| Author |
 Topic  |
|
|
Admin
Pupule
USA
4551 Posts |
 Posted - 12/30/2009 : 07:45:35 AM
|
|
this is a test
|
Andy |
|
|
Admin
Pupule
USA
4551 Posts |
Posted - 12/30/2009 : 08:13:22 AM
|
| test2 |
Andy |
 |
|
|
Admin
Pupule
USA
4551 Posts |
Posted - 12/30/2009 : 08:14:00 AM
|
The Gettysburg Address
Gettysburg, Pennsylvania
November 19, 1863
On June 1, 1865, Senator Charles Sumner commented on what is now considered the most famous speech by President Abraham Lincoln. In his eulogy on the slain president, he called it a "monumental act." He said Lincoln was mistaken that "the world will little note, nor long remember what we say here." Rather, the Bostonian remarked, "The world noted at once what he said, and will never cease to remember it. The battle itself was less important than the speech."
Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth. |
Andy |
|
|
|
Admin
Pupule
USA
4551 Posts |
Posted - 12/30/2009 : 08:15:51 AM
|
test test. test.  |
Andy |
|
|
|
Admin
Pupule
USA
4551 Posts |
Posted - 12/30/2009 : 08:19:59 AM
|
Background
Union soldiers dead at Gettysburg, photographed by Timothy H. O'Sullivan, July 5–6, 1863From July 1–3, 1863, more than 160,000 American soldiers clashed in the Battle of Gettysburg, in what would prove to be a turning point of the Civil War.[2] The battle also had a major impact on the town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, which numbered only 2,400 inhabitants.[3] The battlefield contained the bodies of more than 7,500 dead soldiers and several thousand horses[4] of the Army of the Potomac and the Confederacy's Army of Northern Virginia, and the stench of rotting bodies in the humid July air was overpowering.[5]
Interring the dead in a dignified and orderly manner became a high priority for the few thousand residents of Gettysburg. Initially, the town planned to buy land for a cemetery and then ask the families of the dead to pay for their burial. However, David Wills, a wealthy 32-year-old attorney, objected to this idea and wrote to the Governor of Pennsylvania, Andrew Gregg Curtin, suggesting instead a National Cemetery to be funded by the states. Wills was authorized to purchase 17 acres (69,000 m²) for a cemetery to honor those lost in the battle, paying $2,475.87 for the land.[6]
Letter of David Wills inviting Abraham Lincoln to make a few remarks, noting that Edward Everett would deliver the orationWills originally planned to dedicate this new cemetery on Wednesday, October 23, and invited Edward Everett, who had served as Secretary of State, U.S. Senator, U.S. Representative, Governor of Massachusetts, president of Harvard University, and Vice Presidential candidate, to be the main speaker.[7] At that time, Everett was a widely famed orator. In reply, Everett told Wills and his organizing committee that he would be unable to prepare an appropriate speech in such a short period of time, and requested that the date be postponed. The committee agreed, and the dedication was postponed until Thursday, November 19.[9]
Wills and the event committee then invited President Lincoln to participate in the ceremony. Wills's letter stated, "It is the desire that, after the Oration, you, as Chief Executive of the nation, formally set apart these grounds to their sacred use by a few appropriate remarks."[10] Lincoln received formal notice of his invitation to participate only seventeen days before the ceremony, whereas Everett had been invited 40 days earlier: "Although there is some evidence Lincoln expected Wills's letter, its late date makes the author appear presumptuous...Seventeen days was extraordinarily short notice for presidential participation even by nineteenth-century standards."[11] Furthermore, Wills's letter "made it equally clear to the president that he would have only a small part in the ceremonies",[11] perhaps akin to the modern tradition of inviting a noted public figure to do a ribbon-cutting at a grand opening. |
Andy |
|
|
|
Admin
Pupule
USA
4551 Posts |
Posted - 12/30/2009 : 08:21:19 AM
|
Background
Union soldiers dead at Gettysburg, photographed by Timothy H. O'Sullivan, July 5–6, 1863From July 1–3, 1863, more than 160,000 American soldiers clashed in the Battle of Gettysburg, in what would prove to be a turning point of the Civil War.[2] The battle also had a major impact on the town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, which numbered only 2,400 inhabitants.[3] The battlefield contained the bodies of more than 7,500 dead soldiers and several thousand horses[4] of the Army of the Potomac and the Confederacy's Army of Northern Virginia, and the stench of rotting bodies in the humid July air was overpowering.[5]
Interring the dead in a dignified and orderly manner became a high priority for the few thousand residents of Gettysburg. Initially, the town planned to buy land for a cemetery and then ask the families of the dead to pay for their burial. However, David Wills, a wealthy 32-year-old attorney, objected to this idea and wrote to the Governor of Pennsylvania, Andrew Gregg Curtin, suggesting instead a National Cemetery to be funded by the states. Wills was authorized to purchase 17 acres (69,000 m²) for a cemetery to honor those lost in the battle, paying $2,475.87 for the land.[6]
Letter of David Wills inviting Abraham Lincoln to make a few remarks, noting that Edward Everett would deliver the orationWills originally planned to dedicate this new cemetery on Wednesday, October 23, and invited Edward Everett, who had served as Secretary of State, U.S. Senator, U.S. Representative, Governor of Massachusetts, president of Harvard University, and Vice Presidential candidate, to be the main speaker.[7] At that time, Everett was a widely famed orator. In reply, Everett told Wills and his organizing committee that he would be unable to prepare an appropriate speech in such a short period of time, and requested that the date be postponed. The committee agreed, and the dedication was postponed until Thursday, November 19.[9]
Wills and the event committee then invited President Lincoln to participate in the ceremony. Wills's letter stated, "It is the desire that, after the Oration, you, as Chief Executive of the nation, formally set apart these grounds to their sacred use by a few appropriate remarks."[10] Lincoln received formal notice of his invitation to participate only seventeen days before the ceremony, whereas Everett had been invited 40 days earlier: "Although there is some evidence Lincoln expected Wills's letter, its late date makes the author appear presumptuous...Seventeen days was extraordinarily short notice for presidential participation even by nineteenth-century standards."[11] Furthermore, Wills's letter "made it equally clear to the president that he would have only a small part in the ceremonies",[11] perhaps akin to the modern tradition of inviting a noted public figure to do a ribbon-cutting at a grand opening.
Lincoln arrived by train in Gettysburg on November 18, and spent the night as a guest in Wills's house on the Gettysburg town square, where he put the finishing touches on the speech he had written in Washington, D.C.[12] Contrary to a common myth, Lincoln neither completed his address while on the train nor wrote it on the back of an envelope.[13] This story is at odds with the existence of several early drafts on Executive Mansion stationery as well as the reports of Lincoln's final editing while a guest of David Wills in Gettysburg.[14] On the morning of November 19 at 9:30 a.m., Lincoln, astride a chestnut bay horse and riding between Secretary of State William H. Seward and Secretary of the Treasury Salmon P. Chase,[15][16] joined in a procession with the assembled dignitaries, townspeople, and widows marching out to the grounds to be dedicated.
Approximately 15,000 people are estimated to have attended the ceremony, including the sitting governors of six of the 24 Union states: Andrew Gregg Curtin of Pennsylvania, Augustus Bradford of Maryland, Oliver P. Morton of Indiana, Horatio Seymour of New York, Joel Parker of New Jersey, and David Tod of Ohio.[17] Canadian politician William McDougall attended as Lincoln's guest.[18] The precise location of the program within the grounds of the cemetery is disputed.[19] Reinterment of the bodies buried from field graves |
Andy |
|
|
| |
Topic |
|
|
|
test
