By the year 1863, Gettysburg's
over 2,000 civilians had a good year ahead of them. Their farms and businesses
were booming, with promise of a wonderful summer. However, as the month of June
1863 crept to a close, an ominous whisper came on the wind. Rebel soldiers,
Confederates from Robert E. Lee's huge Southern army, were drifting closer.
Before citizens had time to contemplate the destruction of an invasion force,
the "rebs" were here.
For three days, July 1-3, 1863,
the pallor of death covered the small Pennsylvania
borough. Many thousands fell, never to awaken again, and thousands more were
wounded, returning home torn and broken, with horrible haunting memories of the
place called Gettysburg. It is a
known fact that the things happening at Gettysburg
don't seem to be what people call "normal," and too many visitors and
locals have documented "sensing" things for it to be mere
coincidence.
The Hauntings
Ask anyone to share what they think is the most haunted place on the Gettysburg
battlefield, and many will say Devil's Den. Its name alone is
enough to chill the spine, but the story is even more ominous. Soldiers hid
among the huge boulders created by natural upheavals under the earth, waiting
for death to seek them out. When the fight of the second day was over, men lay
in among the rocks, their spirits long departed. To this day, various people
from different states and different walks of life have claimed to see a "Texan,"
a wide-eyed man with disheveled clothing and hair, wandering around the
boulders. To make the story stranger, it is a documented fact that Texas
soldiers did have a huge part in claiming the rock pile for the Confederacy.
Jennie Wade is one of Gettysburg's
civilian celebrities, but she has a sorrowful claim to fame. Jennie, whose
birth name was Mary Virginia Wade, was the only civilian to be killed in Gettysburg
during the three days of battle. It is surprising that there were not more
serious casualties among the townsfolk, because Confederate sharpshooters took
up residence in the town's homes and aimed at Union men on Cemetery Hill.
Jennie was soon to be married to a Union soldier whom she loved very deeply,
when a bullet took her life as she did her baking. Some who tour the quaint
brick double-family home (actually Jennie's sister's home) can sense her
presence. Jennie's father James Wade Sr., who died estranged from the family,
may also have taken up residence there. Visitors have mentioned feeling sorrow
and desperation in the house, and wonder if it is Jennie's father trying to
communicate his apologies to his daughter.
For those who want a hotspot for haunting that many Gettysburg
tourists seem to find effective for finding "evidence," try Sachs
Bridge.
It is located mere miles from the sacred beauty of the battlefield. In 1863,
both armies trod this 1850s red covered bridge, and gruesome tales have
cemented the idea of its spiritual link. Rumor tells that three soldiers were
hanged here, apparently for desertion, and whether or not this is true, there
is evidence that there was a field hospital here along the riverbank. Perhaps
the bridge itself was used for surgeons' work. Encounters vary, but taking
pictures in the gloom of night has brought many surprising results to curious
ghost-hunters.