August 28, 2013

Though I usually don’t use “busy” photos, I like the photo above for two reasons. First, it shows a cannon at a place where I don’t usually have an opportunity to snap a photo. Second, it adequately portrays how busy McPherson’s Ridge can be on a summer afternoon and shows a proliferation of monuments and other battlefield features. At the center of the photo, the main subject is a cannon representing Battery L of the 1^ST New York Light Artillery. This is possibly the first cannon I ever touched or saw . . . I stood here at age eight on my first trip to Gettysburg and was enamored with Civil War artillery from the get-go.

The blocky monument to the left of the cannon is Battery L’s monument. The road at far left, full of cars as always, is Reynolds Avenue. The stone marker to the right of the large monument is a Division marker for the 1^ST Division of the Union army’s Cavalry Corps. The tall black shaft is an upturned cannon barrel that marks the spot of Gen. Abner Doubleday’s headquarters during the Battle of Gettysburg. Another stone monument can be seen to the right, much the same as the Cavalry Corps marker but skinnier. This is the 8^TH Illinois Cavalry. The stone marker toward the center of the photo, just below the bridge, is the 1^ST Army Corps marker.

The bridge is a fairly new one, and rises above the Railroad Cut whose slope can be seen at the center and right of the photo. The traffic light regulates traffic from Route 30 and Reynolds Avenue. The road at right is known as Chambersburg Pike, Route 30, and Lincoln Highway, and is also the start of Buford Avenue. A bronze statue-topped monument to Gen. James Wadsworth is partially hidden in the trees to the right of the bridge. Two monuments can be seen down over the slope of the Railroad Cut . . . the tall white one honors the 3^RD Indiana Cavalry, while the monument at far left behind the fence represents the 6^TH Wisconsin Infantry, part of the Iron Brigade. I also like that there are two “Gettysburg style” fences visible here, one in the distance at Route 30 and one in the foreground.

**HONORED TODAY**

BURNETT CHAPMAN MAUPIN (1836 – 03 Jul 1863) 

CARSON B. MAUPIN (1831 – 03 Jul 1863)

56^TH Virginia Infantry

It’s hard enough to think of how many mothers and fathers wept for the sons they lost at Gettysburg, but for some families the occasion was even more heart-wrenching. Rice and Polly Carr Maupin of Albemarle County, Virginia were unfortunate enough to lose two sons during the battle, Burnett and Carson. It appears that neither man was married and that both were killed during the Pickett-Pettigrew-Trimble Charge.


(c) 2013 Skies of Blue and Gray