Gettysburg and the Blood of Both Sides

Gettysburg battlefield, Pennsylvania © Erin Faith Allen

One hundred and fifty-eight years ago, over the first three days of July, this lush landscape absorbed a horrendous chaos of men, horses, and cannon, and the blood of tens of thousands of them.

One of the estimated 40,000 casualties was my ancestor James.

James had quite a war. He was captured at Harpers Ferry, imprisoned, then released. He went on to shed blood for the Union at Gettysburg. Upon his recovery he was re-enlisted into the Invalid Corps, the Veteran's Reserve for men whose wounds left them disabled or otherwise unfit for combat. What his wounds were exactly remains unknown, but if the gods of research continue to bless my fact-digging, I will find out.

I have other ancestors who fought here, too. Some who stood in Confederate grey and faced off against the Yankees in blue. Still more grandfathers fought in other vicious battles across the same war. One gave his life.

I am standing where they fought and bled, with the blood of two opposing sides of one conflict running through my veins, and I am thinking about what it means to hold that, within my own genetic lines. To contemplate history and peel apart its often uncomfortable and contradictory layers is always a reckoning.

The country that fought within itself then does so, still, now.