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Home » Musings » Independence Day 1863: A Reflection on Gettysburg
Musings

Independence Day 1863: A Reflection on Gettysburg

Matthew Klint Posted onJuly 4, 2023November 13, 2023 18 Comments

a cannon on a field

I ran the story below on July 4, 2013 on the 150th anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg. Another decade has passed and I find it all the more timely that we reflect upon the US Civil War and the lessons we can draw from it in this era of intense political division.

Battle of Gettysburg: 160 Years Later

Imagine yourself on an open field in rural Pennsylvania on July 4, 1863. For the last three days, a fierce battle had raged, a battle that had inflicted 46,236 casualties and claimed 7,863 lives. The weather is sticky and warm and the smell of blood and death is heavy.

Quite a different day than Independence Day 87 years earlier, when church bells celebrated the Continental Congress’ unanimous vote to sever ties with the Crown, proclaiming in the Declaration of Independence:

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness….

It was these words above that propelled both sides, the North and the South, to sacrifice their lives, fortunes, and honor to fight in what remains the deadliest war in American history, claiming 618,222 lives between 1861 and 1864. Thankfully, the North emerged victorious, putting to rest the ultimate mockery of the notion that all men are created equal.

George Santayana once said “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it” and the incidence of war over the last 150 years bears out his somber warning.

Gettysburg is now a tranquil field, dotted now with the graves of the dead and monuments to their sacrifice. My brother and I had a chance to visit in 2009 and I will share some of my photos below. I think it imperative that Americans, and all peace-loving people, make a pilgrimage to Gettysburg. The smell of death may be gone, but death lingers over that field, a memorial to those who “died to make men free” as the third stanza of the Battle Hymn of the Republic so quintessentially describes. The lesson to draw is not that war is never worth the cost, but that it costs so much.

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About Author

Matthew Klint

Matthew is an avid traveler who calls Los Angeles home. Each year he travels more than 200,000 miles by air and has visited more than 135 countries. Working both in the aviation industry and as a travel consultant, Matthew has been featured in major media outlets around the world and uses his Live and Let's Fly blog to share the latest news in the airline industry, commentary on frequent flyer programs, and detailed reports of his worldwide travel.

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18 Comments

  1. Billie Reply
    July 5, 2013 at 4:22 am

    Thank you Matthew.

  2. Lukas Reply
    July 4, 2023 at 1:52 pm

    “Four score and 7 years ago…” When I was there and looked it up, I finally understood what “score” stood for.

  3. Heather Reply
    July 4, 2023 at 2:10 pm

    I live close to Gettysburg and we did a weekend trip in the fall. The town is lovely and the park is a gem. The licenses battlefield guides are fantastic. The testing required weeds out anyone who isn’t obsessed with the history. And at $37 an hour, an absolute bargain.

  4. derek Reply
    July 4, 2023 at 3:26 pm

    Gettysburg represents a bloody battle between the United States and anti-American separatist forces. So many American lives were lost as well as anti-American lives.

    • John Dogas Reply
      July 4, 2023 at 4:05 pm

      Actually, it represents a battle between freedom like the founding fathers fought for and the big government monster North that did not believe Southerns could choose to be free from its grip. The North went against the principles of America by becoming worse than the British crown.

      • Billy Bob Reply
        July 4, 2023 at 4:54 pm

        You don’t deserve to be in the country you fascist. I sure hope you’re working today because you shouldn’t be celebrating America’s independence, this holiday is not for you. George Washington is rolling over in his grave knowing people like you are here

      • derek Reply
        July 4, 2023 at 6:58 pm

        Not true. The South committed a wanton act of terrorism by bombing Fort Sumter. They could have negotiated. They could have had a security blockade but they did not. They did a 9/11 type bombing. That started the war.

  5. Joe United Reply
    July 4, 2023 at 3:47 pm

    There appears to be a certain group of people that cannot accept that the people who fought against the United States were traitors and tried to destroy our country. The generals who fought to defend slavery had previously sworn a oath to defend the United States and should have been hanged after the civil war. I do not understand why military bases were ever named after these generals.

    • John Dogas Reply
      July 4, 2023 at 3:59 pm

      By your account you would call the founding fathers traitors because they said no to the British crown and yea to freedom. The Southern Generals swore an oath to freedom and not enslaving millions of Southerners in a system it did not consent to be in. Consent of the governed is the foundation of a civilized society. Like the founding fathers, the Southern Generals fought for freedom against a monster big government North. The South declared independence and it was the North that was the slave master and aggressor. The North replaced one form of slavery with another.

      • UA-NYC Reply
        July 4, 2023 at 4:28 pm

        Let me guess…Pro-controlling a woman’s body and book banning, Anti-peaceful transfer of government, right? Nailed it.

      • Billy Bob Reply
        July 4, 2023 at 4:58 pm

        While the US would be much better off if the south were it’s own country, the confederates were still traitors. It’s too bad the north allowed and confederates to remain as they should have been put on boats and sent to Africa to be slaves over there. Eye for an eye

        • GUWonder Reply
          July 4, 2023 at 5:51 pm

          Unlike the US in Germany after WW2, the US never stayed focused enough to purge and keep purged the traitorous supporters of the Confederacy, slavery and the basket case ideology of white supremacy. And so they keep raising their ugly head again and again and try to pretend as if the Civil War was about something else beside the real issues: slavery and an inferiority complex.

          If the anti-American Brits were not forced to acknowledge our independence after the Battle of Yorktown and War for Independence was won when it was, the US could have ended up like Canada except worse off as the Brits were intending to bleed America to further finance Britain’s imperialist ambitions around the world. Keep in mind that the Brits had started to get too rich and cozy from seeing how they could use colonizers in one place to better drain colonies in another place to maximize their own power projection and control everywhere. Just consider this: what the British did to South Asia/India tapped India of so much of its wealth that an Indian economy that was equal to or greater than all of Europe before the age of European colonization ended up being pauperized. If the French, Spanish and Dutch hadn’t been so antagonized by the Brits, we could have ended up with having King Charles as head of state of the US but being almost as poor per capita as Jamaica.

  6. John Dogas Reply
    July 4, 2023 at 3:53 pm

    The North replaced one form of slavery with another. The Southern States wanted freedom in line with the Declaration of Independence and the North went to war to enslave millions of southerners in a system it did not consent to. Initially, the North did not intend to end slavery even in Northern states. The war was fought over representation and power. Given how we have 46 genders being taught to 6 year old kids by their teachers and violent criminals roaming around cities and suburbs who ruin every peace and tranquility, no, we should not be thankful the North won. We are enslaved by a massive government. That’s the opposite of those words of the Declaration of Independence. The colonists went to war over a 1% tax on tea and sugar yet today the govt. runs our lives. Disgusting.

    • Billy Bob Reply
      July 4, 2023 at 5:00 pm

      Yea it’s disgusting that Ron DeSantis wants to exterminate gay people and Republicans want women who have miscarriages to die from infection. It truly is shameful, as are you

    • Maryland Reply
      July 4, 2023 at 6:24 pm

      Mr. Dogas,

      The Constitution was to protect the rights of all citizens, not just those who support your beliefs. While I respect your right to have another interpretation, I also wish you would acknowledge my rights as well. And this should be discussed in a forum of dignity and decorum.

      As we are still a young nation, on this the anniversary of our birth, may we celebrate today together, and plan for a mutual peace.

  7. GUWonder Reply
    July 4, 2023 at 5:30 pm

    Just today learned that the last battle of the war for US independence should be considered to have taken place in India, between the French and the British, after Yorktown.

    • Matthew Klint Reply
      July 4, 2023 at 8:31 pm

      It’s an interesting (and very plausible) theory:

      https://www.cnn.com/2023/07/04/asia/last-battle-american-revolutionary-war-india-intl-hnk-ml/index.html

  8. Jerry Reply
    July 5, 2023 at 1:55 pm

    If humans acted ethically, there would be no need for war.

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