Lindsey Albertson Bailey and the Wheatfield at Gettysburg

On Saturday, April 12, 2014, Gma and I toured the Gettysburg Battlefield with our granddaughter Lindsey and her husband Alex. One of the sites we visited is the Wheatfield, scene of some of the fiercest fighting on July 2, 1863.

It is estimated that over 6,000 men were killed, wounded or captured as the twenty-six acres of wheat changed hands between the North and South six times. 

George Rosensteel who opened the first Gettysburg National Museum in 1921 where Gma worked as a clerk in the summers when she was a student at Shippensburg State Teachers, claimed you could not walk across the Wheatfield without stepping on a dead body.

Following the battle, Francis C. Ogden, who farmed the property for owner, George Rose, submitted a claim to the Office of the Quartermaster General for $481 for the wheat destroyed by the Union and rebel armies. 

The claim was denied because there was no proof that “the property was actually received or taken for the use of, and used by, the U. S. Army.”

On Saturday, April 12, Lindsey walked in the footsteps of her GGGG Uncle, Francis C. Ogden, who planted and cultivated the Wheatfield at Gettysburg 150 years ago.

Bruce

April 9, 2014