Tuesday, September 4, 2018

"Not Enough Hours..."

You've heard that phrase before, right?  I know I've SAID it often... and totally meant it.  And that's the case with this blog too.  A variation: "So much to do and so little time..."

Since I last left you, I finished up the amazing Georgia tour and am about to head back down there soon, taking a northward swing into Pennyslvania and Ohio before I get down there.

At all of these venues, and others, I've met new people with their own perspectives on the Civil War.  I've met other authors, park rangers, tourists from all over, and I even got to meet the great-great-grandson of Ulysses S. Grant!  He frequently is found at the Fredericksburg NPS site and you can see the resemblance.

I've met old friends and new, and look forward to more of the same!

Pamplin National Historical Park
Fredericksburg National Battlefield Park
So much time has flown by that I'm going to have to figure out how to describe what it was like to find my name on an article featured in Civil War Times!  The word "amazing" doesn't quite cover it, believe me.  And then at my book event at the book store at Gettysburg, I met Dana Shoaf, the editor, who was kind enough to come up and introduce himself!

And for every place I have gone, there has been the "place" as well.  Above left, I am at the sculpture outside of Pamplin National Historic Park.  It is a bit west of Petersburg, and is where the Union Army of Grant was able to break through Confederate lines held by Lee and make the last push that ended the Civil War at Appomattox Court House in April 1865.

The picture above right shows a stone wall across from where I was signing books.  That is THE Confederate Stone Wall on Marye's Heights that was such an important feature in the Battle of Fredericksburg in December 1862.  One of the people that LeRoy knew, T.R.R. Cobb, the leader of Cobb's Legion, died defending that stone wall, not too far from where I took this picture. 

Gettysburg National Battlefield Park
TWICE
And then there's Gettysburg.  The photograph on the left was taken on Steinwehr Avenue, going into town.  I've done two events there now, and will go back up there on occasion.  A friend of mine passed through the area recently, and she's not into history too much, but went to see it when I suggested it.  She told me that when they were up at Little Round Top, she started crying -- hard -- and didn't understand why.  THAT is Gettysburg.  And probably Antietam, although I have not been there yet.  

There is so much more to update you all on -- and I hope to catch you all up as this week goes on!