Gettysburg: A Gathering of Ghosts
As I looked out over the huge rocks down to the open fields below, I tried to comprehend the thought of 51,112 casualties of war–the official stat from the Civil War Trust. One of my relatives fought in this the costliest battle of the Civil War in human life–from this very vantage point at Little Round Top, Day 2 of the 3-day battle of Gettysburg. I felt strangely connected as I stood on the boulders, photographing a strange mist that my camera picked up that I could not see with the naked eye. Seconds later I picked up a white figure near the trees, and in the next photo part of it turned navy blue–indicative of a Union uniform? As I went to jump from one boulder to another to possibly get a better photo of the figure, I saw a dark shadow move into the trees from the path. I couldn’t help but think of what the difference is between the white figure, the figure in the blue uniform that I captured on my digital camera just a second later, and the dark figure that I saw with my eyes–is it based on how one lives their life, or their mood, or their overall outlook on life, or does it have to do with light and dark matter that makes up the universe? Whatever the cause of their appearance, I was not alone as I gazed out into the visually empty fields of green and tried to imagine them stained with the blood of thousands of men fighting for causes they may or may not have believed in.
Here are the figures that showed up on a digital photo on Little Round Top (taken just a second apart), the site of a particularly ferocious Confederate assault whose outcome changed the whole Civil War. Notice that in the 2nd photo part of the figure is clad in a navy blue uniform.
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I came upon Gettysburg quite by accident; you see I had to deliver a revised edition of my second book along with new photos to my publisher in Pennsylvania, turn in the signed contract for book #2, as well as talk with my editor and publicist. Because it was their annual picnic, I would also get to meet with my publisher and other authors to talk about their latest projects, interests, and endeavors. We traveled up Route 95, the main traffic artery along the East Coast, and traffic became congested and slow-moving due to returning vacationers as well as Florida residents trying to escape the wrath of Hurricane Irma–before we even came to Washington D.C., which is always a bottleneck. So we took an alternate route that took us within 6 miles of Gettysburg–and I have been anticipating going there for several years. So we diverted that afternoon to the site of so much carnage over 150 years ago to see if this bucolic setting of green fields and trees held any evidence of the vitriol between the opposing sides of the Civil War.
It was ironic that such a beautiful day on the East Coast was the precursor to such a violent storm that would ravage Florida and Georgia, and in a fitting analogy just like the irony of the beauty of the pastoral green fields of Gettysburg being overrun with blood stains from over 50 thousand men. Our journey began at the Gettysburg National Park Visitor’s Center, from which we would obtain a map to follow a self-guided tour in our car through and around the major points of conflict. Along the way I would take many photos, and came up with some convincing evidence that the battlefield and its buildings are still holding on to some of its fallen. I was shocked by how many faces that showed up in the Lutheran Seminary and the other buildings on Seminary Ridge. There were also faces in the Trostle farmhouse and outbuilding, as well as other stops throughout the tour.
Here are a group of faces captured in a window at the Lutheran Seminary in Gettysburg. Perhaps the battle is still being fought for these men:
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All I could think of at the end of the day as we sat eating at a Gettysburg brewery/restaurant was that I hadn’t even left yet and the place was calling me back. Whether it was the fact that I had multiple relatives that fought on both sides of the conflict, or just that one person that fought and was wounded at Little Round Top that was the draw I cannot say–I just have to go back. I won’t go into all the details about the Battle of Gettysburg or even the Battle at Little Round Top–the Civil War Trust can do a much better job. I would like to share the photographs of the mist that I found at Little Round Top, the figures by the tree, as well as a group of many faces that I captured in the Lutheran Seminary on Seminary Ridge–something the Civil War Trust can’t do. In fact, according to them, the hauntings at Gettysburg basically started in the 1990s when there was a concerted effort to hunt for the paranormal “myth”–and to make a little money selling ghost tour tickets. As a former skeptic myself, I know that the only way to convince a skeptic of the reality of the paranormal is if they have an unexplainable experience themselves. In the meantime I will keep accumulating and sharing my photographic evidence for those of you that know about this netherworld–a place where the word “myth” does not apply . . .
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After 2 years of research, a lot of experimentation, and over 10,000 photographs, check out the world’s first groundbreaking photographic study of ghosts: Haunted, Historic Colonial Williamsburg Virginia with Breakthrough Ghost Photography available at both Schiffer Publishing and at Amazon:
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Amazon: http://amzn.com/0764350609
Tim Scullion is a published author, photographer, and musician. He is a graduate of the College of William and Mary, with both a bachelor’s and a master’s degree Cum Laude. In addition to the book mentioned above, Tim has written a novel, a series of instruction books on the guitar, a children’s book (all available on Amazon) and has a photo-essay published by the University of Virginia in the book Troubled Times Companion, Vol. III.
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