Last Ghost at Gettysburg

by Paul Ferrante

  “Oh, yeah,” said Bortnicker. “Can’t wait for this weekend.”

  “Wait a minute,” said Elway, taking in the various articles that had spilled from the bags. “You two are...participating in the reenactment?”

  “Of course,” said Bortnicker offhandedly. “We figured, why not? Say, have there been any sightings lately?”

  “None to speak of,” said Elway, not letting Bortnicker’s comment rile him. “But you never know. This event creates an atmosphere that could bring something out.”

  “You think?” said Bortnicker, who was obviously enjoying himself.

  “C’mon, Bortnicker, we’ve gotta go,” said T.J., tugging at his friend’s tattered Boston Red Sox tee shirt.

  “Right. Later, Mr. Elway,” he said over his shoulder as they staggered up the sidewalk.

  * * * *

  Some twenty minutes later Al Warren’s phone rang. He truly didn’t want to answer it, as he’d spent the entire morning overseeing the setup of the police and EMT command posts on the reenactment “battlefield.” There had already been various fender benders around town, a shoplifting complaint, and a late night call from the Cannonade Motel manager about a bunch of rowdy reenactors from Arkansas who had gotten stinking drunk and were singing “Dixie” at the top of their lungs. What now? he wondered as he picked up the phone.

  “Chief? It’s Wyatt Moss over at The Battle Cry.”

  “Oh, hi, Wyatt. What’s the problem? Somebody try to lift something?”

  “No, nothing like that. You said to call if anyone came in asking for period ammo?”

  Suddenly Warren was all ears. He slid forward in his seat. “What happened?”

  “Well, these two boys came in. One kinda looked like a young Paul McCartney—”

  “And the other was a goofball with Coke bottle glasses.”

  “Right! How’d you know?”

  “It’s not important. What’d they buy?”

  “Well, besides two complete Civil War drummer boy outfits, which cost a pretty penny, let me tell you, the good looking one bought four .44 bullets and some cartridges.”

  “Repro?”

  “Nope. They were period.”

  “You’re sure that’s what he wanted?”

  “Chief, he specifically asked for ‘never fired .44 pistol bullets.’”

  “And you sold them to him?”

  “Chief, there’s no law against purchasing antique bullets. It’s not like the kid bought a gun to go with it.”

  “Okay, okay, thanks for the call, Wyatt. Sorry I was short with you. It’s been a long day.”

  “That’s okay, Al, I understand. But you’ve got to pace yourself. It’s only Monday. We’ve got a whole week to go.”

  “You’re right,” said Warren, reaching into his desk for some Advil. “Let me know if they come back.”

  “Will do.”

  Warren washed down three pills with some iced tea and sat back in his desk chair, rubbing his face. How could this day get any worse? As if in reply, the phone rang again. He took a deep breath and picked up. “Chief Warren.”

  “Al?” said Carlton Elway, “you’ll never guess who I just ran into.”

  * * * *

  By the time the boys finally mounted the Darcys’ porch they were exhausted and soaked to the skin. Aunt Terri and LouAnne relieved them of their baggage and they collapsed onto the living room couch. “I’ll be back in a second with some lemonade,” Terri said, as LouAnne started poking through the various bags. “How much coin did you guys drop on all this?” she marveled.

  “History comes at a price,” said T.J.

  “I guess,” she said. “But I have good news for you.”

  “They’ve cancelled the reenactment?” mumbled Bortnicker.

  “Ah, no, sorry. Apparently, my dad called his buddy, Matty, who stores all the regiment’s bulky stuff in his farm’s barn, and ol’ Matt just couldn’t wait to drop off your drums and sticks so you can get to drumming. He also emailed Dad some guidelines, which I have graciously printed out for you.”

  “You’re too kind,” said Bortnicker.

  “Can I see them?” requested T.J.

  “Here you go,” said his cousin, handing over the document.

  He started reading through the material, skipping over the part about obtaining the right equipment, tightening the drum heads, etc. “It says here there’s a manual we should read called Bruce and Emmett’s Fifer and Drummer’s Guide,” he said with a frown.

  “Oh, sorry. It’s in the garage with the drums. Matty left that as well.”

  T.J. started passing the printout sheets over to Bortnicker, who did a quick study. “Well,” he said, “because of all the stuff we had to do in orchestra at school, we know all the ‘traditional grip’ stuff and basic drum rolls and whatnot. In the manual we’ll find the basic pieces like assembly, drummers call and reveille.”

  “We’ll need to have the music for some of the songs in here,” said T.J. “Let’s see...there’s some I’ve heard of like ‘Yankee Doodle’ and ‘Garry Owen’ but some of these others like ‘Army 6/8’ and ‘Connecticut Halftime’ I’ve never heard of.”

  “I’m burning you guys a CD of those tunes as we speak,” beamed LouAnne.

  “Well then, Bortnicker, let’s get out of these sopping clothes, grab a sandwich and get after it,” sighed T.J.

  “Might as well.”

  After changing they sat down for some tuna sandwiches and lemonade and then ventured into the garage where they found two fairly new Civil War reproduction drums with eagles stenciled on the side, along with the 72nd Pennsylvania logo. After adjusting their cotton slings so that the drum fell around their left hip, they went into the spacious back yard and worked on some basic rolls. LouAnne joined them and set up a beach chair with a mini umbrella attached.

  “The manual says that keeping your posture erect is a big thing,” reminded T.J. “These drums are gonna get heavy after a while.”

  They stayed in place for a time, working out the various rolls until they were pretty much in sync. After a while LouAnne looked up from her paperback. “Uh, guys, don’t forget the marching part,” she said sweetly.

  “All in good time,” responded Bortnicker through gritted teeth.

  Slowly they began, a few steps at first, then ten yards, then fifty, back and forth, stopping occasionally for lemonade refills that LouAnne poured. It was monotonous, repetitive work, and the boys were again dripping sweat, but neither wanted to quit, especially in front of their one-girl audience.

  After what seemed like years they removed their drums and crumpled to the ground, staring at the sky, and never noticed Mike pulling his truck into the driveway. Suddenly he was standing over them. “How goes it, troopers?” he joked, as LouAnne chuckled.

  “I don’t know, Daddy, you might want to have these two court-martialed,” she chided.

  “Nonsense,” he said, sitting down beside the exhausted boys. “I think it’s cool you guys want to do this. Don’t get too carried away. Just a basic cadence will get you through. All the guys in the regiment will be really appreciative and will help you however they can. They’ll set up a tent for you and everything.”

  “Will they install central air conditioning in this tent?” asked Bortnicker.

  “Can’t help you on that one. Not authentic. But I’ll tell you what. Seeing how dedicated you guys are to all this, I will suck it up and sleep in the camp as well.”

  “Oh, the sacrifice!” wailed LouAnne dramatically, the back of her hand to her forehead.

  “How many nights are we talking about here, Uncle Mike?” asked T.J., sitting up.

  “Friday and Saturday should do it,” he answered. “We’ll be doing two reenactments: The Wheatfield on Saturday and Pickett’s Charge on Sunday. I worked my schedule so these would be my days off.”

  “That gives us three more days to practice,” said T.J. “I think we’ve done enough for one day.”

  “You got that right,” agreed Bortnic
ker. “I’m gonna have to put a pad under my pants to keep the drum from whacking my thigh so much.”

  “Tell you what,” said Mike. “Why don’t you guys grab a shower and we’ll grill some burgers and stop at the ice cream shop later on?”

  “Solid!” said Bortnicker. “You know what they say...an army travels on its stomach!”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Wednesday and Thursday were pretty much the same. T.J. and LouAnne went for their morning run, they ate breakfast, and then the boys resumed their drumming practice as LouAnne helped her mom with chores around the small barn and henhouse. Mrs. Spath, like many area residents, would be out of town for the Reenactment Weekend, so LouAnne had some time to spend around the house.

  With their intense level of repetition, the boys were actually becoming proficient in the basic fundamentals, but by Thursday afternoon they needed a break.

  “I have an idea,” said Bortnicker. “Since we’re gonna be doing Pickett’s Charge on Sunday, what do you think about checking out Cemetery Ridge one last time to see what we’ll be recreating?”

  “Not my idea of a break, man,” groaned T.J. “Still, you’re probably right.”

  “Hey,” chimed in LouAnne, “know what would be cool? Why don’t we recreate Pickett’s Charge?”

  “Say what?” said T.J.

  “I mean, let’s walk down Seminary Ridge to the Virginia Memorial. It’s only a couple hundred yards down the road. Then we can walk across the field all the way to the Union lines on Cemetery Ridge. You can see what Hilliard was talking about.”

  “Makes sense,” said Bortnicker.

  “I had a feeling you’d agree,” mumbled T.J.

  After lunch they strolled along the ridge, noting again the Confederate markers and cannon lining both sides of the one-way road. Finally they came to the Virginia Memorial, an imposing structure with bronze soldiers at the base of a large pedestal atop which sat Robert E. Lee astride his favorite horse, Traveler.

  “This has to be the most bigtime Southern monument,” said T.J.

  “Correct,” said LouAnne. “Now, if you look straight across, you’ll see some farm fields, then the Emmitsburg Road where they had the split-rail fence Hilliard described, then a couple hundred more yards to the Union lines. All told, the Confederates had to cross one thousand yards of wide open territory, with no trees or other type of cover.”

  “That’s like...suicidal,” marveled T.J.

  “Yep, I’d say so. Let’s see how long it takes us to walk it.”

  The three set out, side by side, striding purposefully. The wheat or whatever it was had been mowed recently, but the terrain was still uneven, and by the time they reached the Emmitsburg Road they were sweating in the midday heat.

  “Okay,” said LouAnne. “Now, in 1863 the embankments on each side rose up a bit, topped by the fence. The road itself was kind of sunken. So you can see how hard it was for them to walk up the bank and climb the fence.”

  “They were like sitting ducks!” cried Bortnicker.

  “Exactly. It’s no wonder a lot of them were huddled there, afraid to move forward. That’s why Hilliard was trying to get them to push down the fence. But in doing so they would’ve been exposed to all sorts of cannon and rifle fire.”

  “Oh, man,” said T.J. “Well, let’s push on.”

  They crossed the road, which was now a two-lane blacktop, and resumed their trek on a gradual upgrade toward the Union defense line on Cemetery Ridge. There were monuments and statues all along the ridge, cannons behind them.

  “See that bunch of trees?” said LouAnne, pointing to a part of the wall that jutted out a bit. “That’s called ‘The Angle.’ It’s where some Southern troops did actually break through. Let’s head for there.” They completed their journey by climbing over the knee-high loose-stone wall similar to those the boys saw everywhere in Connecticut. “Now,” she said, “turn back and look at how far we came in just under twenty minutes.”

  “Wow,” said Bortnicker. “It took us only twenty minutes, but to those poor guys it must’ve seemed like forever.”

  “Those who made it,” added T.J.

  “Check this out,” said LouAnne, motioning the boys over to a chest-high stone marker. “This is a rarity, a Confederate monument in the middle of the Union lines.”

  “How come?” asked T.J.

  “It’s dedicated to General Lewis Armistead, who decided to lead the attack, on foot, as an example to his men. Word has it he stuck his hat on his sword, raised it high, and ran in front of them, actually making it over the wall into the Union troops. Then he got shot up pretty badly. He died shortly thereafter in a Union field hospital. People come here and, as you can see, leave offerings of coins on the monument. Nobody knows how that got started.”

  “Hey, T.J.!” said Bortnicker proudly. “Look here! The 14th Connecticut Infantry was on the front line of defense!”

  “It seems like a lot of the units that were here on Day Three were from the Northeast,” said T.J. He took a long look up and down the line, then turned to his cousin. “You know,” he said seriously, “now I’m glad you talked us into doing this. I can really understand how heroic those guys on both sides were, especially the Confederates. I can also see what Hilliard was trying to do when they shot him in the back. The Confederates didn’t have a chance. But why do they call it ‘Pickett’s Charge’?”

  “Well,” said LouAnne, sounding strangely like her father, “Pickett and Pettigrew’s divisions led the way, under orders from General Longstreet, who of course got his orders from Lee. As the story goes, Pickett’s troops were so decimated by the end that when he returned to the rear, and Lee told him to re-form his division, he answered, ‘General, I have no division!’ That’s when Lee must’ve realized he’d blown it.”

  They sat for a while, watching the other tourists strolling about. A huge tour bus disgorged a large group who seemed to be from Florida or somewhere tropical, as most had tans and flowered Hawaiian shirts. One boy about their age with a puka-shell necklace approached Bortnicker and said, “Yo, dude, which way is the front line?”

  “Thataway, dude,” he replied, pointing at ‘The Angle.’ Then he turned to the cousins and said, “I’ve seen enough. Let’s head out.”

  They picked their way through the crowd, stepped over the wall and walked back toward the Virginia Memorial.

  At dinner that night they told Mike of their excursion to Cemetery Ridge. He listened intently, nodding as they described the landscape and the impressions they got as to the futility of Lee’s attack. “Yeah,” he said finally, “you can say that one encounter turned the tide of the war permanently in the North’s favor. And just think, we’re going to try to do it justice on Sunday.”

  “I don’t know, Uncle Mike,” said T.J., “I know it sounds corny, but don’t you feel like a, um, responsibility to not screw it up, to make it as real as possible?”

  “All reenactors do, T.J.,” said his uncle. “I know a lot of people think we get carried away into fantasy land, but most reenactors have a deep, abiding respect for those whom they portray. That’s why I think you two will do great. You two get it.”

  “So,” said Bortnicker, trying to lighten the mood, “when do we report for duty, sir?”

  “Here’s my suggestion,” said Mike. “I have to work tomorrow, and my unit’s not getting here till late afternoon anyway. But there will be a smaller presentation by some other units called ‘Battle for the Brickyard’ that recreates the conflict on July 1st where a Union Army force fought a delaying tactic as the Confederates surrounded the town. A lot of the fighting occurred near a brickyard close to the Harrisburg Road.

  “If Terri doesn’t mind, she could give you a ride over to the farm to watch the battle. It’ll give you a good idea of what’s in store for us on Saturday and Sunday.

  “Now, there’s going to be hourly demonstrations and seminars on site in different tents near the battlefield area, so you can get there any time after the gates open
and check out whatever interests you all the way up till the battle in the late afternoon. Make sure you put on sunscreen and drink lots of water. And I suggest that T.J. and LouAnne forget about running till after Sunday. We’ll all have to conserve our strength because they’re saying both weekend days are going to be mucho hot.

  “Then I’ll get home from work, load all our uniforms and equipment into the truck, and meet you out there. Our regimental camp should be set up by Friday evening; we’ll get you boys squared away and introduce you to Colonel Pelham and the rest of the men. We’ll sleep at the camp Friday night, as you two ease into it. Then, our regiment’s going to participate in both the Saturday ‘Battle of the Wheatfield’ and the big show on Sunday, ‘Pickett’s Charge.’”

  “I have to work at the Inn Friday night, so Mom’ll be taking me home after Friday’s battle,” said LouAnne. “But I’ll come spectate on Saturday and Sunday. Dad, is it okay if I suit up for a Saturday night camp visit?”

  “As long as you’re in full costume, it shouldn’t be a problem,” said Mike. “And what will you be doing, dear?” he said sweetly to his wife.

  Terri shook her head. “Listen,” she said, “I’ll run the shuttle service, as always, but I think I’ll skip the battles this year. I have misgivings about the boys being out there with so little experience.”

  “Don’t worry, hon, I’ll keep an eye on them,” assured Mike.

  “Oh, yeah? And who’s going to keep an eye on you and your kooky friends?”

  Mike smiled weakly as the teens laughed out loud.

  Chapter Thirty

  Friday morning T.J. was treated to a rare pleasure, an opportunity to sleep late. By the time he rolled out of bed at 7:30 A.M., Bortnicker and Aunt Terri were already clattering pots and pans in the kitchen. LouAnne, wearing a Beatles Rubber Soul tee shirt and pajama bottoms, drifted downstairs right after him.

  Bortnicker, who was frying up some bacon, sang about welcoming people to a place called The Lido for sausage and beer.

  “‘Here at the Western World,’” said LouAnne with a yawn. “Can I have some coffee please?”