THE SOLDIERS’ NATIONAL CEMETERY
Of the eighty-three cemeteries in the United States dedicated exclusively to the burial of soldiers, that at Gettysburg was the first.
A few days after the battle, Governor A. G. Curtin, of Pennsylvania, solicitous for the welfare of the soldiers, came to Gettysburg and appointed David Wills, a leading attorney, to act as his agent in the work of establishing a cemetery. Correspondence with the governors of other States was begun. Grounds were selected by Mr. Wills, and by the direction of Governor Curtin purchased for the State of Pennsylvania, to provide a burial-place for soldiers who fell in the battle.
Lots in the cemetery were tendered without cost to each State having dead upon the field. The expense of removing the bodies, laying out, ornamenting and enclosing the grounds, erecting a lodge for the keeper, and erecting a suitable monument to the memory of the dead, was to be borne by the several States, assessed in proportion to their population.
The seventeen acres of land which were purchased lie on Cemetery Hill adjoining the Citizens’ Cemetery, at the apex of what had been the triangular battle-line of the Union Army, and an important tactical position on July 2nd and 3rd. At the time of the battle this land was a cornfield, divided by stone fences which were used to great advantage by the infantry of the Union Army. The most elevated portions had been points of vantage for many batteries of artillery.
The land was surrounded on the west, east, and north by a substantial, well-built wall of native granite, topped by a heavy dressed coping. A division fence of iron was erected between the Soldiers’ National Cemetery and the Citizens’ Cemetery.
The plans and designs for the laying out of the cemetery were prepared by William Saunders, an able landscape gardener of the Department of Agriculture, Washington, D. C. A semi-circular plan for the arrangement of the graves was adopted. The ground allotted to each State converges upon a central point. The size of each plot was determined by the number of graves belonging to each State. The bodies were placed side by side in parallel trenches with a space of twelve feet to each parallel and with a grass path between the rows of graves. The outer section is lettered A, and so on in alphabetical order. Two feet of space was allowed to each body, and a person standing in the center of the semi-circle and facing the circumference reads the names from left to right. The bodies are laid with the heads towards the center. The headstones are uniform in size and contain the name, regiment and company of each soldier so far as it was possible to obtain them. Another lot was set apart for the soldiers of the Regular Army. The graves of the unknown dead are located at each end of the semi-circle.
On the 27th of October, 1863, the work of exhumation was begun under the supervision of Samuel Weaver, a citizen of Gettysburg. It was completed on March 18th, 1864. The number of bodies exhumed and interred in the cemetery was 3,512, including 158 taken up by the authorities of Boston. Of the total number, 979 were unknown. Later other bodies were discovered and added, and the total interred was 3,734. Many other Union dead were sent to their family burial places. The Confederate bodies remained in the original trenches until 1870-73, when 3,320 were transferred to southern cemeteries.
The central point of the semi-circle from which Lincoln delivered his address is now occupied by the National Monument, one of the finest on the field. It is 60 feet in height; the pedestal, 25 feet square at the base, is crowned by a colossal statue representing the Genius of Liberty. Projecting from the angles are four buttresses, each supporting an allegorical statue. War is personified by an American soldier. History, a figure with stylus and pen, records the achievements and names of the dead. Peace is typified by a statue of an American mechanic; Plenty by a female figure with a sheaf of wheat. The main die of the pedestal is panelled. Upon one of the panels is inscribed an extract from Lincoln’s Address.
From the point where this monument stands, a magnificent view is presented to the beholder. Sloping gradually toward the north and the west, the entire cemetery is spread out as a beautiful panorama, showing on a carpet of green the semi-circle of graves, the driveways lined with rows of splendid maples, spruces, birches, magnolias, and many other trees, as well as many clumps of shrubbery filling the intervals between. A view from this point as the sun sinks behind the distant range of the South Mountain is one long to be remembered.
Standing at the upper end of the cemetery is a lesser monument in the form of an exedra, the center of which contains a bust of Lincoln. Two panels, one to the left, the other to the right, contain inscriptions; one giving David Wills’ letter of invitation to President Lincoln to attend the dedicatory exercises on November 19th, 1863; the other, Lincoln’s immortal address in its entirety.
Opposite this monument is the Rostrum from which the memorial addresses are now delivered. The first memorial exercise was held on May 30th, 1868, establishing a custom continued until this day. Among the speakers of recent years, either in the cemetery or on adjoining sections of the Park, have been Presidents Roosevelt, Taft, Wilson, Coolidge, and Hoover; Vice-President Curtis; Pennsylvania Governors Sproul and Pinchot, and Honorable James J. Davis.
Airplane View.—The National Cemetery with its curving rows of headstones