Ghosts of Gettysburg II

by Mark Nesbitt

  But to those who fought at Gettysburg, it was either all of those things, or none of them. Those fortunate enough to survive the three-day holocaust found themselves, soul-drawn to return at reunion times and as often as their mortality would allow, until they too joined the ranks of their former comrades-in-arms, no longer strong, youthful soldiers but now, “townsmen of a stiller town.”1

  Most of those who died here, of course, probably only visited the place once, but that was enough. Or perhaps it wasn’t.

  The University Grays—Company A, 11th Mississippi Volunteers—were from the area around the college town of Oxford, Mississippi. Over half the company, when it was recruited in 1861, came directly from the classrooms of Ole Miss. Well-to-do, and intelligent, they could have been considered a cut above the common Confederate soldier, perhaps even officer material, had they wanted it that way. But most shunned the epaulets of command and put on the rough-cut frock coats of the rank and file infantryman. For most, once they got to Gettysburg, that common gray cloth would become their winding sheets.

  Most Gettysburgians are at least vaguely aware of the carnage wrought by the two great armies literally outside their kitchen doors. Though they may live in warm, comfortable, modern homes, they realize that in another time not so long ago, the very space they now occupy in their rocker next to the fire was likely once occupied by a scurrying soldier—as in those houses, including my own, on the north end of town where the Union retreat took place. Or, where they lay their head to rest on their pillow upstairs was once in the flight path of a ten pounder Parrott shell. Or, as in some of the houses in the modern housing development called Colt Park right on the edge of the fields of Pickett’s Charge, they cook their barbecues and play with their children very near where once a line of infantry—the University Grays, in fact—marched in ordered, doomed quickstep into a horizontal wall of minie balls and canister to their own immolation a few hundred feet hence. Of the seventy-nine who originally signed up with the Grays in 1861, only thirty-some were left to make the charge on that lurid last day at Gettysburg. Of those, fourteen were killed and seventeen were wounded. But numbers are not enough, are they? We can tell you the names of the gentle, bookish souls if you want: John Moore; Lieutenant Baker; Private De Gaffenreid; and the child Tom McKie, whose frantic mother wrote Confederate President Jefferson Davis asking her son be spared, and whose fervent prayers for his safety were answered for ten battles, until Gettysburg. Some brutish clump of hot iron caught him full in the chest; Mrs. McKie need not pray any more.

  Field of Pickett’s Charge south of Colt Park.

  Perhaps this all explains, in some disconnected way, why one woman, although an immaculate housekeeper, continues to smell at odd, random moments in her modern house in Colt Park, the horrid, sickly-sweet odor of rotting meat. A quick spray of air freshener and the smell is gone. But then, sometimes weeks or months later, unexpectedly, there is that whiff of rancid flesh floating in the same space—but at a different time—where it once, in reality, may have floated.

  And while the ghostly, putrid odors may be explained away by some not necessarily understood mental process, what’s harder to explain are the times her teenaged daughter would awaken in the middle of the night, suffocating, complaining of a choking feeling, as if unseen hands were twisting and clawing at her throat. It happened not once, to be tossed off as a bad dream, but many times, in that same space where men once clawed at their own throats for breath that would never come again.

  You see, when the physical space is the same, sometimes it literally is only a matter of time.

  The battlefield is also a place of recreation and escape for many who live here. Bicyclists, joggers, and evening walkers all enjoy their spare time on the avenues through the National Park. But whether they realize it or not, they are never very far from where men’s mortal souls took that last long flight by the thousands into that eternal night.

  A local man who, as a teenager, would seek solace late into the evening on the battlefield told of a couple of odd experiences, one at Spangler’s Spring, the other on Little Round Top.

  He related how, one evening as he rode his bicycle in toward Spangler’s Spring from the Baltimore Road, just before he got to the area of the spring, he glanced off into the broad field to the left. Having lived in Gettysburg all his life, he was probably aware of the story that has recurred over the years of a tall, graceful figure—obviously a woman—moving ethereally through Pardee Field just over the hill from Spangler’s Spring, moving, then bending down, then moving some more, as if searching, some say, for a fallen lover slain in the raw carnage of the fighting on Culp’s Hill. He was also aware of those odd mists that seem to have been draped like a vast burial shroud in the evenings across many sections of the battlefield. Yet one night one of the wisps of fog caught his eye as being slightly out of place, a little too animated, a little too upright, as it moved about the open field near the spring once sought by thirsty, wounded soldiers for its life sustaining liquid.

  He described it as a “glowing, phosphorescent specter,” as he paused to watch as it moved from place to place about the field once filled with the helpless chaff of battle. Obviously too purposeful for any windborne fog, perhaps could it be some dear good Samaritan still compelled by truly overwhelming charity, to wander in search of those in need through all eternity?

  Field near Spangler’s Spring.

  He also admits to running away from home one night, for whatever youthful reason he has now forgotten, and ending up on the western slope of Little Round Top late one evening, and inadvertently falling asleep there, in the warm misty magic of a summer’s night in Gettysburg. He awakened some hours later with a start, realizing how long he had been there, well into the early morning hours. And as he began to rise to leave, his gaze was drawn to something strange happening in the valley below him.

  Lights—not the twinkle of early evening fireflies but numerous stronger, glowing, yellowish lights—floated about Plum Run valley just a hundred yards or so below, in seemingly random fashion. They would move, then he would see one stop, then move on, then another would stop, and move on, as if conducting some sort of search.

  He seemed confused about what he saw and what it meant, until I mentioned to him that he wasn’t the first to have seen that strange nocturnal display.

  Others had seen that same sight in the same valley over the years. But all those sightings were merely repeats of the original scene enacted over a century and a quarter ago throughout the long night of July 2, 1863, when wounded soldiers witnessed the candles and oil lamps and lanterns of men searching the Valley of Death for comrades wounded in the day’s fighting. Moving, then stopping to try to recognize a face twisted in death, then moving on, then stopping….

  The look on his face can only be described as one of confused relief: Relief that he finally knew what those lights meant; confused because he knew with certainty that the heartfelt emotions of men searching for wounded comrades, just like the phantom lights after the passing of a long century, should have faded by now into the darkness.

  And finally there is the recurring tale of the horseman. In one 48 hour period, I had no less than three people come to me and ask if I had heard any stories about a horseman on the field. One recounted the often told story of the ghostly equestrian who picks his way down the west slope of Little Round Top on certain mist-veiled nights, headless.2

  There are countless stories of people hearing mounted men in column, passing by in the middle of the night, on some nocturnal ride through time in different areas in and near Gettysburg. I’ve forgotten how many people over the years have mentioned being awakened early in the first hours of the morning by horses trotting by when there were no horsemen to be seen. We know of the guests at the old Cashtown Inn who were awakened by horses impatiently pawing at the ground.3 But at the other side of Adams county—once criss-crossed by horsemen of both Union and Confederate armies—there are stories of a young woman being awakened i
n the middle of the night by horses whinnying and pawing outside her bedroom window. She was truly frightened because this farmhouse was several miles from town and several hundred yards from her nearest neighbor. When she looked out to confront the trespassers who had ridden up on horseback, no one was to be seen. Of course the house is just off Low Dutch Road, one of the main routes back and forth as General George Armstrong Custer’s Union cavalrymen cut across to engage Jeb Stuart’s Confederate Cavalry at East Cavalry Battlefield.

  The Wheatfield.

  Someone recently mentioned seeing a man on horseback ride up to them in—of all places—the Wheatfield at dusk, dressed in the fine but dusty uniform of a Union officer. He tipped his hat, nodded and said hello as he rode by and excused himself for he had serious work before him, then turned his horse’s head to ride back into what was once death’s own playground. The visitors to the Wheatfield were pleased. Although they knew of no reenactment that weekend, it added to the ambience to see an authentically dressed officer and beautiful horse on the battlefield. Their smiles faded as they watched him ride a few more yards then vanish, taking with him a thousand secrets of the ages.

  Finally, a member of the Gettysburg Police Department told me of his experience late one night in the early 1970s at the High Water Mark. Although some parts of the battlefield are officially closed to visitors after 10:00 p.m., local law enforcement officials would sometimes enter the battlefield roads on quiet nights so that they could be a stone’s throw from their patrol duties and still be able to catch up on some paperwork. Settling down with a cup of coffee and his forms, this particular officer had parked at the famous “Angle” in the stone wall where Southern valor passed its most trying test. Pickett’s Charge—or Longstreet’s Assault, depending upon which historian you talk to—had punctured the Union line at that point. During the assault, by practical necessity, only a few Confederate officers were allowed to ride their mounts because of the perfect targets they would make. Those who did ride were shot down in the titian mist that rose from the fields in front of the stone wall.

  The officer was deeply into his work before he paused for a minute to rest.

  He looked up to see some sort of movement out in the darkened fields across the wall. As another minute passed he realized that it was a man in uniform on horseback, riding up to the wall only a dozen or so yards away.

  The officer knew that the National Park Service had obtained horses the year before and was successfully using them for both historical interpretation and law enforcement. He even knew one of the rangers who rode, but couldn’t tell as he waved to the late night equestrian, whether it was his acquaintance or not. As if oblivious to the officer’s wave and even to the presence of a police patrol car, the mounted man continued to scan the once ghastly, darkened fields. The officer said the horse and rider stood for several minutes, then, still scanning the night, slowly he rode off into the darkness.

  Later, the policeman confronted his ranger friend and asked him why he didn’t acknowledge his presence when he was off on his midnight ride. Confusion crossed the ranger’s face as he listened to the story. It wasn’t he that took the horse out on a midnight ride. Nor, to his knowledge, was it any other ranger; the horses were on a full, strict, daytime riding schedule and, to his knowledge, needed their rest and were not allowed to be taken out on dangerous night-time rides by anyone.4

  Incredulous, the Gettysburg police officer was left pondering what it was he had seen so distinctly across the wall once fought over by American Cains and Abels.

  ***************

  Chapter 12: Fall Of The Sparrow

  What has gone takes something with it,

  and when this is of the dear, nothing can fill the place.

  All the changes touched the borders of sorrows.

  —Major General Joshua Chamberlain

  Most experts agree that a “haunting” is the recurrence in the same venue of the same or similar paranormal happenings; when similar paranormal happenings occur to many different people over a number of years, a house or an area can truly be considered haunted.

  Devil’s Den must surely fall into this category. Old Dorm, Schmucker Hall at the Seminary, Stevens Hall, the houses on Baltimore Street and Carlisle Street, and a number of historic houses on and around the battlefield have had numerous inhabitants who have reported similar unexplainable sights and happenings. Iverson’s Pits apparently at one time had a great deal of paranormal activity, which, at least in one case, has continued.

  Prior to the massive expansion in recent years of Gettysburg College, two quaint houses stood across from the College Union Building and south of the Health Center, about where the new dining hall addition stands today.

  They were two and a half stories high and were called, respectively, East Cottage and West Cottage, and housed female students for the most part. One was white stucco and stood until just a few years ago when it was razed. One must wonder where the displaced spirit went that was heard to wander in it by the numerous students who co-habitated with it.

  No one would ever go into the attic of the cottage even though a good bit of storage space was there. It seems that virtually every time someone opened the small door in one of the second floor rooms that led up to the attic and attempted to climb the stairs, odd noises would begin—stifled moans, muffled voices, threatening sounds—until the intruder was driven to leave the area and close the door.

  One woman, who lived there as a student, recalled the experiences that were had by her and the other residents of the house. At first they began blaming the personal items that were out-of-place on each other playing pranks. But strange things happened so often that even the most hard-core prankster would soon be expected to tire of them and admit to being the perpetrator—unless no living resident of the house was the cause of the happenings.

  She thought the spirit must be classified as a “poltergeist” or “noisy ghost,” because of the odd physical manifestations of its presence and the tireless repetitiveness of the events. The poet Robert Graves, writing about “noisy ghosts” in 1958 said that “poltergeists everywhere show an appalling sameness of behavior; humorless, pointless, uncoordinated.” Poltergeists have run amok in nearly every country, and for quite a while too: one of the first cases was recorded in Germany in A. D. 355.1 Yet, how many unexplainable occurrences of physical objects—stone implements or animal skin clothing or pottery—being moved happened before that date and were never recorded or even spoken of, the percipient fearful of an angry god or evil spirit?

  The women in East Cottage would, one by one, clean up, make their beds and leave for morning classes. They would study after class in the library, or be busy until noon, when they would all manage to return to the cottage to have lunch. Sure enough, one of the beds would be torn up and disheveled, pillows here, covers there. One of the housemates would get the blame and profess her innocence, until it had happened enough times to everyone in the house that some other presence was eventually blamed.

  East Cottage (Special Collections, Gettysburg College Library).

  The woman who related this story later worked for the National Park Service and had some further experiences out on the battlefield, some of which are recorded in this book. But none was quite as disconcerting as those she experienced in East Cottage.

  Her room was on the second floor. She had a bookshelf in that room that had a raised edge—a “lip”—at the front of the shelf to keep the books from tumbling. A half-dozen books were lying upon the shelf on their sides—not upright as they normally are—and she watched one night in utter amazement as one by one each book lifted over the lip and fell to the floor.

  She and the other women were the victims several times of the messy poltergeist when it threw papers around individual rooms while they were gone.

  They would sometimes be awakened late at night by the old piano downstairs playing by itself. No specific tune, just a random tinkling of keys. At first they thought it was a mouse or sq
uirrel, but never could confirm the unlikely event that some timid creature like that would wander up and down the keys of a noisy piano without scaring itself. There were never any other normal signs of rodent infestation—chewed windows, food nibbled at, droppings—to confirm the fact that it was a living creature and not a spiritual one who was attracted time and again to the half-century-old instrument to play some mournful, ethereal music on the keys.

  Perhaps the time that the poltergeist evoked the most anger was when my friend’s small, porcelain, Hummel-type music box with a figurine was flipped off the bookshelf onto the floor to smash into several pieces. It was the same bookshelf with the lipped edge on it, from which books would unexplainably tumble. Disappointment gave way to confusion as to how the heavy figurine could have lifted itself from the shelf, over the lip, and hurled itself to the floor without the least bit of movement within the house or movement of the shelf itself or anything else on it. In fact, it would have taken an earthquake to lift the weighted music box over the edge of the shelf and toss it carelessly to the floor. And of course, no earthquakes have been recorded in Gettysburg in the last century-and-a-half, unless you want to count the unleashing of hundreds of cannon in three horrid days in July 1863. Her anger came later, as she was trying to carefully glue the pieces back together since the figurine held much sentimental value. “All right,” she scolded angrily into thin air when a piece would not stick. “I’ve had it with you! That’s enough!” For a long time there was no more activity in the house.

  Then, one day, she was standing in the kitchen of the cottage. The door to the unfinished cellar was closed and locked with its skeleton key. The old door was apparently out of joint and the women noticed that if they didn’t lock the ancient lock with the key, they would find the door open in the mornings. They never used the basement for anything, but stored canned goods in the stairway.