Religion & Death at Gettysburg | History Traveler Episode 127

in the last episode of history traveler we kicked off our trip to gettysburg with a visit to the seminary ridge museum where general john buford famously positioned himself in the cupola to observe lee's army as they were approaching the town and from where he directed his cavalry on the first day of the battle but the seminary is more than just john buford and the cupola the seminary was the scene of some vicious combat on the first day and served as one of the first field hospitals in gettysburg so in this episode we're back at the seminary ridge museum to get a fuller picture of the battle of gettysburg and the civil war at large [Music] all right so we just got into the museum here and the way they have it structured there's three different levels of the museum each tackling a different topic that is is pertinent to the seminary so so this first level is kind of looking at a big picture view of the civil war looking at some of the causes and kind of examining faith and like racing and freedom in america as you're walking into the displays on this first floor they they tackle faith and freedom in america and also the anti-slavery movement the the spot where we are is very close to the mason-dixon line so there would have been a lot of debate here amongst the students at the seminary um you know you would have had students here from the south students here from the north so um the the cultural impact that that we were seeing at the time is reflected here in this display and they also if you take a look at this have a copy of uncle tom's cabin so in this room which they've entitled questions of faith they they really take on the the difficult task of examining the role of the church and the role of the bible in the civil war and they have some artifacts here too so this is a pew from the gettysburg presbyterian church they also have this lectern here also from the gettysburg presbyterian church this of course would have been during the the civil war period um what what makes this such a complicated issue is that both sides confederate and union were using the bible to justify the the rightness of of their cause so so this display and this room really uh kind of tackles tackles that question asking what does the bible say and they have a quote from abraham lincoln here it says both read the same bible and pray to the same god and then they have different verses that that you can examine here that both sides would have been reading i really really like that they've done this so i'll freely admit that i came to this place because of john buford and the cupola um this room is making me think now because there are a lot of questions you know that people were asking themselves during the civil war is slavery morally acceptable does the bible condone slavery um you know is war justified will god protect me both sides were praying to the same god um i don't know definitely a lot to think about here they have a couple books here uh one that was written in 1857 and the title of it is slavery ordained by god and then they have another book over here god against slavery so i don't know i heard a pastor say one time that we don't read the bible the bible reads you so i don't know you can go through it and make it say anything you want but in the end what's most important is what does it actually say and this room kind of tackles that [Music] this room here is looking at the role of african-american soldiers in the civil war so of course pennsylvania was a free state so you would have had a lot of african-american men who were volunteering to fight yeah and this this room uh kind of takes you through what their experience might have been like here's one thing that many people may not know is that whenever the confederate army was moving up into pennsylvania there there were a lot of cases of african americans being kidnapped and brought back to the south to be sold into slavery a lot of african americans had fled gettysburg before the confederates arrived some of them tried to hide but whenever they were retreating there were captured african-americans seen among the the wagon trains of supplies and wounded all right so that's just a little bit of what you see here on the first floor um definitely a lot to think about especially the the display talking about the role of faith and and the bible in the civil war i've never seen that tackled in any other museum um yeah i wish i had a little bit more time in this video to to dive into uh that topic a little bit more in depth uh but anyway we're gonna go ahead and move on to the second floor now [Music] now one thing that a lot of people may not realize and that i certainly didn't realize is that this seminary was used as a hospital uh during the battle and for for months after a lot of people think of you know the seminary they think of john buford and the cupola and that's it uh but but there was a lot of fighting and a lot of suffering that happened right here in this building now as i mentioned this whole floor is dedicated to to the wounded and to the doctors here at the seminary and my goodness this ghastly scene here shows what things might have looked like on the first day of the battle just a lot of wounded men packed into these rooms bleeding all over the place golly here's a little item that they have in here they have this surgeon's field case that is made out of leather and horse hair and uh shows a little bit of what a civil war surgeon might have carried around with him and then they also have a field tourniquet that would have had supplies or tools to cut off the bleeding if you got hit in a major blood vessel here's another awful scene especially whenever you imagine what it must have actually looked and sounded like as these men were being operated on or as amputations were being performed oh i just can't even imagine the horrors all right they have a few more items here a military surgery manual also some different surgical needles here's an amputation kit which i always find just horrifying uh here's a etherton but here is the display that will knock you back whenever you are on this floor so during the civil war well people were in the process of learning so battlefield surgeons were sending samples back to be studied and these are all amputated bone pieces from men who were wounded here at gettysburg now here's what is exceptionally interesting about this display we not only have the bone fragments or the bone pieces but we know who they belong to so this is a piece of a knee joint obviously that was amputated from a guy named george albright who was in the 53rd north carolina here we have some thigh bone fragments here is another knee joint that has the mini ball still embedded in it and then we have the scapula of an individual who who died and then they sent the scapula off to be studied and they also have his picture here's the one that really got me though there was one soldier who got shot in the face his name was john schultz and he was treated right here in this building that middle bullet was removed from his face and still has parts of his beard hair attached to it that is crazy [Music] so probably our wealth most well-known patient on the united states side is lieutenant colonel george mcfarland who's the commander of the 151st pennsylvania volunteers he's a schoolteacher by trade he joins the army of the potomac in 1862 and he's only 27 days away from his enlistment expiring when he gets here to gettysburg the 151st fight's on mcpherson ridge and as the army is retreating past this building in the afternoon mcfarland is shot through both legs he's pulled into this building as the confederates are also coming in the other end he lies on the floor in a pool of his own blood for three days eventually his right leg is amputated below the knee his left ankle is saved but it is shattered mcfarland is going to be in this building for about two and a half months until he's well enough to go home during that time he writes prolifically about his experiences here the pain that he's experiencing from both legs from both wounds the importance of his wife and children being by his side to help nurse him through this difficult time and then also talks about some of the other experiences what other patients and doctors are doing in this building goes home to to his home in juniata county pennsylvania and it's going to be 42 weeks before he stands up again and hobbles around the room but he talks about what a great feeling that is to once be once again be able to get up and out of bed it's going to live for 30 more years suffering from the wounds that took a split second to occur on july first 1863. all right so walking into this room they have this scene set up that shows what uh one of these rooms might have looked like as a field hospital and man you can only imagine just how how horrible that must have been and really what the smell must have been like as well [Music] very very interesting never knew that the seminary was used as a field hospital as well all right well that was the seminary ridge museum right here in gettysburg that place is seriously amazing and it is way more than just the cupola where john buford set up if you come to gettysburg and you don't pay this place a visit uh you're really cheating yourself uh you really need to come to this place to really understand the the full picture of the battle of gettysburg for right now we are headed off to the next place right here in gettysburg

Channel: The History Underground

Views: 60,403

Rating: 4.9850187 out of 5

Keywords: history, civil war, travel, gettysburg, battle of gettysburg, army of the potomac, army of northern virginia, robert e lee, seminary ridge, battle of gettysburg documentary, gettysburg movie, history traveler, history underground, american battlefield trust, general lee

Id: 4J7qWREiJn4

Length: 14min 27sec (867 seconds)

Published: Wed May 05 2021