Yesterday Franklin Horner and the 12^th Pennsylvania Reserves marched until 1:00 a.m., some twenty-five miles. Today they began marching at 6:00 a.m. He writes that they have halted within sight of the rebels and are expecting to march onto the battlefield soon. Suddenly, his writing changes to present tense, the immediacy so great he forgets punctuation: “ evening we are on the battlefield and in line of battle the boys are determined to drive the rebels out of the state the battle is rageing [sic} fiercely now we will soon be in.”

From Thomas Ware’s diary on this Thursday we learn that he marches through Cashtown and came in sight of Gettysburg. They rested in an “old field” until 2:00 p.m. “…at which time we left to Attack the Enemy. After passing through a very heavy shelling for 20 minutes we rested and then formed a line of battle. Here at the foot of the mountain the engagement became general & fierce…”

Franklin Horner, exhausted from marching, lack of sleep, little food and the sheer nervousness of not knowing whether, in ten minutes, he would be alive or dead, ends up on the boulder-strewn west slope of a small hill south of Gettysburg, which would later come to be known as Little Round Top. It is from there he writes his entry in his diary.

Thomas Ware, his brother Robert, and the rest of the men of the 15^th Georgia have marched hours with but little rest to finally end up at the lower end of an oddly-shaped triangular field near a jumble of huge boulders the locals call the Devils Den. Just beyond Ware in the Triangular Field, within musket-range in fact, is the upper slope of Little Round Top where Horner stands, two American enemies, after 35 days of campaigning, finally on the same part of the battlefield at Gettysburg.

It is here where I must end my narrative. I do not want to spoil the ending of the book for those interested in reading it. A hint as to how it ends: one soldier lives, the other dies.

I will share an interesting story, a “perk” so to speak, associated with the writing of the book. Several years after it was published, I received a letter from a resident of Washington, Georgia, asking if I would like to speak to the descendants of Thomas Ware. That was a particularly busy year for me so I deferred, suggesting perhaps a later time. I honestly never expected to hear from him again. But Gary Norman was persistent, and the next year my wife Carol and I flew to Atlanta and drove our rental car through a night-time thunderstorm to Washington. We were put up in a delightfully restored building owned by the president of the local historical society. The next day we were treated to lunch with over 25 Wares, Normans, and Remsens, names which appear in the roster of Company G, 15^th Georgia Infantry.

One person I was particularly interested in meeting was Mary Lucy (Ware) Probst, Thomas Ware’s grand-niece, whose name had been given to me by family member Ken Norman early in my research. Every family should be lucky enough to have someone like Mary Lucy in it, for if they did their heritage would never be lost. I spoke with and wrote to her numerous times during the development of the book. It was only fitting that I should present to her, on behalf of the family, the microfilmed copy of Thomas Ware’s entire diary, which I had purchased from the University of North Carolina, Southern Historical Collection for my research. Now, anyone in the family can read first hand of their relative’s heroic, harrowing journeys.

I spoke that afternoon to some thirty heirs to the legacy of the one Confederate soldier, out of several hundred thousand, whom I had chosen to represent all the rest. For me it was emotional to have gotten to know their ancestor so well, and to pass that information on to them. I spoke about observations he had made of the land through which he was marching and how many of those landmarks remain. I talked about how astounded I was that throughout his entire diary, there were no references to slavery for this Southerner. The only “N” word Thomas ever used was “Negro” speaking of someone named Steve who sent him some food from home. I told them of the admiration I had for their kin, who endured more, physically and emotionally, than anyone should have to protect his family back in Georgia. I told them how honored I was that they should invite me to speak to them.

Gary Norman’s wife Suzanne is a Ware. They sponsored a reception at their house after my speech to the family. Speaking to Suzanne about the research and miles traveled to produce the book, I told of my one disappointment. In all the volumes of books and papers I perused and the archives I visited, I never found a photo of Thomas Ware. I had no idea what this young man, whose life I had chronicled, whose most intimate hopes and fears I was privy to,  looked like.

“Oh,” Suzanne said. “I have his photo hanging on my wall.” She walked me into the house and handed me a small picture of the young man whose life took up so much of my life for the past several years. I felt a well of emotion as I looked into his face. Two words, probably sounding strange to the rest of the Ware family who had gathered around, but summing up all that he and I had been through over the several years it took to research and write his book came out of my mouth:

“Hello, Thomas.”

This Tuesday, the last day of June, was the day Franklin Horner and his fellow Union soldiers mustered for pay. They took up the line of march at 7:00 a.m. and marched until 7:00 p.m. covering some 20 miles. As they passed through several towns they uncased the colors—their flags—and had their bands play martial music.

Thomas Ware began their march about 9:00 a.m. It was a short day ending at 1:00 p.m. stopping to camp in the town of Fayetteville. His comrades gathered a large amount of cherries, which were in season in Pennsylvania and, as he put it, “We made fences fly…” for firewood, of course. He has some time to write a letter home.

Horner casually mentions that they marched twenty miles this day, but it was probably one of the hardest marches he’s had to make. They are on the move for twelve hours, which means a lot of it was stop and go before they could go into camp and take a long rest.

Since it is the end of the month, there are some administrative duties each company has to take care of. They determine how many men are present and accounted for so that they can requisition money from the government to pay them for their service. In the Union army, pay was $13 per month.

The end-of-the-month muster also gives us a general—but not specific—idea of the troop strengths at the time. When historians analyzed the muster records, they felt confident in determining the number of soldiers present on July 1, the opening of the Battle of Gettysburg. But there are variables: men get sick overnight, or drop out of the ranks marching the next day. In addition, the muster rolls give only an approximate number of combat troops. There were thousands more non-combatants, from teamsters to farriers to personal servants to “camp followers” who accompanied the armies and remained behind the lines during combat. The total number of human beings being drawn to this part of Pennsylvania as if caught in a whirlpool may never be known; but it certainly was more that the 97,000 Union and 75.000 Confederate combat troop figures we used in the National Park Service.

Once again, the Federals are marching an inside arc to the Confederates’ sweep northward and eastward. The rebels had been reported in York and so Horner’s unit is sent toward the east, always trying to be the buffer between the enemy and their capital. Music playing and flags flying while marching through northern towns were more for the civilians’ benefit than the soldiers. Horner, who had lived through the bloodiest single day in all of American History at the Battle of Antietam, knows he is headed toward yet another, and potentially bloodier battle with one of the finest and most deadly armies on the face of the planet; one that had already whipped his army more than once before. The cheering civilian residents of the towns may not have exactly inculcated Horner and his fellow veterans with confidence.

Perhaps because of the extra free time he has thanks to a short march, Ware’s thoughts turn homeward and he records in a sort of code that he has been using, that he wrote a letter to “J. B. F.” Throughout his diary, Thomas Ware uses his alphabet code to record letters he sends to someone at home. Could it be that he has a sweetheart in Washington, Georgia?

This night, Ware and Horner are only thirty-seven miles apart, a day’s march for each of these American enemies to a collision-point.

Franklin Horner had orders to march at daylight, but because of the Union troops concentrating in the Frederick, MD, area, his unit did not get started until 1:00 p.m. They marched about 10 miles and went into camp at 11:00 p.m.

Thomas Ware’s regiment, along with the 17^th Georgia and other from the division were sent to destroy four miles of railroad north of Chambersburg, a place called Scotland Station. They tore up all the rails and burned the ties and a substantial bridge along the way, then returned to their camps. He writes of the “Q Masters” (Quartermasters) continuing to gather up all the horses and beef cattle they can find. Some of his comrades see the finer horses in the area tied up in the woods in an attempt to hide them from the round up.

One thing I forgot to mention yesterday: When Horner and the men of the 12^th Pennsylvania Reserves are attached to the Fifth Corps, they also find that they have a new commanding general for the entire army. Major General George G. Meade, formerly commander of the Fifth Corps, was ordered to replace Major General Joseph Hooker as commander of the Army of the Potomac.

For Meade it is a dubious distinction. To go from commanding a corps to an entire army in the midst of an active campaign and the invasion of the north by the enemy threatening to capture his home state’s capital is a lot to put on any commander’s plate. Overnight he goes from commanding one corps to commanding eight times that many men, all needing to be fed, supplied with enough ammunition and supplies in case a battle looms, and ordered where to march without impeding one another to intercept the greatest threat to the nation’s security in its history. Interestingly, either Horner hasn’t heard or he’s more concerned with his own sore feet, or where he’s going to get his next meal, but he doesn’t even mention the change in high command in his diary entries.

Though Horner only marches 10 miles this day, it takes 10 hours to do so. It was stop and go, apparently because of the concentration of Federal troops attempting to stay between the invading Confederates and Washington. The good news is that the Union army is taking the “inside route” while the Confederates swing wide to the north and east and must march farther.

(Taking a short break to speak and sign at the Adams County Winery’s 150^th Anniversary Commemoration day. I’ll be right back!)

(Did you miss me? What a great day. Gorgeous weather in the beautiful mountains near Cashtown. Spoke to a BUNCH of interesting people. Saw some old friends from the Licensed Battlefield Guides. Thanks, Rob, for a well-done event. Okay. Back to the blog….)

Railroads are historically protective of their right-of-ways, some of which were established in the early 19^th Century, so it’s easy to find some of the places Ware mentions along the railroad north out of Chambersburg, since they haven’t changed much in 150 years.

The railroad bridge at Scotland, PA, is made of stone and concrete now, but does rise some fifty feet above the river, as Ware records about the old wooden bridge.

In an interesting sidelight, Scotland, PA, is the ancestral home of my wife Carol. It wasn’t until her mother Phyllis told me that the Chambersburg Country Club property included the building that had been her ancestor’s home that we made the connection between Thomas Ware, a soldier I chose somewhat randomly to write about and our relationship by marriage. The subject of my book on this day marched past the farm of my future wife’s ancestors 150 years before.