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At 6:00 A.M. on the 4th of July in 1863, it rained in Gettysburg -- it rained on
many of the 27,000 wounded and dying Confederate and Union soldiers. It rained
on the thousands of dead yet to be buried. As the day wore on, Lee's shattered
army left Gettysburg and Major George Rogers Clark Todd, 10th Georgia Infantry
(surgeon in Semmes' Brigade) headed south, leaving behind the battlefield his
brother-in-law, Abraham Lincoln, would come to consecrate just 4-1/2 months
later. Vicksburg fell to the Union this day. General George Gordon Meade must have
in some way felt this to be a bittersweet victory as his sister, Charlotte, was
a resident of Vicksburg, and married to a Southerner, Alfred Ingraham. The
Ingrahams, having sided with the Confederacy, lost one son in an early engagement
of the war, a soldier son-in-law to disease, and another son at Chancellorsville. General
Robert E. Lee's sister, Anne, along with her husband, William Marshall, sided
with the Union, and their son, Louis, served on the staff of Union General John
Pope. This truly was a war of family against family, brother against brother.
While the Civil War is a remarkable
piece of history to study, it brings us all close to the pain and heartache of
what war is truly about. Many lives were lost at Gettysburg. Many lives were
lost in the war. I would like to list every single one, as each was our
brother. To them all, both Confederate and Union, I give my utmost respect for
defending with their lives what they believed in. Each and every one deserves to
be remembered for sacrifice and devotion to a cause thought just. May their
souls be blessed and may they rest in peace.
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