American Civil War Game Club (ACWGC)

I found this old photo I took a few years back at Chickamauga. The Park Station is located over by where Rosecrans HQ was located during the battle. Hidden behind some trees is the maintainence shack and it is there that they store some of the broken and vandalized monuments. Anyone who has ever visited Chickamauga is well aware of the vandalism that has occurred over the years as there are many monuments with missing tablets, bayonets, hands, ect. These losses are caused by natural things (tree's falling), drunk drivers, relic hunters, and vandals.



Below is a picture from Shiloh of a very near miss for this Union Campground Marker. I still can't believe the providence that must have intervened for this marker to have been spared given the size of the tree falling around it.

Blake,
It's amazing that someone would be so bent on destroying something, that they could actually break a stone statue...

Oh, for an expanded Department of the Interior budget...hire some more officers, replace the damaged monuments, protect our nation's history. Why don't politicians care about that kind of thing at all? It's a sad state of affairs when the only type of politician that would even care about the preservation of our nation's history would probably be some ultra-Nationalist type looking to recall former glories...

Gettysburg is getting a good going over, but literally thousands of other sites where our common history was written are being built over, or being allowed to degrade so far that they could be gone by the time our grand-children are born (if not even sooner)
<salute>

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Brig. Gen. Nick DeStefano
5th Artillery Battalion, 2nd Division, II "Wolf-Pack" Corps, AotM
[img]http://www.acwgc.org/IVCorps/Image/IVCorps250.png[/img]

I agree Nick. Gettysburg gets a ton of glory, which is fine, but there are alot of other sites out there in need of help. I was at Gettysburg today and they just repaved all of the roads along highway 30 through town and repaved all the sidewalks. The city looks good and healthy. Lots of antique shops and art stores, ect. Do you know whats up the road from Chickamauga? An adult video store, lol. And across, literally, from the National Cemetery at Stones River is another adult video store. They should pass some sort of ordinance giving National Cemeteries some breathing room from Car lots, adult stores, bars, and gas stations.

I think most of the damage occurs from falling trees and bad drivers. People love to fly through battlefields but fail to make turns sharp enough and slam into monuments.

Gettysburg is not immune to such things, there have been similar incidents with statues and such being damaged by vandals there.

I believe one of the reasons the Gettysburg Battlefield looks the way it does is the volunteers who give their time and money to support the park. It is subject to the same decreasing federal funds as the other national parks but the Gettysburg Foundation and the Friends of the National Park at Gettysburg have provided funds and volunteers over the past 20 years that work with the park service in attempting to maintain the park. Over the years these and similar groups have raised money to buy battlefield area land that was being used for commercial purposes and donate it to the park service. Some of the work that used to be done by maintenance people that are no longer available due to budget cuts is now done by volunteers. Although there are members all over the country like myself who attend the annual fundraising events and many of them come to help out on the work days where things such as fence mending and building, clean up and such are done, there is a core group of locals who provide much of the labor for these events.

I visited both Stone's River and Chickamaugua when I was in Tennessee for TC III earlier this year. The area around both parks is much more built up than Gettysburg. Within walking distance of the entrance to Chickamaugua park is a 4-6 lane highway with a very busy business district. Also Chattanooga and Murfreesboro are much bigger cities than Gettysburg. I don't know if they have anything similar to the Gettysburg groups at these parks but if they do I urge those of you who live in the area to support them.

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Gen. Ken Miller



The McKeesport Union Guard

3/1/II
Chief of Staff
AotP

The Civil War Preservation Trust ( http://www.civilwar.org) is one of the organizations that are devoted to acquiring the land, when and where possible, to expand the Battlefield parks, along with others including the Central Virginia and others.

Their efforts in fund raising and their lobbying efforts at the national level as well as local levels have led to increasing the size of many of the preserved battlefields every year.

It is hard to stem the tide of development in these areas, as those that want to develop on and in the battlefield area will continue, like the WALMART at Gettysburg. A few years ago, a developer at Harpers Ferry was DENIED a permit to excavate the higher ground above Harpers Ferry; so on a holiday weekend, he moved his equipment in and dug a trench entirely across the area. I think he got his wrists slapped, but the damage was done. I do not know for sure, but I think the development did stop.

Sometimes, writing letters to various legislatures and local and national politicians are helpful, even from people who are not members of that particular constituency.

Anyway, it all does cost and it all come back to dollars and cents. It is hard to fight against that.

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General Ernie Sands
President ACWGC -Sept 2015- Dec 2020
7th Brigade, 1st Division, XVI Corps, AoT
ACWGC Records Site Admin

"If you do not know where you are going, any road will take you there."