Gettysburg Address, Shiloh National Cemetery - Shiloh, TN
Posted by: 
linkys
N 35° 09.033 W 088° 19.281
16S E 379642 N 3890537
Bronze plaque containing the words of the Gettysburg Address inside the entrance to the cemetery where many of the soldiers who gave their lives in the bloody Battle of Shiloh rest.
Waymark Code: WMCACQ
Location: Tennessee, United States
Date Posted: 08/15/2011
Views: 10
From the National Park Service website.
"In 1866, the War Department established a cemetery on the battlefield of Shiloh, in southwestern Tennessee. In order to bury the dead not only from the April 6-7, 1862, battle of Shiloh but also from all the operations along the Tennessee River, workers began building the “Pittsburg Landing National Cemetery.” Changed to “Shiloh National Cemetery” in 1889, the cemetery holds 3,584 Civil War dead, 2,359 of them unknown. In the fall of 1866, workers disinterred the dead from 156 locations on the battlefield, and 565 different locations along the Tennessee River. Headboards of wood first marked each grave, but were replaced in 1876 and 1877 by granite stones. Tall stones marked the known dead and square, short stones denoted unknown soldiers."
Shiloh was the first of the great bloody battles that were to be fought in what became a great bloody war. And while Lincoln was never there, its death toll and the anguish it spread throughout the nation, added to burdens that he carried during his Presidency. It is indeed proper and fitting that we reflect on the Gettysburg Address as we enter the cemetery and try to comprehend what those words mean.