by Murray Pura
Her hands were knotted in her lap and turning white as she squeezed them together.
“I had many high notions before I ever saw a battle,” she continued when Iain did not immediately respond. “But now I realize the war has changed everything—it has changed my town, it has changed my soul, it has changed my nation, it has changed you—and not always for the better. The pain and suffering it brings are great. Perhaps too great. What I experienced on Cemetery Ridge cuts and chops away at me inside.”
After a few more moments of silence, Iain finally put his arm around her shoulders and drew her close. “Some soldiers feel just as you feel, Avery. Perhaps the majority. But they will never show it or talk about it. They will bury it deep, so deep they count on it never rising to the surface. Others will shrug it off. If you asked them, they would say in war it’s kill or be killed. That you can’t dwell on it. Only survive and carry on and do your duty. I suppose there are a few that truly don’t feel a thing, who wouldn’t understand your pain. But most, if they were honest, could see themselves in your shoes. They would admit war is ugly and gruesome. But then they would ask, what is the alternative? Leave the nation divided and broken? Leave four million in slavery? So I guess only you can answer what you ask—are the slaves worth what you’ve gone through? Is the Republic? Is the town of Gettysburg?”
She could not think of anything to say in response.
He gently squeezed her shoulder. “You told me William was killed at Fort Wagner in July. With the Fifty-Forth Massachusetts.”
“Yes. We saw his name in the Boston papers. In the casualty lists.”
“Tell me—would he say his life was worth the fight for freedom? That he was glad to pay the price? That he’d do it all over again? You know William better than I do.”
“I know what he’d say. I know.” She did not bother trying to stop the tears that burned her face. “He believed heaven was on our side. That God was on our side. That’s what he felt in his heart. He kept quoting two verses from the Bible, from the book of Judges—‘They fought from heaven; the stars in their courses fought against Sisera. The river of Kishon swept them away, that ancient river, the river Kishon. O my soul, thou hast trodden down strength.’ He was thinking about it as the defeat of General Lee.”
She knotted and unknotted her hands.
“It is difficult … but I … I must side with William,” she went on. “Despite war’s terrors, which leave a bitter taste of bile at the back of my throat, I would rather have it and end slavery than not have it and see slavery perpetuated with no end in sight. For it would, I know it would. I have no illusions about the capacity for wickedness of the human heart. I’ve read the Confederate constitution. They mean to enshrine bondage in their nation and take it west wherever the Confederacy grows. They mean to clasp it to their bosom indefinitely. We must end slavery, Iain. It’s worth the pain and sacrifice to end it. But the price is hard. It’s so very hard.”
Yet even after she was able to resolve this, weeping in the church in Iain’s arms, she couldn’t return to the ridges or the valley or the hills. It was still too much. But refusing to go to the peach orchard or the Round Tops or up to the stone wall on Cemetery Ridge didn’t spare Clarissa the rack and ruin of war, for many buildings in town and a good number of houses had bullet holes in them, which she couldn’t fail to notice. Now and then she saw the stain of blood too, black and dried and hard—it was on picket fences, in alleys, on walkways, on the roads, on the stones. So every day the battle she’d witnessed was before her. It was not only in her mind. She could still touch it with her hand. She saw it in Iain’s limp. War was in the mirror that showed hair that stubbornly refused to grow back and return, in any appreciable way, to the deep crimson hue she’d been born with.
When people talked about Gettysburg in the papers now, they talked about the Battle of Gettysburg. The town had become the battle; it no longer had any life of its own. The three-day fight that took so many lives was the reason people came to visit. The valley was not just the valley anymore—it was Pickett’s Charge. Little Round Top was the bayonet attack of the Twentieth Maine. Cemetery Ridge was the stand of the Sixty-Ninth Pennsylvania. The stone wall was the Bloody Angle. The chestnut oaks were the trees Confederate troops marched toward and used as a marker for their assault—nothing more. It was up to her to come to terms with all of that. It was up to her to make sense of her town, and its farms and fields and hills, and of the great battle.
In the midst of her ongoing struggle, another visitor came to Gettysburg because of the battle. Only because of the battle. And he brought thousands with him. Only because of the battle. And he had something to say. Only because of the battle.
It was Abraham Lincoln.
At first she had made up her mind that she would not go to hear him speak.
Because now they had turned her town into a graveyard for the burial of the Union dead. The Soldiers’ National Cemetery at Gettysburg—that was what they called it. To Clarissa, it was another blow. Her town was reduced to burial plots and monuments. And Lincoln had come to consecrate all this.
Yes, the fight for the Republic was worth it. She had made up her mind about that with William at her shoulder. The fight for abolition and emancipation were worth it. But did the fight and the way it was remembered have to continue to destroy the sweet rustic beauty of the town she’d grown up in?
When the day in November came, when some fifteen thousand people jammed Gettysburg to see Lincoln dedicate the National Cemetery, Iain did not try to persuade her to be part of the occasion. He would go, and her parents would attend the consecration with him. Clarissa must make up her own mind.
Was memorializing the great battle a wrong or a right? Did it make her town more, or did it make her town less? Should Gettysburg become a shrine to a decisive battle against rebellion and slavery, or should the battle be forgotten and Gettysburg forgotten along with it?
Just before Iain and Clarissa’s parents pulled out of the yard that morning, Clarissa emerged from the house in a navy dress and cloak with a matching bonnet and sat beside Iain, who was driving the carriage, as if nothing had ever been amiss.
“You changed your mind,” he said.
“I didn’t change it,” she replied, looking straight ahead. “I never made it up in the first place.”
“Oh. All right.”
“Yes. All right.”
Iain was a wounded veteran of the very battle the cemetery had been created to commemorate. A number of his men were already interred there, so he was directed to an area set aside for veterans, where he and his party could sit fairly comfortably. Clarissa endured the band music and ceremony and the two hours of oration by Edward Everett of Harvard College: “Standing beneath this serene sky, overlooking these broad fields now reposing from the labors of the waning year, the mighty Alleghenies dimly towering before us, the graves of our brethren beneath our feet, it is with hesitation that I raise my poor voice to break the eloquent silence of God and Nature….”
And then President Lincoln finally stood up.
He was taller than she had expected and his voice a higher pitch too, His face was pale and he looked ill. Even somewhat haggard and destroyed. The way she looked in the mirror if she had fought the fight at Cemetery Ridge all over again in her mind the night or afternoon before. She stared at Lincoln’s craggy face and had no doubt he had fought the battle here, and the one at Antietam, at Vicksburg, at Bull Run, at Chancellorsville. He had fought them all, suffered through every defeat, and died a hundred thousand deaths with the men, both North and South, who had fallen in Virginia and Tennessee and Mississippi and Maryland and Pennsylvania. That, in a way, he too was interred at this cemetery along with the Union soldiers and officers who lay in silence under the earth. Seeing him look like death changed everything for Clarissa in a moment. She sat up and paid attention and prepared to drink in every word he spoke.
But there was not much to drink in. Lincoln only spoke for three or four
minutes. She heard every word clearly and tried to absorb each sentence. She had thought he would speak for an hour. But he was no sooner on his feet than he was done and the band was playing a dirge. She continued to stare at what she could see of Lincoln and caught a glimpse of his face a final time. It was the color of ice and snow.
He slept with the Union dead.
She turned to Iain. “I want to go and look now.”
Fifteen thousand people were dispersing all around them, and he glanced at her in surprise. “What’s that?”
“I want to go everywhere. I want to go where we fought. I want to see the fields and the heights. I want to see the stone wall, where it zigs and zags. I want to see the copse of chestnut oaks. I want to go to the Round Tops where we picnicked.” She paused, as if catching her breath. “I want to see the town that saved America.”
Iain stood rooted. “You said …”
“I know what I said. I’ve changed my mind.”
“Why? Why now? Lincoln didn’t give us much of a speech.”
“Oh, he gave me enough. True, I could have handled a good deal more. But he gave me enough.” She gripped his arm. “We live. We live because of this town and what happened here. And now, because of that, this town shall live forever. You understand that, don’t you? This town and America shall live forever.”
He stared. “You astonish me. You ought to have done the oratory here instead of Everett.”
“Please bring the carriage round. While folks are hobnobbing here, you can take my mother and father and me up to Cemetery Ridge.”
“That is truly what you want, Avery?”
She smiled. “That is truly what Avery wants.”
And it was what she wanted. Standing at the trees and the angle in the wall for the first time since the night of Independence Day, when she’d waited impatiently for Lee and his army to retreat south, she suddenly felt right. She saw where Pat O’Shea had fallen and told the rough-hewn Irishman, You died for something. She saw the green flag and the American flag and the boys in blue struck to the ground by musket fire, and she said, Your lives weren’t thrown away for power or politics. You gave America its breath. Now we can live a life again. The crashing roar of cannons swept over her, just as it had more than four months before, along with storm clouds of dirty smoke, and she saw the blue line bend and then snap back more solid than before, and she watched the red battle flags of the Confederacy fall and fall.
It did not take long for the sun to set in November in Pennsylvania, or for the air to cool once it did. All sorts of people were exploring Cemetery Ridge and Little Round Top, and many of them walked the route Pickett’s men had taken from one side of the valley to the other. However, once the stars began to appear that Thursday night and the half-moon rose, the ridges and hills and valley were deserted but for Clarissa and her party, for she had insisted they remain until the four of them were alone.
“Such a change has come over you, my dear,” her mother murmured. “What is it?”
“I can memorize quite well,” Clarissa replied.
“Yes, dear, I know that. You were quick to pick up your letters and your numbers.”
“Mrs. Henry said I had a mind like a series of daguerreotypes. Today, I suppose, she might use the term photographic to describe my mind instead.”
“I suppose she might. What’s this about, darling?”
Clarissa stood at the wall and began to recite, linking her arm through Iain’s: “‘It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us, that from these honored dead, we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain, that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.’” She smiled at Iain. “I believe I have that down to a T. You can compare it to what the newspapers print in the morning.”
He shook his head. “Every day I’ve spent with you, you never fail to knock me back on my heels.”
“Good. So, let me knock you back a little more. It’s time for a ceremony the whole world can see. Marry me, Iain.”
“Avery …”
“God has witnessed our love and devotion to one another. Now let all Gettysburg witness it. Marry me, Iain Kerry Kilgarlin.”
“Oh Avery.” He laughed. “With all my heart.”
“And all of mine too. Every single part. With nothing missing, my love. Absolutely nothing.”
Early on the morning of Christmas Day, snow mixed with rain came as slowly and softly as cherry blossoms, as white as daisy petals, as silver as coins. Bells pealed from all the churches in town, not simply because it was Christmas Day, but because the town knew that Iain and Clarissa were getting married—Iain was their war hero, Clarissa one of the brave women who had gone out into the fields at night to save the wounded. Clarissa arrived at Christ’s Church by carriage with her two bridesmaids, while Iain and his groomsmen waited patiently by the altar with the Lutheran minister. Although the Lutheran church was not prepared to have its bells ring out until after the ceremony, the other churches filled the air with their strong and beautiful sounds, commencing at eight and carrying through until a quarter after the hour.
“Oh my, that sounds wonderful!” exclaimed Clarissa, as she walked up the steps to the doors of the church, her bridesmaids lifting the long train of her white gown. “A little like heaven.”
“I hope your marriage will be a little like heaven,” one of her bridesmaids said. “From beginning to end.”
Clarissa smiled. “Thank you. I get goose bumps when I think about sharing the rest of my life with him.”
If Iain grinned with boyish delight—looking down the aisle to the back of the small church and seeing his young bride gleaming in a dress whiter than the snow falling outside, carrying a bouquet of three dozen roses as crimson as her short hair—Clarissa felt herself quiver from head to toe, drinking in the vision of her man, tall and heroic in his blue uniform, his groomsmen equally handsome in theirs, having been granted leave from the Sixty-Ninth Pennsylvania to stand with Major Kilgarlin at his wedding. Their swords glistened in the candlelight, their gold braid sparkled, their polished boots shone. Clarissa started up the aisle, the organ filled the church with its music and its power, and everyone in the packed sanctuary stood.
She scarcely heard the vows she made. After all they had been through on the Underground Railroad and at the Battle of Gettysburg, she was finally marrying the man she cherished, the man whose life she had saved twice. It was like a daydream that she might conjure up while she sat in the porch swing or when she walked past the flower gardens and picket fences of her town. The only sentences that mattered to her were when the minister said, “I now pronounce you man and wife,” quickly followed by “You may kiss the bride,” and then Iain’s own whisper as their lips came together: “You are easily as beautiful as the sun or the moon, Clarissa Avery. I will love you long after this earth has ended for both of us. Before God, my sweet bride, you are my soul mate, and I shall happily love you for all eternity.”
There were four other officers among the guests, all hailing from Adams County and from different regiments. They joined the groomsmen in drawing their sabers on the church steps and creating an arch of steel the newly married couple had to duck to walk under.
“One slip and my hair will be even shorter than it already is,” Clarissa giggled, hugging her husband’s arm. “What will you do with me then?”
“The same I intend to do with you now.” Iain was grinning his boyish grin again. “Whisk you away on the most amazing honeymoon God has ever gazed upon since He created our green planet.”
“It’s not green here today, Major Kilgarlin, sir.”
“Pennsylvania has put on white just as you have put on white. It’s the most splendid day in the history of the world.”
“My, your language is extravagant, s
ir.”
“It is an extravagant day, my dear Avery, and a soldier must keep in step.”
The last two officers dropped their sabers, barring the couple from passing through, and one said, “Kiss required to pass.”
Clarissa glanced at Iain. “You never told me about this.”
“The army has so many traditions I can’t remember them all.” Iain shrugged and smiled. “Anyways, I like this one. It beats shining my boots or polishing my belt buckle.”
She laughed. “I’m certainly glad to hear that.” She took her time with the kiss, drawing him in as close as she dared. “Now. Does that satisfy the major?”
“It does. But the sabers haven’t lifted yet, Avery. You will have to bless me with another.”
“I will, will I?” She grinned and pressed her rose-red lips against his once more. “Anything for an officer and a gentleman.”
This kiss was even longer. She loved the combined sensations of snow falling on her head and shoulders, the sting of cold on her cheeks, the wetness of his face where the snow drops were melting, the warmth of his mouth on hers, and the strength of his embrace that made her feel so happy and safe. When the sabers lifted and they finally broke off the kiss, she saw him take a gulp of air, as if he’d been drowning and in desperate need of oxygen, and this made her even happier.
“It’s a good thing we have permission to carry on now, Major Kilgarlin,” she teased, unable to suppress her most dazzling and mischievous smile. “I fear another kiss from me may kill you.”
He shot his boyish grin back at her. “Believe me, it would be a most pleasant and honorable death.”
“My, my, such conspicuous gallantry. How bold and fearless an officer you are, sir, braving musket fire and cannon blasts and a Yankee girl’s kisses.”
“I am a man of audacious courage, aren’t I?”
