A Year of Blogging: April 12, 2011

April 12, 2011 marks the 150th anniversary of the start of the Civil War. Over the next few years there will be a lot of memorials and commemorations. As a history lover, I am looking forward to it. I have always loved history, but I didn't start getting interested in the Civil War until we went to Gettysburg. We took a family vacation to Pennsylvania seven years ago. We went to Hershey, Boyd's Bear Country, and The Gettysburg Battlefield. Before this trip, I had an interest in the Civil War, because it was part of history. But I hadn't studied it any more than what was covered in classes. Visiting the battlefield, and even the town of Gettysburg made such an impression on me. My Grandpa Wager had always been a big Civil War buff. Surrounded by all of this history, I felt a part of it. I could see the battles. I could almost smell the death in the air. It was powerful. Shortly after I returned from that vacation, I went to the bookstore and bought a ton of books on the Civil War. I've been reading and studying it ever since. Sometimes I catch myself thinking "I have to ask Grandpa about that". I have read about different generals (Union and Confederate), different battles, and even the side stories you don't often hear about. Every time I buy a bunch of books, there are still so many more I want to read. I don't know that I will ever achieve the status of 'buff', but I think 'enthusiast' is a good way to describe me. My goal is to make it to all the major battlefields. Including going back to Gettysburg. I think later this year I might get a start on that plan by visiting Fort Sumter. How appropriate- to go where it all started! My great-great grandfather served in the Civil War. He was in the ambulance corps. I have a letter he wrote to his mom the day after the Battle of Gettysburg. He describes the battlefield, and the fighting he saw. The family legend was that his hands were blown off when a cannon backfired as he was loading it. Supposedly, he had a hook on one hand and a claw on the other, and the myth was that they were buried in my parents' backyard. We never found them. Now that I have been working on the ancestry for many years, I think I know why they weren't found. Because this great story is simply a myth. I wondered why he was loading a cannon if he was in the ambulance corps. I found Civil War pension lists which indicate if the soldier was wounded in battle. He has no injuries listed. And, perhaps the most convincing evidence- the veterans in my hometown had G.A.R. reunions every few years. There is a picture of the veterans from 1890, and my great-great grandpa has hands. I know they weren't doing hand transplants that early. It was a neat story, but for me the better story is the letter we have from Gettysburg. That is real. That is something our family will hopefully cherish for generations.