
Hagerstown Road for Lee’s Army, who would need it as their retreat route from
Gettysburg. Had Starr been reinforced and victorious, Lee might have had to
fight his way back to the Potomac. If Lee were trapped, the Confederate Army of
Northern Virginia would either have to fight its’ way out or surrender.

Directions to the Fairfield
Battlefield: From Gettysburg take route 116 west past the David Stewart
Farm, about 6 miles. Just before you get to the town of Fairfield, turn right
on Carroll’s Tract Road. Look for bronze government markers indicating units
that participated in the fighting. The battle took place in these fields.
Return on Carroll’s Tract Road and turn right to enter the village of
Fairfield.

[image error]Marshall Farmhouse

Fairfield is a quiet small town. An evening visit might
produce some paranormally interesting photos of the street scene in front of
some of these buildings.

Several houses in town are marked as having been used as
hospitals after the battle. The Marshall farm on the battlefield, the Blythe
House, R. C. Swope House, and the St. John Lutheran Church on Main Street were
all used as hospitals. The Fairfield Inn, a tavern since before the Civil War
came to Fairfield, may have been used as a hospital as well.

One of the participants in the fight was involved in a
paranormal event just before the battle. A Confederate casualty was Lieutenant
John Allan, adjutant of the 6th Virginia Cavalry. The night before
the battle he wrote a note in his daybook requesting that if anything should
happen to him, his remains should be delivered to an address in Baltimore—his
wife’s—and the deliverer would receive $500. The Lieutenant’s body was left
with a citizen of Fairfield. Lieutenant John Allan, stepbrother by his father’s
adoption of famed poet Edgar Allan Poe, was delivered home per his written,
post-mortem request. Did he retain his sensitivity into the afterlife?

Captain George C. Cram—universally disliked by many of his
men—was captured, as was the commander of the Union 6th U. S.
Cavalry, Major Samuel Starr who, as a prisoner of the Confederates in Fairfield,
had his right arm amputated after being wounded in the battle.

EVP (electronic voice phenomenon) is another avenue for
investigation. One of the men who died of his wounds after the battle was Lt.
Christian Balder.

Since spirits are known to be mobile, you probably don’t have
to be directly on the battlefield to communicate with them. I attempted to
contact Major Starr from my office and was successful in garnering some EVP.
Was it he or some other entity? I need to do a little more historical research
on Starr and ask a few more pertinent questions before I can know.

Good luck!

13 Hidden, Haunted, Hotspots of Gettysburg #7

My first years as a ranger/historian at Gettysburg were some
of the most rewarding of my career.

First, I was living in a legendarily historical place I’d
read about and visited with my parents since I was a child. Second, the job
consisted of being stationed at one of several battle sites throughout the park
and presenting the history once an hour, imparting tales of sacrifice, tragedy,
military events and the meaning of it all to dozens of visitors. Dozens? Let me
re-phrase: Dozens at each talk. I think I calculated, according to the average
number of people at my talks and the number of talks I gave, that I spoke to
roughly ten or eleven thousand people
that first summer. With twenty or so seasonal rangers on duty, that gives you
an idea of the numbers of people we touched.

One of my duty stations was Little Round Top. We were told not to go into too much detail, to keep descriptions of the fighting on a large scale. But on Little Round Top I couldn’t help but tell the story of the gallant men of the 20th Maine and their commander Colonel Joshua L. Chamberlain. I had read The 20th Maine, the classic regimental history by John J. Pullen, and felt that the story of men holding the extreme left flank of the entire Union Army, under attack by a larger force and running out of ammunition was dramatic enough to spend a few extra minutes relating.

Periodically I’d get a family that was from Maine and they would
ask where the monument for the 20th Maine was. I would tell them to
head down the hill on the road and look for a deer path on the left and follow
it back through the woods to the monument. Nine times out of ten they would
return, having missed the turn-off or not having gone deep enough into the
woods. If I had the time before my next talk, I’d lead them back to the
monument, pushing aside the limbs and brush.

But since the publication of Michael Shaara’s The Killer Angels (another classic, but in the historical fiction genre) and the movie “Gettysburg,” based upon the novel, the hardly discernible pathway has become a wide, paved, marked footpath—for that area virtually a “superhighway”—back to the monument to the now famous regiment.

(Interestingly enough, after I published my book of Chamberlain Through Blood and Fire: Selected Civil War Papers of Major General Joshua Chamberlain I was invited to Chamberlain’s home in Brunswick, Maine to an autograph session. They seated me at the table with none other than my boyhood idol, John J. Pullen. Also interestingly, I got to know Michael Shaara through an early publisher of mine. Finally, I met Jeff Shaara, Michael’s son who is the author of countless historical novels of all eras of American Military History. Small world, Gettysburg.)

Below the monument is a parking area and it is from that lot,
looking to the right of the 20th Maine monument, one can see what
appears to be a road along the backside of Little Round Top. And on days when
the front slope of the famous hill is overrun with schools groups, boy scouts
and tourists, Chamberlain Avenue, with its screen of trees, is relatively
quiet.

But that belies the fury and horror that once filled the
area.

Per standard tactical arrangement, Chamberlain placed Color
Sergeant Andrew Tozier and his color guard at the center of the regimental line.
His brigade commander, Colonel Strong Vincent, told him to hold the position at
all hazards. A look around no doubt impressed Chamberlain with the sobering fact
that they were the last troops in the line.

Chamberlain sent Company B off into the woods to your right as
you face the monument from the parking lot. (That position is also accessible
via a pathway and is identified by historical markers.) Artillery opened on
them as they got into position and it is probably at this time Chamberlain was
wounded for the first time—a shot to his right instep, painful but not
debilitating. His men were barely into a semi-circular position when the first
Confederate assault rolled up the hill.

Colonel William C. Oates’s 15th Alabama got to
within 40 yards of the Union troops on the south slope of Little Round Top when
they were met with, according to Oates, “the most destructive fire I ever
witnessed.” As this fire came from troops to the right of Chamberlain’s, Oates
began to wheel his men away from the fire to try to flank the line. The
movement brought him face-to-face with the 20th Maine. To protect
the movement toward his flank, Chamberlain bent his line back making an angle from
where the monument now stands and stretching the line dangerously thin.

Oates’s men sidled more to their right and advanced up the
slope again, this time wavering like “a man trying to walk against a strong
wind.” Some of the 20th Maine were pushed back almost to the
“hogback” ridge on that part of the hill, but then pressed back down the slope
against the enemy. Chamberlain recalled how “the edge of the conflict swayed to
and fro”—a seesaw battle for the southern spur of Little Round Top. Chamberlain
sent one of his younger soldiers to the rear with a wicked bullet wound to the
forehead “to die in peace” as he recalled. “Within a half hour, in a desperate
rally I saw that noble youth amidst the rolling smoke as an apparition from the
dead with bloody bandage for the only covering of his head, in the thick of the
fight.”

Between the Confederate assaults there were three or four
lulls as both sides re-arranged their lines—the Alabamians closing ranks where
gaps marked the fallen; the Mainers piling rocks for a little more meager protection
and pulling in the wounded and dead, stripping them of their ammunition.
Suddenly, from the hazy woods, came yet another assault.

The Confederates had moved further to their right. The
fighting was generally now along what later became Chamberlain Avenue. Oates,
in later years, referred to “ledges” along the slope of Little Round Top upon
which the Yankees made their stands and from which military expediency dictated
the Alabamians must drive them. The construction of Chamberlain Avenue was
either upon one of these “ledges” or obliterated one of them.

“I saw around me more of the enemy than of my own men,”
Chamberlain recalled. Looking back through the black powder smoke, he saw
Tozier and only two men left of the color guard standing next to him. Tozier
himself had the colors tucked under his arm and was biting off cartridges,
loading and firing as fast as he could. The three men, plugging a gap in the
center of the bent-back line, then disappeared in the smoke. Chamberlain sent
his own brother Tom to tell them to fall back a bit to close the gap on either
side of them. Tom vanished in the haze like a ghost and Chamberlain sent a
second courier in case his brother didn’t make it.

It is doubtful that Chamberlain, in the tumult, heard Oates
order “Forward, men, to the ledge!” By Oates’s count there were five rallies by
the northerners to drive him from his position. In one of the counter-attacks,
Oates saw one Union man reach for the 15th Alabama regimental colors
just ten feet away from him. An Irish Sergeant fighting for the South, drove
his bayonet into the head of the Union soldier who dared to reach for the
colors, a gruesome sight that haunted Oates the rest of his life.

Oates looked down the line just in time to see his own
brother John riddled with bullets and mortally wounded. Oates shouted an order down
the line and Captain James H. Ellison leaned closer to hear. A bullet slammed
into his head and Oates watched, horror-stricken as Ellison fell on his side,
rolled to his back, raised his clenched fists, convulsed once or twice, then
died.

The Alabamians were slowly working their way farther to their
right along the general path of what is now Chamberlain Avenue. Chamberlain
continued stretching his line thinner and thinner as they met the Confederate
flanking movement. Then, echoing through the woods behind and to either side of
him he heard the calls: ‘Ammunition!” “Cartridges, here!”

During a brief lull in the fighting, Lt. Holman Melcher
approached through the haze and requested to go out in front of his lines to
gather the wounded. Chamberlain, grasping the desperate situation, said “I am
about to order a charge.”

There is a controversy—this is Gettysburg, remember?—about
whether Chamberlain actually gave an order to charge.

We do know that he shouted, “Bayonet!” and the clink of steel
bayonets being fixed on musket barrels rattled through the woods. We also know
that Oates’s men were a few short yards away, either preparing to advance or
already in motion. The men of the 20th Maine were seasoned veterans
and they knew the situation and what was coming. Chamberlain may have called
out “Forward!” but the men never needed the order. Like the assault up
Missionary Ridge four and a half months later, each man became his own
commander and the Mainers launched themselves over their breastworks.

Yet there was seemingly some order to the charge as the
center of the line became the pivot upon which the left wing swung across
present Chamberlain Avenue and into the Confederates, driving them down the
valley between the Round Tops. Some Confederates ended up running toward
Company B in the woods. According to Chamberlain, Company B was also on the
move toward them, all of the 20th Maine then driving Oates’s men
down the valley toward Devils Den, as well as up the slope of Big Round Top.
Oates would later say that the 20th Maine’s success was due in part
because he had already ordered a retreat.

Directions to Chamberlain
Avenue: Coming from Devil’s Den or Big Round Top go to the small parking
lot on the south end of Little Round Top and park.This area is part of the
Gettysburg National Park, so be sure to adhere to the seasonal closing times.

[image error]Chamberlain Avenue

If you are going do a paranormal investigation, keep in mind
that the NPS has designated EMF (electromagnetic field) meters as “metal
detectors” and are therefore banned from usage on the battlefield. (I have
tested the four or five different models of EMF meters I own by holding them pressed against a Civil War era Enfield
musket and a light artillery saber with no reaction from the meters whatsoever.
But why go through the hassle of having your equipment confiscated and fighting
a citation before a Federal magistrate in Pennsylvania—especially if you are
from far away.) A discrete investigation using cameras, video recorders, and audio
recorders is the way to go.

Remember, Little Round Top was the site of the two reenactors who, on a hot evening on the anniversary of the battle, were approached by a figure dressed as authentically as they had ever seen. He spoke to them, mentioning the hot day they’d all been through and handing them cartridges before vanishing back down the slope and into the tangled brush. The reenactors were astounded. These were authentic Civil War era paper cartridges, complete with lead minié ball, correctly tied string, and beeswax coating. (Objects passing from one dimension into another is not unheard of in the paranormal world—it is called an apport.) Before he left, he said, “Take these. You boys may need these tomorrow,” in what can only be seen as an otherworldly reference to them running out of ammunition on Little Round Top. (See Ghosts of Gettysburg II.)

If you attempt to gather electronic voice phenomena (EVP) you
may want to address some of the men specifically mentioned by Chamberlain in
his writings:

Sergeant George Washington Buck, Co. H, from Linneus, ME, whom
Chamberlain found mortally wounded on Little Round Top, shot in the chest. Buck
had been earlier demoted to private, unwarranted in Chamberlain’s opinion.
Chamberlain promoted him back to sergeant as he lay dying on the field.

Second Lt. Warren L. Kendall, Co. G, from Belfast, ME, killed
in action.

First Sergeant George S. Noyes, Co. K, from Pownal, ME,
killed in action.

First Sgt. Charles W. Steele, Co. H, killed in action.

First Lt. Arad H. Linscott, Co. I, from Jefferson, ME,
wounded on Little Round Top, died July 27, 1863.

I have gotten EVP on Chamberlain Ave., but even though I wrote a book about him, nothing from Colonel Joshua Chamberlain yet. I addressed Noyes, one of the men killed in action on Little Round Top, who seems to have answered on the digital recorder.

13 Hidden, Haunted, Hotspots of Gettysburg #6

The first day’s battle at Gettysburg literally swirled around
the Widow Mary Thompson’s house. In fact, it may be said that within sight of
the Widow Thompson’s stone house and barn atop Seminary Ridge, a decision was
made which completely altered the history of the world.

Imagine yourself Confederate General Robert E. Lee. You have
embarked upon your second invasion of the enemy’s country, marching your army
for three weeks northward, crossing into one of the largest, wealthiest, and
most influential states in the Union—Pennsylvania. During the campaign you have
attempted to gather in as much materiel as you could from the northern
states—avoiding pillaging Maryland as a gesture to a state that might still
join the Confederacy. But farmers and townsfolk throughout this area of
Pennsylvania have felt the sting of a hostile army “requisitioning” food
animals, draft animals and dry goods, such as shoes, hats, socks, medical
supplies and thousands of barrels of flour.

That’s one of the arguments for the invasion you discussed
with President Jefferson Davis: the war had been waged in the south for two
years putting extreme strain on the farmers, especially in the Shenandoah
Valley, to supply two armies fighting in Virginia. Another reason for invasion
was the hope of British recognition of the Confederacy as an independent
country; a victory on northern soil might convince them to send money, more
arms and supplies. As well, there was a powerful “Peace Party” in the Yankee
government; winning a battle in Pennsylvania, then threatening an attack on
Washington would add more credence to their arguments.

Since leaving the northern reaches of the Shenandoah Valley your
army has spread across southern Pennsylvania, northeastward toward Harrisburg,
the capitol of the state, and east, reaching the Susquehanna River at
Wrightsville on the road to Philadelphia. With the wings of your army separated
you have given all your commanders orders not to bring on a general engagement
with the enemy. In fact, after hearing that the enemy had crossed the Potomac,
you issued orders for the wings to begin to assemble near Cashtown and
Gettysburg.

Early this morning, however, arriving in Cashtown you heard
the ominous sound of cannons firing from the direction of Gettysburg, a town
that has several roads radiating out from its center. The sound of the guns
continues until you deem it necessary to personally find out who is violating
your orders, where it is happening, and just what is going on. As you get
closer to Gettysburg you begin to see clouds of black powder smoke rising in
the distance.

It is nearing 2:00 P.M. and additional evidence of a large battle can be seen—some wounded from your army filling aid stations and field hospitals along your route. More and more wounded as you got closer to Gettysburg. There’s a battle going on—a big battle—and you don’t know how it is turning out. You anxiously crest a ridge overlooking the town and you see what is happening. You are pleased with what you see.

As a young cadet at West Point, those many years ago, you’d
read about battles that changed the course of military history: Waterloo
stopped Napoleon in his tracks as he sought to conquer Europe; Cannae,
Hannibal’s battle of annihilation of the Romans; and, most relevantly,
Yorktown, where Washington won his country’s independence.

In front of you and to your left you see your troops pressing
the enemy from the north. More troops are arriving from the east and the attack
in your front resumes, pressing on “those people” from the west. The enemy is now
in full retreat with your troops pressing them through the town below only a
block or so behind them. The battle that you had wanted to avoid is now turning
into the victory on the enemy’s soil your country needs so much. The
apprehension for battle you felt just moments ago vanishes like the morning
mists in Virginia. Your army has presented you with a victory, a victory that
just might lead to the Confederacy’s independence. Now, how to make the most of
it.

Looking around you see that your aides are ordering men
around, cleaning up the area of debris and dead bodies, and beginning to have
your headquarters tents set up. The western slope of the ridge where this
school sits should do. They tell you it is a Lutheran Seminary.

Across the road you can see a small fieldstone house. Already
your aides have stationed four guards around it. From the position on the ridge
overlooking what is likely to become a battlefield, the spot is a good one for
headquarters….

And the controversy begins.

Sometimes historians can get picky, almost to an absurd
extent: “How many buttons did General Reynolds have on his coat when he was
shot?” picky. Lee’s headquarters site at Gettysburg is one of those historical
things that always had a mental asterisk after it. Did he or did he not use the
Widow Thompson’s house as his headquarters?

Major General George G. Meade, Lee’s counterpart at Gettysburg, has his headquarters plainly marked on the Taneytown Road, the Lydia Leister House. So there’s no controversy there, right?

Wrong. Certainly the Federal Government was sure enough of
its authenticity to purchase the Leister House as Meade’s Headquarters; no
doubt some of the more important decisions about the battle were made in that
house, such as whether to stay or retreat after the second day of battle. But
when the Confederate cannonade prior to Longstreet’s Assault (aka “Pickett’s
Charge”) began raining artillery shells around the Leister House, discretion
became the better part of valor and Meade moved his headquarters farther to the
east to a house on the Baltimore Pike.

Shouldn’t that also
be Meade’s Headquarters?

Not good enough for the National Park Service. When the
property came up for sale a number of years back, they passed on it. The
remnants of the house eventually tumbled down and were last seen (by me) being
loaded into the back of someone’s pickup truck who felt the need to save at
least some part of Meade’s second Gettysburg Headquarters.

But Lee’s headquarters at Gettysburg is a little more
nebulous. Historians mostly believe that Lee spent some time in the Thompson
House, at least enough to have dinner the night of July 1, and perhaps even a
few hours of shut-eye there as well. No doubt he was out early on July 2,
perhaps before dawn, scouting the enemy’s lines, receiving reports, adjusting
his own lines for battle, and giving orders for the coming day’s action. Former
Chief Historian of the National Park Service and a ten-year veteran as
historian at Gettysburg National Military Park, Harry W. Pfanz wrote in his
book Gettysburg: The Second Day about
Lee’s movements late July 1 and early July 2. He never mentions the Thompson
House but says Lee was on the move: before dark he visited General Ewell on the
Confederate left flank; later that evening Ewell rode over to see Lee,
apparently somewhere near Seminary Ridge. After that, Lee “returned to his tent
to sleep.”

Very early the next morning General Longstreet found Lee at
his headquarters, which Pfanz describes as a group of tents in an orchard on
the south side of the Chambersburg Road on the west side of Seminary Ridge.
There today is an upturned cannon monument—symbolic of high-ranking officer’s
headquarters locations on the Gettysburg Battlefield—with a plaque reading “‘My
headquarters were in tents in an apple orchard back of the Seminary along the
Chambersburg Pike.’–Robert E. Lee.”

That should end all arguments. I mean, Lee himself said it,
right?

Not so fast. The quote actually comes from an article written by Henry S. Moyer in 1907. As explained by Timothy H. Smith, Gettysburg Historian, author and Licensed Battlefield Guide in his book, The Story of Lee’s Headquarters Gettysburg, Pennsylvania Moyer visited the battlefield in 1874 and claimed he interviewed an elderly lady on the porch of the Thompson House. He asked her point-blank questions and received the same kind of answers: Yes, she lived in the house on July 1, 1863; No, General Lee did not have his headquarters in the house; No, Lee was never even in the house.

However, it couldn’t have been the Widow Thompson. She had
died the year before.

Moyer also wrote that sometime before 1870, Gettysburg historian Colonel John Bachelder had “told a good friend” (unnamed, of course) that he discussed with Lee where his headquarters were located at Gettysburg and was told that Lee answered in the following words: “My headquarters were in tents, in an apple orchard, back of the seminary along…” Yeah. You got it.

And that is where the National Park Service—or actually the
War Department who administered the battlefield in 1919 when the cannon
monument was erected—got the information.

[image error]

Lee is known to have done a great deal of battle planning
from a fallen log just north of the main seminary building (Schmucker Hall),
sending out scouting parties and conferencing with subordinates about his
battle plans.

Lee was also on the move much of the time. About 9:00 A.M. he left to visit General Ewell again. In his absence, Lee met with General Trimble who took him to the county almshouse on the road to Harrisburg, where there was a cupola for observation. They returned to Ewell’s headquarters to meet with Ewell to establish his actions for the day. Ewell then returned with Lee to Seminary Ridge. After that, Lee may have only returned to his headquarters in the evenings and may or may not have visited the Thompson House again before the Confederate retreat.

Over the years, the Thompson House had many incarnations, as
a residence, a “bawdy house,” and a museum. Tourist cabins grew up around it in
the first half of the 20th century and then “Larson’s Cottage Court”
in the second half. A modernized motel and restaurant occupied the site later.

In this century, the Civil War Trust was convinced that the Thompson House was a worthy project and purchased the motel and land in early 2015. By 2016, the motel and restaurant were razed, leaving the ground as open as it was in 1863. Walking trails lead to various sites of interest and the house has been restored and is open on special occasions.

Directions to Lee’s
Headquarters: Travel out Route 30 West toward the Seminary. At the top of
Seminary Ridge, on the right is parking for Lee’s Headquarters and the Thompson
House.

[image error]Widow Thompson’s House

Over the years I have collected a number of ghost stories
from the area.

When the ground was occupied by Larson’s Motel, sleeping tourists were awakened—not once, but a number of times—by obviously military noises just outside their rooms. Documented in Ghosts of Gettysburg IV is the story of a man and woman asleep in the western-most wing of the motel. Suddenly they were jolted awake by a horrendous explosion that rattled the walls and shook the mirrors in the room. The man leapt from bed, grabbed his robe and went outside to see what had exploded. He was met only by the cold, silent cannons representing Battery B, 4th U.S. Artillery sitting right behind his motel room.

From Ghosts of Gettysburg III comes the story of one of the dead soldiers “gathered up” by Lee’s aides to clean up the area before the general made his headquarters there. With little time to bury them all, some were unceremoniously piled in a small, cold, stone room in the lower part of the barn across the street from the Thompson House. One of bodies on the bottom of the pile, however, was not quite dead. For several days he lay under the oozing, decomposing pile of humanity, unable to free himself, slowly going mad. He was finally found, but died shortly afterward. His angry spirit is blamed for the explosive poltergeist activity a couple experienced coming from the cellar of their house built on the barn’s foundation. The activity would not cease until a priest was called to cleanse the house. The mark of a cross within a circle left by the priest on the door in the cellar is still there, confirmed to me just a few years ago by a former occupant.

[image error]Area where the “Buried Alive” barn once stood

But for modern thrill-seekers, take your video and still
cameras, digital recorders, pendulums and dowsing rods out to the Thompson
House complex some evening around dusk. See if you can capture any of the
spirit-remnants of the torn and tortured souls who once were as alive as you
and I. Good luck!

If you’re interested in more of the ghost stories associated with Seminary Ridge, check out my ebook Seminary Ridge Ghost Tour: A Ghosts of Gettysburg Self-Guided Tour.

Download a free PDF map of Gettysburg’s Hidden, Haunted, Hotspots sites

13 Hidden, Haunted, Hotspots of Gettysburg #5

Not too long ago I was teasing a friend of mine about how
interesting it used to be to listen to all the “old guys” reminisce about the
Gettysburg of their younger days, when there was a such-and-such store where there
is now a 7-Eleven, or when the National Park Service used to allow whatever,
which is now illegal.

The teasing part was that now we are the “old guys” reminiscing about things younger people in
Gettysburg don’t remember.

For example, I remember talking to a woman who told me she
was selling her huge farm, one that had carried her family name for numerous
generations. “I just can’t make a living at it anymore, Mark.” The old house
and barn had been used as a hospital and was a beautiful, historic landmark for
years.

Do you want to know who bought it?

Walmart.

It was one of the first farms to sell out on Route 30 East,
which up to that time had been pristine farmland. Now, of course, it is one of
the prime areas for commercialization with scores of businesses grown up all
along both sides of the road.

There is one historic spot along the south side of York Road, however, that has somehow avoided development. It is part of the area where Camp Letterman, the large general hospital from the Battle of Gettysburg, was located.

As I mentioned in previous blogs about Gettysburg’s Hidden, Haunted, Hotspots, various
hospital sites were scattered about the countryside after the battle, beginning
with triage aide stations to the larger field hospitals where surgeries occurred.
After a couple of weeks, much of the manpower of the army had left the
Gettysburg area and the logistics became a nightmare. It proved impossible to
get food and supplies to all the individual sites caring for the wounded. The
answer was to create a General Hospital and move the wounded there.

From Greg Coco’s classic work, A Vast Sea of Misery about the Field Hospitals at Gettysburg from July 1 to November 20, 1863, I have gleaned the following:

According to Henry Janes, a volunteer surgeon for the Union
who remained behind in charge of the wounded after the battle, there were over
20,000—of which 5,456 were Confederates too badly wounded to be taken with
Lee’s Army on their retreat—scattered about in 60 hospitals.

Janes and two others from the Medical Department located a
site about a mile east of Gettysburg on some high ground overlooking the town that
afforded several advantages. It had a spring of good water, trees for shade, a
frequent breeze, and perhaps most importantly, the railroad which curved to
within walking distance of the hospital so that when they were well enough, the
wounded could be placed on a train for home. Mr. George Wolf owned the farm
upon which “Wolf’s Woods” was located. It was popular among locals as a picnic
area. Coco indicates that Wolf’s house or woods may also have been used as a
hospital area during the battle, since there were already six Confederate
burials on the site.

Established on July 20, 1863, the site was named Camp
Letterman after the Medical Director of the Army of the Potomac, Jonathan
Letterman. By this time some 16,000 wounded had been sent off to hospitals in
Washington, or those closer to their homes, leaving 4,217 occupants of the new
General Hospital to be cared for by surgeons, orderlies and volunteer nurses.

Camp Letterman, according to Coco, was the first of its kind
actually sited on a battlefield. When fully operational there were more than
400 tents in six double rows, ten feet apart with each tent holding up to ten
patients. Come autumn each was heated with a woodstove.

By the end of August, 1,600 patients remained at Camp
Letterman. Each medical officer had forty to seventy patients under his care;
by the end of October some 300 wounded remained; two weeks into November, only
100.

Typical for the era, a large number died two to three weeks after the battle as they succumbed to infection. They were taken to the Camp Letterman graveyard south of the hospital tents. Part of the graveyard may have been located on the Daniel Lady Farm, now owned and overseen by the Gettysburg Battlefield Preservation Association.

[image error]Daniel Lady Farm

Coco quotes from a letter by a Pennsylvania militiaman on
October 26 who writes that the tents (and their “streets”) take up about 80
acres. He mentions that as many as seventeen die per day, are mostly
Confederates and are buried in the field south of the camp. Amputated limbs are
put in barrels, buried in the ground, and when decomposed, are exhumed and sent
to the Medical College in Washington. Near the graveyard is a tent they call
“The Dead House” where bodies are embalmed before they are buried.

Sophronia Buckland, a nurse, wrote four years after the war that the cemetery eventually held 1,200 bodies, of which two-thirds were Confederates, although her estimate is probably too large. Glen Hayes of the Gettysburg Battlefield Preservation Association said that of the approximately 4,000 treated at Letterman, 365 died and were presumably buried in the graveyard.

What became of that graveyard is a bit of a mystery. One
assumes that after the closing of Letterman on November 20, 1863, the bodies of
the Union soldiers (and only the
Union soldiers) were exhumed and taken to the newly consecrated National
Cemetery on Cemetery Hill in Gettysburg.

I recently found evidence of Confederate soldiers being removed from the graveyard, as in the case of Lieutenant James M. Manley of the 1st Tennessee Infantry. Wounded on July 3, 1863, with fractures in both the right arm and right thigh, he was captured and sent to Camp Letterman in August where he died. He was listed as buried at the Letterman burial ground. More importantly, his body was listed as exhumed from the 3rd row, grave 12, and sent to Hollywood Cemetery, Richmond, Virginia.

According to Gerard A. Patterson in Debris of Battle: The Wounded of Gettysburg, the first of the Confederate bodies shipped to Hollywood Cemetery in Richmond, Virginia occurred in June 1872, with the final shipment to Hollywood on October 11, 1873, totaling 2,935 remains. Perhaps this means the bodies of the Confederate dead remained in the Camp Letterman graveyard for nine or ten years after the battle.

Directions to Camp
Letterman: Head out Route 30 East. Turn right into the Giant Shopping
Center and take the second left past the Giant gas station. Follow to end of
parking lot and park near the plaques and benches.

[image error]Camp Letterman Plaques in Giant Grocery Store Parking Lot

Urban sprawl has taken over much of Camp Letterman, but
preservationists managed to erect informational plaques in a little “park” at
the Northeast corner of the parking lot for the Giant Grocery Store. It is far
enough away from the cars and road to allow gathering of EVP.

Some of the graveyard is suspected to be on part of the Daniel Lady Farm. With permission, my paranormal investigative team, including a medium, visited the site. Through electronic voice phenomenon (EVP) I got responses to questions including a name sounding like “Jacob Voos.” One of the medium’s first questions (years before I found Lt. Manley’s story) was “Are you from Tennessee?” As well, her impressions were of the smell of cooking cabbage—something we discovered later was used to feed the wounded. She also saw strange ditches, which she thought seemed out of place until I read an account from Nurse Sophronia Bucklin who visited the site after it was closed and all the tents removed: “I looked on that great field so checkered with the ditches that had drained it dry….”

A visit with a second medium on August 16, 2007, also
references excavations: “a field with holes being dug.  I see holes and water—lots of holes and
water all over the field.” Also: “I have viewed this field at night and during
the day, and I have not seen a battle, but I do see activity at both times. There
are 3 large campfires and 2-3 smaller ones.  I see small structures or obstacles and I can’t determine
what they are—piles of supplies? 
Maybe tents?  Piles of dead
too, and injured soldiers.”

Mark’s Camp Letterman EVP

Listen for a very quiet “Jacob Vous” after 25 seconds. Also, some
interesting noises after “What state are you from?” and “Who’s your president?”

13 Hidden, Haunted, Hotspots of Gettysburg

After the wounded were treated at “aid stations” just behind the battle lines, they were moved to field hospitals. The field hospitals were located farther back behind the main battle lines. This was where most of the amputations and surgeries took place. For the wounded, it was truly a descent into Hell on earth.

As I mentioned before, antiseptics, bacteriology, and sterile
surgical environments were in the future. At the field hospital, often the
front room to a private home (preferably with windows and southern exposure for
light) was the surgical room. A large table, (perhaps the owners’ dinner table)
or even a door taken off and laid across two barrels, would become the
operating table. A good surgeon could remove an arm or a leg in under ten
minutes.

I read recently that anesthesia was commonplace with plenty
of chloroform to go around. Since we have the following contradicting accounts,
I’d have to see some additional documentation.

From the National Medical Museum of the Civil War’s Director of Research Terry Reimer, comes an online article in which he states that, “Anesthesia was used in 95% of Civil War surgeries.” Both ether and chloroform were available, but the latter was the choice of surgeons, probably because it took only 9 minutes on the average to take effect, whereas ether took 17 minutes. When you have hundreds of suffering men lying outside your operating room, you want to get to them as quickly as possible.

From the University of Alabama Birmingham School of Medicine comes an article by Bob Shepard titled, “Anesthesia Came of Age during the Civil War.” In it he quotes a paper by Maurice S. Albin, MD, Professor at the UAB Department of Anesthesiology, who estimated that anesthesia was used approximately 125,000 times during surgeries on the wounded in both the north and south. The only problem is that he estimated that there were approximately 476,000 wounded during the war. That leaves 351,000 unlucky wounded who were operated on without anesthesia.

Civil War numbers and losses are always tricky. Then you
throw in a little logic and the Washington (and Richmond) bureaucrats.

First of all, most battles came on rather suddenly—even the
commanding generals were often surprised that an enemy attacked when they did. The
Battle of Gettysburg, for example, was an accident with the two armies
colliding and neither commander wanting to fight when and where they did. Planning
ahead by the surgical department as to when they would need an abundance of
chloroform was impossible, so they carried what they could with them.

Secondly, as the war went on, each battle became larger with
greater casualties. A Union or Confederate surgical department, just before the
Battle of Shiloh in the spring 1862, had no idea how much chloroform to carry
with them. When it turned out that in the two-day Battle of Shiloh the armies
produced more casualties than in the entire two years of war with Mexico, there
could be no planning for that.

As well, after seeing how much chloroform the surgeons felt
they would need in anticipation of the next battle, the bureaucrats in
Washington would have laughed themselves silly and sent them amounts based on the
last battle, just to save money.

Nevertheless, shortly after the fighting began, the field hospitals were set up behind the lines, preferably near a source of water and a road over which to send the recovering wounded home. The road between the Baltimore Pike and Taneytown Road was right for the Union Army, and it was along this road that a number of hospitals were set up.

Directions to Hospital Road Field Hospital site: Head out the Baltimore Pike past the entrance to the Gettysburg Military Park Museum. Turn right onto Granite Schoolhouse Lane and follow the signs to the Baladerry Inn, which is on Hospital Road.

[image error]Hospital Road

Years ago, as a young park ranger, I found through research what I thought was the farm where Brigadier General Lewis Armistead was taken after being wounded in Pickett’s Charge and where he died. (I wrote about my encounter with the family that owned it then in the first Ghosts of Gettysburg book.) I thought I had found the farm on Hospital Road owned by the Spangler family during the battle. I was met by the family as they relaxed after a hard day’s work on the porch and asked if this was the house where General Armistead died. The looks on their faces told me they weren’t interested in my research. Their glowering silence had me wondering how to leave gracefully.

Finally, the matriarch of the family spoke up. She said that
if anyone had died in the house, she didn’t want to know about it. This was my
cue to say thanks and leave. But she continued.

She said that she’d heard from the previous owner that on
certain summer nights they would hear a strange clanking coming from the yard.
Looking out the window they would see a man in a long white coat carrying a
bucket out to the area where the long-defunct well once was. He would then make
his way wearily back and appear to enter the first floor of the house.
Descending the stairs, the family would find no trace of the man who was
apparently on a decades-long assignment to bring water for the surgeons and
thirsty wounded.

The farm has since been purchased by the Gettysburg
Foundation and is apparently open to the public on select days.

A little farther on Hospital Road is the Baladerry Inn. I knew several owners of the house before it became the Baladerry. Though not marked as such, it would be surprising if the original brick part of the structure, and the now vanished barn, would not have been used by the surgeons.

[image error]Baladerry Inn

Ghosts of Gettysburg has worked with the Baladerry Inn presenting our “Haunted Crime Scenes Weekends” based on the book series that I co-authored with forensic psychologist Dr. Katherine Ramsland. A paranormal investigation done there years ago was rich in results, including the levitation of an investigator, an “impossible” photo (printed in Ghosts of Gettysburg VIII) and some frightening EVP I still haven’t been able to explain.

Other than the Baladerry Inn, I have not investigated
Hospital Road, BUT, there’s a particular house on Hospital Road that, for a
while, every time I passed it, had a “For Sale” sign in front of it.

There are other “Field Hospital” plaques along Hospital Road,
but these are all on private property. Please do not trespass on privately
owned land.

If you’re going to do an investigation in the area, stay at the Baladerry Inn. The accommodations are wonderful, the food is great, the location superb and… it is very paranormally active.

13 Hidden, Haunted, Hotspots of Gettysburg

The next three entries of my “13 Hidden, Haunted, Hotspots of Gettysburg” blog series will go together in an historical way. They are about places of great horror and suffering, where human emotion and anguish overflowed. Death was considered a welcome, considerate, merciful friend.

Battles don’t produce just dead men; they also produce the wounded. And wounds that are not immediately mortal are as random and varied as there are wounded men. It would seem, after seeing the end results of a battle, that the God of War is not really a god at all, but instead must be the most creative of all demons. A cursory look into the several volumes of The Medical and Surgical History of the War of the Rebellion, by Joseph K. Barnes (1877), will convince the reader of the complete arbitrary nature of being wounded during the Civil War.

Once you were struck by a soft lead minie ball flying at
approximately 900 feet per second what happened next depended upon where you
were struck. Hit in an extremity—an arm or a leg—the lead bullet would flatten
and pulverize the bone. The sheer volume of wounded pouring into a field
hospital rendered a lengthy repair and setting of the bone an impossibility.
The most efficient thing to do was to amputate the limb as quickly as possible
and bring in the next patient.

If you were struck in the torso, the surgeon’s job was even
simpler. Make the patient as comfortable as possible—in other words, lay him on
some straw in a corner of a barn or outbuilding somewhere—and let him die in
peace. Internal surgery was almost unknown during the Civil War and with a
battle raging nearby and hundreds of other wounded who might be saved, a
lengthy, complicated operation was just not in the cards.

Ironically, leaving a gut-shot soldier alone might have been
the best thing a Civil War surgeon could do for him.

A hypothetical scene from a field hospital on any Civil War
battlefield: A soldier, wounded in the intestines, is laid upon the operating
table and a surgeon does a brief examination with his fingers to see how
extensive the damage is. Finding that there is nothing he can do, he tells the
orderlies to move the patient and bring in the next, a young man in good health
with just a minor flesh wound on his arm. The surgeon pokes around with the
same fingers that just examined the previous soldier’s intestines, makes sure
the bullet is nowhere to be found in the arm and has the orderlies bandage the
arm. “You’ll be fine,” he assures the young man with the arm wound. About two weeks
later, the soldier with the gut wound is being sent home to recuperate. The
young man with the minor arm wound feels fine one day, but is dead the next of
tetanus or blood-poisoning from the introduction of bacteria by the surgeon’s
dirty hands.

Joseph Lister didn’t develop his method of antiseptic
surgery until 1865-67, sadly just after when it may have been needed most in
America.

At least the field care for those wounded on the battlefield
had become more organized. Aid stations, like Hospital Woods, were set up just
behind the battle lines to care for the wounded as quickly as possible and
preparing the men for transportation to a larger field hospital, in a safer
location where surgical operations could take place, like along Hospital Road.
Still, the scores of field hospitals spread out all over the vicinity of the
battlefield of Gettysburg presented a logistical nightmare for the delivery of
food and medical supplies. Finally, a general hospital was created—Camp
Letterman—to which the wounded were gathered to recover or finally succumb to
their traumatic injuries.

All three of these types of hospital sites are still extant
at Gettysburg, although they look nothing like they did from the morning of
July 1, 1863, when the first wounded man arrived at an aid station behind
McPherson’s Ridge, until the last man left by train from Camp Letterman around
November 21, 1863, four and a half months after they had been wounded.

I devoted an entire chapter in Ghosts of Gettysburg IV to a house located across the road from hospital woods, which displayed an unusual amount of poltergeist activity.

Activity in the house began with just a few anomalous events
which happened while the owner was out of town: a throw pillow which she always
placed “just-so” on her sofa was out of place when she returned; a book on a
side table was moved from the center of the table where she always placed it,
to the edge. Her husband had died a year or so before, so she was alone in the
house, which made the escalating activity even more frightening.

One night she was awakened by foyer lights aglow, visible
from under her closed bedroom door. She had turned them off when she went to
bed. Then there were the shutters on the basement windows that were closed when
she came up from the basement, but opened when she returned less than an hour
later. Once again, she had been out of town and when she returned she noticed
that the door to her guest room was scuffed and damaged as if someone had been
kicking at it.

While upstairs on the phone, she heard the loud, solid
“thunk” of the basement door closing. She excused herself from her caller and
went down to find the basement door wide open. That same night, around 10:15,
she went downstairs to get a drink. She noticed that one-half of her louvered
doors to the dining room were open—doors she had habitually kept closed and was
sure she had closed when she had ascended for bed earlier.

Electronic equipment began to act oddly in the house. After
playing an audiotape to the end, she went upstairs to bed. At 2:30 in the
morning she awoke to the tape downstairs playing. Somehow it had been rewound
and began to replay from the beginning.

I received a fax from her home office one night that said
the book on the side table had been moved again to the edge, and that three
nail holes had been driven destructively into the tabletop. Also, her
grandfather clock had just struck midnight although it was only 11:15 p.m.

Again she went out of town only to return to find that her
husband‘s heavy bureau in their bedroom—which would have taken a couple of men
to move, was moved out from the wall. As well, the bathroom sink in her
husband’s bathroom had been used, as if someone had brushed their teeth and not
cleaned up. After another trip she said that another sink in the house—the one
in the guest room—appeared to have been used and the heavy bureau had been
moved six or eight inches…sideways, this time.

She was wont to blame it on a female neighbor who had
committed suicide a number of years back and who had been seen upon occasion
walking along the street she had strolled along in life. She had even been seen
in some of her former neighbor’s houses on Country Club Lane.

To me, the heavy lifting and destructive behavior signal
only one thing: powerful men. Perhaps soldiers on an invasion of Yankee-dom,
bent on wreaking havoc on civilians in revenge for what the Yankees did to
their homes a century and a half before. Only this time in spirit form….

Directions to Hospital Woods Aid Station site:
Head out Route 30 West to Country Club Lane. Turn left and follow Country Club
Lane until it makes a 90 degree left turn followed by a 90 degree right turn.
All the woods on your right are “hospital woods.”

This is National Park Service property and subject to the
same restrictions as other parts of the Park.

[image error] Hospital Woods

This section of woods is probably one of the first areas to serve as an aid station, since it is so close to the first day’s fighting and located near Willoughby Run, a source of water for the wounded. It is in the rear of the Confederate lines and is cited as a Confederate Hospital site in Gregory Coco’s classic book A Vast Sea of Misery: A History and Guide to the Union and Confederate Field Hospitals at Gettysburg July 1-November 20, 1863.

Coco also wrote in another of his books Wasted Valor: The Confederate Dead at Gettysburg, that about 63 Confederates were buried in the area. How many were exhumed, or if more than that were buried and never found, is not recorded.

Hidden, Haunted, Hotspots of Gettysburg

Virtually everything that happened during the Battle of
Gettysburg involved some kind of controversy, real or imagined, by participants
and latter-day historians. The battle that took place at what is now known as East Cavalry Battlefield is no
exception.

I covered the controversy about Major General J. E. B. (“Jeb”) Stuart’s ride around the Union Army from June 28 to July 2 in my book Saber and Scapegoat: Jeb Stuart and the Gettysburg Controversy. The moral of that story is: don’t die and leave your fellow comrades-in-arms to use you as a scapegoat for their shortcomings in the decisive battle of the war.

Another controversy about Stuart’s role concerns his actions
on July 3, 1863.

Some historians have determined that Stuart had been ordered to take his cavalry around the Union right flank and attack the rear of the center of their lines just as Pickett’s charge was attacking their front.

The problem with that theory is that Robert E. Lee did not know exactly when Longstreet’s Assault (aka “Pickett’s Charge”) was to take place. In the Civil War there was rarely precise timing to assaults. Commanders were usually told to “attack when they heard the sound of the guns” or some other preconceived signal. This often led to a lack of coordination.

Longstreet was reluctant to make his charge on July 3.
Several times officers petitioned him to launch the assault. Finally, after two
hours, Pickett rode up to get permission to order his troops forward and
Longstreet replied with the famous nod. If Longstreet didn’t know when the
charge was to take place, then Lee certainly couldn’t have known the morning of
July 3, 1863, when he ordered Stuart on his ride around the Union right flank.

Stuart’s mission was probably to create havoc in the rear of the Union lines along the Baltimore and Taneytown Roads, the supply and potential retreat routes for the Union Army, giving the Yankees something else to worry about as the Confederates assaulted the front of their lines on Cemetery Ridge. He ran into Union cavalry blocking the vital crossroad of the Hanover Pike and Low Dutch Road. After a couple of hours maneuvering and skirmishing, the battle began to escalate, ending in a massive mounted cavalry charge, led by Union Brigadier General George Armstrong Custer. The result was the Confederate withdrawal from East Cavalry Field.

Ghost
Stories: A woman who lived by herself in an old
farmhouse on Low Dutch Road was awakened one night by the sounds of a large
column of horses riding by. Looking out her window into the moonlit darkness
she saw nothing, but continued to hear the column of horses plodding along the
road.

More recently, two women were visiting the Michigan Cavalry Shaft where Custer’s column crashed into Stuart’s. As they walked through the grass around the monument, they smelled the distinct odor of cinnamon. At first, they thought someone was baking some sort of pie, but realized they were too far from any farmhouse for a smell to waft their way and to last as long as it did. My explanation for the possible source of the odor probably did more to frighten than mollify them. I told them that Custer’s early wartime nickname was “Cinnamon,” because he wore his hair long, in ringlets, and added cinnamon pomade—Victorian-era hair lotion. Since they had ruled out any “normal” explanation for the smell, all that was left was a “paranormal” explanation.

Another interesting story from the cavalry fight actually comes from the first Ghosts of Gettysburg book. For years a ghostly figure had been seen roaming the National Cemetery at night, playing “hide and seek” with rangers attempting to enforce the “Closed after Dark” rule. When one ranger, who walked through the cemetery on her way home, announced “I saw him again last night,” everyone knew what she was talking about. She described him as a cavalryman, with a broad hat, long beard and high cavalry boots.

It turned out that Captain William Miller, 3rd Pennsylvania Cavalry, led an attack that crashed into the flank of Stuart’s charging column, virtually destroying the assault. For this action he was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor—but didn’t receive it until 34 years later, just a few years before his death and burial in the National Cemetery. To add insult to injury, the government failed to place the appropriate “Medal of Honor” headstone over his grave. In the 1970s the mistake was discovered and rectified when the National Park Service was preparing a brochure for the National Cemetery.

No more has the cavalryman—long frustrated by a nation
reluctant to give him his well-earned praise for gallantry—been seen walking
the hallowed ground of the National Cemetery.

To get there: From the center of town take Route 30/116 (York Street) East. When the road splits, bear right and continue to follow Route 116 East. After about two and one-half miles, look for the National Park Service signs to East Cavalry Battlefield. Follow the signs for the tour until you reach the monument for the 3rd Pennsylvania Cavalry off the road about 50 yards on your right.

This area is part of the Gettysburg National Park, so be sure to adhere to the seasonal closing times.

[image error]East Cavalry Battlefield

Some tips for investigating East Cavalry Battlefield:

There are three
areas on East
Cavalry Battlefield that
have yielded good
results: The monument to the 3rd Pennsylvania
Cavalry; the Michigan Cavalry Shaft; and the Confederate side of the field.

I must admit, I was a little reluctant to recommend East
Cavalry Battlefield as one of my “Hidden, Haunted, Hotspots” because the last
time I drove through, there was a line of cars parked along the road and a
group of people, apparently doing a paranormal investigation, gathered around
the monument to the 3rd Pennsylvania Cavalry. But the field is large
and when I followed the road around to the Confederate side of the field there
was no one—at least no one alive.

On the Confederate side of the field, you can ask if any southern troops would like their picture taken—a big deal during the Civil War era. You might ask to speak with Major Andrew Reid Venable a member of Jeb Stuart’s staff. Other officers who may want to talk after all these years would be Brigadier General Wade Hampton, who commanded a brigade at East Cavalry Battlefield and was sabered twice in the head and wounded by shrapnel in the leg. Brigadier General Fitzhugh Lee nephew of Robert E. Lee also commanded a brigade with Stuart.

At the Michigan Cavalry Shaft you can single out the
Michigan troops’ most famous commander, George
Armstrong Custer. The troopers from Michigan would certainly have known the
name Custer, whether they had died at Gettysburg or had lived beyond Custer’s
1876 fated rendezvous with Sitting Bull at the Little Big Horn.

The 3rd Pennsylvania Cavalry Monument marks the
site where Captain William E. Miller,
disobeyed orders to hold this ground, launched his squadron into the flank of
Stuart’s column as it passed and disrupted the assault. He may have something
to say about waiting for so many years for recognition. Second Lieutenant William Brooke-Rawle, who promised to back him up
should he be court-martialed for attacking the enemy, might want to talk as
well.

A fellow investigator and I conducted a paranormal
investigation at East Cavalry Battlefield. We realized that one or two of the
photos we took at the 3rd Pennsylvania Cavalry marker showed rows of
orbs that seemed to be head-high—but only if those people were mounted on
horses.

While trying for EVP on the Confederate side of East Cavalry Field, I was getting frustrated by geese flying over and honking. I finally asked, “Did you ever hear of Robert E. Lee?” and was rewarded with a roar that could have been a resounding “Yeah!” or, perhaps even an echo across time of the famous “Rebel Yell.”

Hidden, Haunted, Hotspots of Gettysburg

I was recently invited to speak at the Gettysburg Battlefield Bash, organized by Pam and Steve Barry to raise funds and
awareness for the Wounded Warriors Project.
This was their third year for the Bash and it was, by far, the biggest and
best. Next year, head to Gettysburg for the event—it is well worth it.

I needed a 30 minute speech for the Battlefield Bash. My wife Carol suggested I talk on the “Hidden, Haunted, Hotspots of Gettysburg.” I compiled a list of the obscure sites I knew were paranormally active. I researched the history, found or took photos, pulled together (or collected in the field) electronic voice phenomena (EVP) associated with the site.

I wanted to share these obscure but
active haunted places with more people. Again, Carol came up with the solution.
Welcome to my Hidden, Haunted, Hotspots of Gettysburg blog series!

A lot of people come into our “Ghosts of Gettysburg Tour Headquarters” and ask, “Where’s the Battlefield?” Of course they mean, “Where’s the National Park?” because the answer to their original question is “You’re standing on it.”

It’s true. If you’re in the town of
Gettysburg, you’re on the battlefield. On the afternoon of July 1, 1863, the
Confederates drove the Union Army from its positions west, north and east of
the town, through the very streets of Gettysburg, to the high ground south of
the town. The enemy was just a block away firing at them almost the whole time,
thus making the town of Gettysburg a part of the battlefield.

Which brings us to one of the hidden, haunted, hotspots in Gettysburg: Coster Avenue.

It marks the scene of a brief but
important rear-guard action in the northeastern part of the town that had a
profound effect on the Union Army being able to establish the solid lines south
of town, which eventually brought them victory—The Battle for Kuhn’s Brickyard.

As they crossed the railroad, one
regiment was detached from the brigade and sent to the railroad station,
visible down the track to the left, to remain in reserve. That left Colonel
Coster with 977 men.

They marched over Steven’s Run, a
little stream that still drains water through Gettysburg, and past Mr. Kuhn’s
house, still standing at 221 N. Stratton Street. Just past the brickmaker’s home,
they filed to the right into his brickyard along a post and rail fence.

On the afternoon of July 1, just after
the 977 men of Coster’s Brigade had established itself behind that flimsy
protection of a post and rail fence, they were attacked by two Confederate
Brigades—about 2,100 men—flushed with victory over Union forces just to the
north.

A volley from Coster’s Brigade and
artillery fire from an artillery battery placed near the college, just a block
to the west, slowed the Confederates—but only briefly. Seasoned troops, they
reorganized and dashed into Mr. Kuhn’s brickyard.

A brief but bloody battle ensued. A
Union participant from the 154th New York said that his regiment got
off between six and nine shots before they were flanked, over-run, and had to
withdraw. Knowing that a good infantryman could get off a shot per minute in
combat and, at best, maybe three shots a minute under “ideal conditions”—the
stand of Coster’s men was over in about ten minutes.

Union losses were catastrophic for such
a short fight. The 154th New York regiment lost 77 percent
casualties in the brief battle, but Coster’s brigade delayed the Confederates
long enough to allow their comrades to escape and establish a defensive
position on Cemetery Hill.

An un-identified sergeant was found
dead near the railroad clutching the tintype of his three children. Obviously,
his last thoughts on this earth were of them. Amos Humiston was later
identified after publishing the photo of his children in period publications.
He now lies buried in the National Cemetery. Money donated by people moved by
the story was used to establish an orphanage in Gettysburg for the children left
fatherless by the Civil War.

In the 1980s, a mural by Mark H. Dunkelman and Johan Bjurman depicting Kuhn’s Brickyard Battle was painted on the side of the warehouse that stands on the former embattled brickyard.

[image error] Mural depicting Kuhn’s Brickyard Battle

Though studded with monuments, Kuhn’s Brickyard Battlefield
is not closed after 10pm like many of the other battle sites. But keep
in mind that paranormal investigations are just as effective in the daylight as
at night.

To get there: If you
want to visit and perhaps do a paranormal investigation, find Stratton Street
which runs north and south from East Middle Street to Lincoln Avenue and parallels
east of Baltimore and Carlisle Streets. Drive north on Stratton from East
Middle and you will cross York Street at the light, then the railroad tracks.
You’re moving in the footsteps of Coster’s Union Brigade as they headed out to
meet the advancing Confederates as their comrades ran in the opposite
direction, away from the advancing enemy. Turn right at Stevens Street. Coster
Avenue is the grassy area on the other side of Hazel Alley. Turn around to park
on the north side of Stevens Street.

If you plan to investigate there, be respectful of the
neighbors who live close to this small but important piece of the “hallowed
ground” of Gettysburg.

Some tips for investigating Coster Avenue/Kuhn’s Brickyard
Battlefield:

I visited Coster Avenue/Kuhn’s
Brickyard Battlefield for investigations during the day and picked up several
bits of EVP. I addressed Sergeant Amos Humiston of New York and got an initial,
loud response. However, when I asked if he thought about his children I
received no communication. Unfortunately, there were some very noisy birds
chirping in the background. Even so, the EVP I received over-rode the pesky
birdsongs.

Some paranormal investigators like to
address specific regiments or individuals when attempting to gather EVP or take
spirit photographs. Names of individuals wounded or killed in the fight are
often engraved upon the regimental or brigade monuments on the battlefield
site. Some of the units participating in the Battle for Kuhn’s Brickyard were
the 154th New York (Humiston’s regiment), 134th New York,
27th and 73rd Pennsylvania Regiments.

Confederate units participating in the
fight were Hays and Hoke’s (Avery’s) Brigades.

Hays’s Brigade was composed entirely of
Louisiana regiments: the 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th,
and 9th, and were known as the Louisiana Tiger Brigade. They were
commanded by Brigadier General Harry T. Hays, a lawyer from New Orleans.

Hoke’s Brigade was temporarily being
commanded by Colonel Isaac Avery, Hoke having been wounded at Chancellorsville
in May, 1863. The promotion to brigade command would prove fatal for Avery. He
was mortally wounded in the attack on East Cemetery Hill the day after the
Battle of Kuhn’s Brickyard. Shot in the neck, mute and partially paralyzed,
before he died he wrote with the help of a comrade, “Major, tell my father I
died with my face to the enemy.” It was written in his own blood.

Hoke’s (or Avery’s Brigade at
Gettysburg) contained the 6th, 21st, and 57th
North Carolina Regiments, if you would care to contact any of the soldiers in
those outfits via EVP. If there is too much background noise, ask for the
highest ranking officer to come forward and address you—it often works to quiet
the rest of the soldiers!

Writing and Editing Tools for Self-publishing Indie Authors

This is a good list of software that will help you as a writer. None of it replaces a good human editor, but it will make you look better when you hand the manuscript over!

Welsh indie author Karl Drinkwater shares a handy guide to writing and editing apps to help you self-edit your work and make your self-published book the best

Source: Writing and Editing Tools for Self-publishing Indie Authors