North Carolina’s impact, presence, and sway is more far reaching than within the 53,819 square miles it encompasses. And even though a Macon County connection is not always obvious, anyone who has lived in N.C. for very long holds some affinity and dedication to the state, which was not only one of the original 13 colonies, but also the first state to instruct its delegates to vote for independence from the British crown during the Second Continental Congress. Thus, this series spotlights some little-known people, places, general facts, etc. to broaden readers’ state-related knowledge. Read past installments at www.maconsense.org.
The majority of the 1,328 monuments, memorials, markers, and plaques within 5,700 acres of Pennsylvania’s Gettysburg National Military Park are tombstone-like. However, one truly distinct memorial represents the North Carolina soldiers who fought at Gettysburg.
The edifices dotting the preserved battlefield landscape are intended to pay tribute to a particular fighting division within the Union or the Confederacy. They stand as a reminder that the Union and Confederate armies each lost more than 3,000 soldiers during those three days of fighting July 1-3, 1863.
In fact, all 11 Confederate states and 17 of the United States are represented on the Gettysburg battlefield, with the State of Maryland memorial honoring men from both sides of the fighting since Maryland was both a slave-holding state and border state straddling the dividing line between fighting northern and southern soldiers; Maryland did not secede from the Union.
Crafted by a famous sculptor
The same sculptor who achieved Mount Rushmore, featuring the massive faces of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln, on the rocky Black Hills of South Dakota, was chosen for the North Carolina monument at Gettysburg. John Gutzon de la Mothe Borglum (1867-1941), also the sculptor for Stone Mountain in Georgia as well as many more works, was approached by the North Carolina United Daughters of the Confederacy to design and create the Gettysburg monument. The proposal for the monument was drawn up by a group of N.C. Civil War veterans in the early 1900s. Purchasing the site on the Gettysburg battlefield for the sculpture as well as commissioning Borglum cost around $50,000 in 1926. The sculpture was dedicated on July 3, 1929, 66 years to the day of heavy fighting by N.C. troops at Gettysburg.
Borglum conceived the sculpture by studying photographs of Confederate soldiers. Instead of an upright, posed sculpture indicative of many historically significant sculptures throughout the battlefield, the N.C. memorial displays movement. The four N.C. infantrymen represented exhibit expressions of fear, fatigue, and determination as they lean forward – advancing during Pickett’s Charge, one of the most famous battles of Gettysburg. It was in this battle that 15 different N.C. infantry regiments fought and suffered heavy casualties.
Walking around the sculpture and studying the realistic faces – the wrinkles on the strained brows, the clenched teeth, and the wide eyes – is almost an eerie experience in that the individuals represented appear not as inanimate bronze sculptures but real people momentarily inert. You expect them to blink, point their guns from muscular, tense arms, or lower the flag pole and politely ask for you to move out of their path.
One soldier is kneeling and visibly injured from the tattered shirt hanging from his shoulder and his arm in a makeshift sling; but he points resolutely to where his fellow soldiers must proceed.
All in all, 32 Carolina regiments were in action during the three days of fighting at Gettysburg; thus, even though 15 fought at Pickett’s Charge, the poignant and remarkable Borglum sculpture situated on Seminary Ridge pays tribute to them all.
In 1963, President John F. Kennedy was present at the N.C. monument 100 years after the N.C. soldiers fought. Visitors to the Gettysburg National Military Park can experience this N.C.-significant site as well.
