I know this is a lot of pictures for one post, but I wanted to (finally) finish out the pictures from this trip and then maybe we can get back to some quilting pictures :^)
On Saturday after all the reunion festivities we stopped at the Pennsylvania Monument and it is massive. The brown plaques around the bottom are lists of names. It's hard to see but just under the top dome is a viewing platform - the spiral stairs were inside one of the columns.
The view was fabulous and I especially appreciated these copper discs pointing out the places we had already visited to put it the battlefield in perspective.
There was even a Reb at the base of this monument...funny thing was, I turned around and he was GONE! Like in to thin air and there was no place to hide...
Later that evening we walked around downtown and eventually stopped at the Rupp House. I have this gentleman's card at home but he talked about the house, saying that the 2 sides of the war were tip toe-ing thru town to fight each other when eventually they decided to shoot thru the houses at each other! Mr Rupp had sent his family away to safer grounds but he had stayed and was hiding in the basement during the battle.
At least the basement door was there to protect him - it didn't fare too well!
I bought a teacup at the Rupp House - I doubt it's antique but it's a nice reminder of my trip.
Sunday morning started early with a 3 hour walking tour of where my g-g-grandfather's regiment fought. The sky was blue and clear and deceptively warm. I was wishing for a couple more layers. GGGrandfather's regiment was part of Col Smith's 2nd Brigade and they fought on Smith's Ridge along with 2 other regiments.
At the time, the ridge was open fields without much to protect the men from gunfire.
Today, it's residential streets. You can see the ever-so-slight ridge - the photo was taken from the top of the ridge, with the National Cemetery behind us.
After the tour we visited with Lincoln on a trip back to the Military Museum gift shop
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| Check out the rabbit ears in true Ballinger fashion. |
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| And who can resist a former president's lap? |
Our last stop before heading home was to
Abraham's Lady. They sell civil war dresses and accessories. You can also buy civil war repro-fabric and patterns to sew your own dress. And you know what happens when people sew??!! There are scraps!!!!!!!!!!!! You can buy bags of scraps for $7 or they had a hamper of scraps that were a dollar each. I managed to limit myself to $20 worth of fabric but there was such variety it was hard - I'm guessing I have somewhere between 4 and 5 yards of scraps with lots of selvages. The lady also told me they would be happy to mail out scrap bags. I don't see them specifically listed on their website but feel free to
contact them for details.
I hope y'all enjoyed my trip - I know I did!
