Gettysburg trip will stir your patriotism

GETTYSBURG, Pa. • Amid the giant swarm of business suits and imposing structures in Washington, you can find the corporate headquarters for democracy and the U.S. government.

But 62 miles to the northwest, at Gettysburg National Military Park, is where you will find the mission statement:

"... that this nation under God will have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth."

GETTING IN TUNE

With this year being the 150th anniversary of the start of the Civil War, National Park Service officials expect increased attendance at parks and battlefields related to that nation-defining conflict. Few places offer more to see, or commemorate more important events, than this site in south-central Pennsylvania.

For Civil War buffs, the tale of this battle is well-known. For the uninitiated, here is a short, admittedly superficial brief:

In late June 1863, Confederate troops under Robert E. Lee ventured north into Pennsylvania to gather food for their starving army and attack the Pennsylvania capital of Harrisburg before heading south to Washington. Hearing this, Union troops under Gen. Gen. Joseph Hooker (later replaced by Gen. George Meade) rushed north from Washington to stop the Confederate movement.

On July 1, the two sides met in combat outside Gettysburg, a tiny hamlet with a theological seminary and the single important attribute that 10 main roads converged there.

The Confederates got the best of the Union that first day, pushing them back through the streets of the town. The Union retreated to a rise of land known as Cemetery Ridge and commanded the high ground for the next two days of fighting.

When the smoke cleared the morning of July 4, more than 51,000 Americans were dead, wounded or missing. Lee was forced to return south, never to pose a major threat to the North after that day.

In November 1863, Abraham Lincoln was invited to say a few words at a ceremony dedicating a portion of the battlefield as a national cemetery. While the weary, besieged president assumed the world would "little note nor long remember," his 249-word speech still stands as the most eloquent exposition of our nation's ideals.

GETTING THERE

As part of a hop-in-the-car vacation, my family once did a nonstop drive to Gettysburg. Two facts:

• It's about 770 miles and takes about 13 hours of driving.

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