The day before we left on our latest adventure, it snowed about a half-foot. At least two more storms were in the forecast. We left home on a Monday and drove south, as far as Jonestown, Pennsylvania. It was still frigid in Jonestown and the campground was covered in a layer of icy, crusty snow. The next day, our first planned stop in Gettysburg was half indoors, out of the elements, and the second half was out in the biting wind around town.
We’d never visited Gettysburg before, and I’m not a fan of war history, but it was very interesting and informative. We browsed some of the museum artifacts while we waited for a short film about the Battle of Gettysburg (July 1-3, 1863) to begin.
The narration at the beginning of the film included some eerily relatable words about national divisiveness and political unrest. I found myself empathizing with those who lived in 1861. Please, let’s not let ourselves turn against each other like that again.
After the film, we viewed a cyclorama of the battle, painted by French artist Paul Philippoteaux in 1883. The 360-degree depiction of Pickett’s Charge on the third day of the battle is fascinating. We got to see it in brighter light than usual because it was undergoing its annual cleaning and restoration. In the following photos, look at the foreground which is not part of the painting but rather actual 3-D materials. This helped to make the whole painting look three dimensional. And note that, hidden among the battle scenes, the artist inserted himself, some of his assistants, President Lincoln, and even an older, gray-haired pair of men whom he’d actually interviewed during his research about the events of that day.
Back outside, we grabbed a quick lunch in our van before heading off to a few chosen spots on the self-guided Gettysburg tour. And I caught my first sighting ever of a Red-headed Woodpecker before we left the parking lot. We visited Gettysburg National Cemetery where Lincoln gave his famous address, the Eternal Light Peace Memorial dedicated in 1938, and Little Round Top from which we could see some of the battlefields spread out before us.
The biting winds were a precursor to a snowstorm predicted to start later that afternoon. So, we left Gettysburg before 2 PM, hoping to visit The National Shrine of Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton in Emmitsburg, Maryland, before the end of the day. Flurries started before we arrived. And when we arrived we were greeted by someone coming out of the building to tell us that the museum was closed due to the weather. But we could look in on the Basilica where mass had started about twenty minutes prior. Disappointing, but we did get to view the beautiful mosaics and marble work, and the Altar of Relics where her remains are kept.
It was snowing when we left—they closed the Basilica as we departed. We arrived at Harper’s Ferry KOA in West Virginia about an hour and a half later and hunkered down for a snowy night, dreaming of warmer weather somewhere south.
Chapter 3 