Restoring a Gateway to Gettysburg: The View From Seminary Ridge

Recipient: American Battlefield Trust · Grant: $62,500, a 2022 Battlefield Restoration Grant from the NPS American Battlefield Protection Program

The view in July 1863

Pickett's Charge and Little Round Top are among the best-known names in American history. The Confederate army's failed assaults on the second and third days at Gettysburg ended the Army of Northern Virginia's invasion of the North and marked a turning point, perhaps the turning point, of the Civil War. But a few days earlier the view from Seminary Ridge was very different: terrified civilians fled as Gen. Robert E. Lee carried the war into Union territory, hoping to force an end to a conflict that had already devastated much of the South.

On the morning of July 1, 1863, Lee and his staff rode just north of Gettysburg and set up headquarters in the farmhouse of Mary Thompson, an elderly widow who stayed in her 1840s stone house through the battle and cared for several wounded soldiers. From there Lee directed the Confederate defence of Seminary Ridge and organised the assault on Culp's Hill.

By July 3, casualties on both sides passed 50,000, the war's deadliest battle. Lee retreated on July 4, the same day the garrison at Vicksburg, Mississippi, surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant, leaving the people of Gettysburg to care for more than 10,000 wounded Union soldiers. Few civilians died, but the sight of nearly 8,000 dead lying in the summer sun left lasting scars on the town's memory.

The project

With the grant, the American Battlefield Trust will pull together research on the civilian landscape of Seminary Ridge: the Mary Thompson House, the James Thompson House, the Dustman Barn and the ruins of the Alexander Riggs House, all of which saw the battle's opening stages. Building on earlier work, the plan will give a full picture of the ridge and a roadmap for restoring its day-of-battle appearance, a view central to visitors' experience of the battlefield.

About the grants

Battlefield Restoration Grants help restore "day-of-battle" conditions at nationally significant battlefields and related sites of the American Revolution, the War of 1812 and the Civil War. They are funded by the Land and Water Conservation Fund, which reinvests revenue from offshore oil and gas leasing in conservation and recreation. The program also offers Battlefield Land Acquisition, Preservation Planning and Battlefield Interpretation grants, supporting community-led stewardship in Tribal, state and local communities.

Sources

• National Park Service, American Battlefield Protection Program, "Restoring a Gateway to Gettysburg: The View from Seminary Ridge," 2022 Battlefield Restoration Grant Highlights. https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/restoring-a-gateway-to-gettysburg.htm
• Series: previous, Promoting Parks – 2022 Battlefield Restoration Grant Year in Review; next, Brandy Station: Restoring the Field that Made the Union Cavalry.
• A photograph of the Mary Thompson House from the American Battlefield Trust is not reproduced here.