As we approach the quarter-millennium of the Revolution, the 4th of July looms large.
But on July 2, I think of Gettysburg.
(In addition to my late brother, Marvin, for this would have been his 64th birthday.)
Our grandfather’s grandfather George Washington Lane of Gloucester, Massachusetts, was there as a soldier in the 32nd Massachusetts Infantry, part of Col Sweitzer’s brigade (2nd Brigade, 1st Div., 5th Corps) in the Army of the Potomac. At first held in reserve, on the afternoon of July 2, 1863 (the second day of the battle), this brigade fought at the “Wheatfield”:
“[T]he Brigade advanced to the support of First Division Second Corps and engaged Brig. Gen. Anderson’s Brigade at the stone wall at the south end of the Wheatfield but the supports on the right having given away the Brigade was attacked on the right and rear and it retired under a heavy fire to a line north of Little Round Top.”
“Casualties: Killed: 6 Officers, 61 Men; Wounded: 26 Officers, 213 Men; Captured or Missing: 1 Officer, 120 Men; Total 427.”
(Quotation from the 1910 bronze brigade tablet at Gettysburg. Photo: my grandfather’s grandfather’s belt.)
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