Trees to Honor Fallen Soldiers, Mark Sesquicentennial
The Civil War was largely fought on the 180-mile swath of land that stretches from Monticello to Gettysburg. That’s the same area in which the Journey Through Hallowed Ground Partnership wants to plant 620,000-trees; one in honor of each soldier who died in the Civil War. “And [we’ll] do so by creating a more beautiful place in what was otherwise the largest concentration of battlefields in the country,” partnership president Cate Magennis Wyatt tells Radio PA.
A special tree-planting ceremony is scheduled to take place on the campus of the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg on Tuesday, where a battlefield Witness Tree will be dedicated and two Living Legacy Trees will be planted. Wyatt says it’s the second major ceremony of the Living Legacy Project, which was established to mark the Sesquicentennial.
The planting and the fundraising will continue over the next few years, as the partnership seeks to raise $65-million dollars for the project. “We’re raising $100-dollars to honor each of the 620,000 men who died, and that is nothing. It’s quite achievable,” Wyatt says of the task that lies ahead.
