History’s Tribute To Freedom in the USA
My first morning in Gettysburg began with the boom of thunder overhead, and the patter of rain on tent canvas. As I stuffed my belongings into the back of the car, I could see the fronts colliding across the sky; the forces of hot and cold engaged in a battle of opposites, just as Gettysburg once did.
I’m not sure what I expected to see upon arriving in Gettysburg, the southernmost stop on a week long road trip from Boston, but it wasn’t the strange juxtaposition of the 19th and 21st centuries that I found. There were miniature soldiers and uniform reproductions in every store window, with one souvenir shop going so far as to sell “scents of the battlefield” candles. Even the campground was Civil War themed— entering cars were greeted by wooden cutouts of a Union and Confederate soldier doing a sort of fist chop.
Seeing all of this paraphernalia provoked a somewhat conflicted response in me. On the one hand, I love history, and finding a town that embraced it so openly was exciting. But only a few short years ago, I endured the wrenching experience of watching a loved one depart for war. My fiancé’s deployment ended safely, but there were many close calls and sleepless nights. When I looked at daguerreotypes of Civil War soldiers and their doe-eyed widows on display in the Gettysburg Visitor Center, I could see a little bit of us looking back. How would I feel if I knew gift shops would be selling “scents of Afghanistan” candles two-hundred years from now?
Curiosity, however, prevailed and I soon found myself joining my traveling companions on one of the many historic tours of Baltimore Street, a section of town that saw more fighting than any other. Our tour guide was a tidy man in his early forties who wore a waistcoat and a pocket watch and introduced himself as Steve. With a lantern clutched in his left hand, Steve directed us past buildings with cannon balls mounted into their facades. Some of the brick walls of homes and businesses were so pockmarked with old bullet holes, they looked like red lace.
At one point, a woman from Colorado asked Steve why he decided to become a tour guide.
“I love history,” he told her. “And I love sharing it. I’ve worked as a public teacher as well, but this helps keep the bacon on the table.”
As we trudged past the Shriver Civilian Experience Museum, we heard tales of townsfolk who accepted strangers into their homes for the duration of the three-day battle, and the young woman named Jennie Wade who risked her life to bring provisions to soldiers. Walking through the town, a visitor can’t help but be imbued with a sense of how the war trapped not only those fighting, but everyone who happened to fall in its wake, young and old, male and female. It made me realize how lucky I am to live in a time and place of relative peace, and to be able to freely stroll down a street that would have been extremely perilous in 1863.
I decided then that I didn’t mind the souvenir shops, or the ghost tours, or the “old tyme” photography studios. These were honest people trying to make a living, to support themselves and their families— exactly as many of the soldiers at Gettysburg were fighting for. My whole road trip was enlightening. I slept a stone’s throw away from the field where Jimi Hendrix once rocked out at the original Woodstock, and drove miles through the heart of Pennsylvania coal country. But I knew that when I looked back later, nothing would surpass my time in Gettysburg. Without the struggles of the past, we wouldn’t be able to enjoy the warm summer air, walking over cobbled streets by the flickering glow of candlelight and fireflies. In that moment, I felt privileged to be so free.
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