Letters From The Time Traveler: Some People and Places Never Move On
Dearest,
As you know, I served for a brief time in the War Between The States. During that time, I served in Gettysburg. However, I don’t talk about how seeing my fellow soldiers fall on July 1–3 of 1863 affected me.
In the summer of 1863, more than 165,000 Union and Confederate troops amassed in the rolling farmland around the 2,400-person town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. The battle that took place over three blood-soaked days would claim more than 7,000 lives and tally an astounding 51,112 casualties (dead, wounded or missing).
You might be surprised to learn that Gettysburg is now a very large national park. Many of the battlefields from both the Revolutionary War and the War Between The States have been preserved in that way.
These national parks attract millions of tourists every year. They are a wonderful way to learn about history and what has shaped this country. These types of places are important to preserve because one must know history in order not to repeat the mistakes of the…
