I found myself observing Memorial Day at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania yesterday, the site of the decisive battle of the Civil War. President Abraham Lincoln months later in his Gettysburg Address outlined the “New Birth of Freedom” secured by the soldiers of that battle — a freedom that has been continuously defended by America’s soldiers and sailors that we honored and remembered yesterday.
Gettysburg has one of the oldest, continuous Memorial Day parades.
Below are a few quick phone/camera shots from yesterday.
Gettysburg: Monuments at Gettysburg Battlefield on Cemetery Hill. For those with a interest in politics, the horseman in the distance is a statue of Major General Winfield Scott Hancock, a leading Union commander during the battle, he was the Democratic nominee for president in 1880, losing the
election to James Garfield.
Parade: Union soldiers lead the Gettysburg Memorial Day parade. There were also representatives of the Confederate forces carrying Confederate flags as well as the Stars and Stripes.
Lincoln: An actor playing Abraham Lincoln enters the military cemetery at Gettysburg. His counterpart, playing Jefferson Davis, announced at the parade’s end that he was not staying for the ceremony but was off to get a beer on the hot day.