A Battle Like None Other
In July 1863, Robert E. Lee and the Confederate army invaded Southwest Pennsylvania. The American Civil War had trudged on for two whole years prior to Gettysburg. General Lee and the Confederate army had the Union army on the run after multiple victories in the preceding months. This battle marked Lee’s second attempt to invade the North after a failed attempt to in the prior year.
The Battle of Gettysburg became one of the Civil War’s bloodiest battles with casualties totaling 23,000 for the North and 28,000 for the South. Though both sides sustained heavy casualties, Gettysburg was a crushing defeat for the Confederacy because the Union army was much larger numerically (about 94,000 Union soldier compared to 71,000 Confederate soldiers).
This battle is widely considered a major turning point in the Civil War and for good reason. With Lee losing roughly a third of his army, the Confederate Army retreated and never invaded the North again. Consequently the Confederacy played defense for the rest of the war before the Union achieved victory in 1865.
Going back to Gettysburg, the North may have won the battle, but the costs were substantial. The nation (i.e. the Union) was in mourning despite the victory. Think about the thousands of families who lost their loved ones in this bloody battle. Something had to be done to commemorate the Union soldiers at Gettysburg.
To Dedicate Their Sacrifice
Five months later after the battle, the Union decided to create a National Cemetery at Gettysburg to honor the soldiers who sacrificed their lives in that battle.
Of course, we all know that good ol’ Abe Lincoln gave his famous “Gettysburg Address” that day to a crowd of 15,000. However, few people know that Lincoln was not the keynote speaker at the Gettysburg Dedication. Instead, former Harvard President and former US Senator Edward Everett was the day’s main speaker. Known as one of America’s greatest public speakers, Everett gave a vivid two-hour speech before Lincoln delivered his brief remarks. What happened next went down in the annals of American history.
The Greatest Piece of American Oratory
I firmly believe that Lincoln’s “Gettysburg Address” is undoubtedly the most iconic oration in American history. In just roughly 270 words, Lincoln appealed to the better angels of America by framing the Civil War and the Battle of Gettysburg not as a result of Southern aggression. Instead, President Lincoln used vivid imagery and evocative metaphors to illustrate how the Civil War is about preserving liberty and equality.
Harkening back to the founding fathers, Lincoln opened up the speech by showing the continuity between the Founding Father’s vision of America with the phrase “four score and seven years ago”. Overall, most of Lincoln’s speech contextualizes the Battle of Gettysburg as a part of the Civil War’s ongoing project to preserve the American union, liberty, and equality in for all people.
The Speech Itself
I included the text of the Gettysburg Address since video recordings didn’t exist back in 1863. Please read the Gettysburg Address because it is one of the most important speeches in American history. In fact, I would recommend that you try to memorize it since it is a fairly short speech. Regardless, Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address is an absolute gem of a speech.
“Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth upon this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate – we can not consecrate – we can not hallow – this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us – that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion – that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain – that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom – and that government of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”