Save Camp Letterman

By Timothy A. Duskin · Originally published January 2018 · p. 5

When Gen. Robert E. Lee left Gettysburg on July 4, 1863, with the Army of Northern Virginia, he was forced to leave soldiers who were too severely wounded to be moved or who lay too close to the Union lines to be retrieved. Estimates vary, but the wagon train of wounded which he took back to Virginia was at least fifteen miles long. Major General George G. Meade, commander of the Army of the Potomac, was expecting another significant battle and took most of his army’s medical personnel and ambulances with him. This left Gettysburg, a town of less than 2,400 people, to care for over 20,000 wounded Union and Confederate soldiers. Every building in and around the town, including private residences, was a hospital to help the wounded. In addition to field hospitals all over the battlefield, some wounded were in woods with only trees for covering; some were in the open air on the field. Once the railroad line into Gettysburg, which had been damaged by Maj. Gen. Jubal A. Early’s troops before the battle, was repaired on July 10, assistance was unable to arrive. Help came from charitable organizations, foremost among which were the United States Sanitary Commission (USSC) and the United States Christian Commission (USCC), as well as individuals from both the North and the South. A limited number of Union army surgeons were assigned to Gettysburg at this time. Some Confederate surgeons were ordered by Lee’s medical director to stay behind. The Union wounded began being transferred to military hospitals in Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington. The Confederate wounded were sent to prison camps, including Point Lookout, Md. Some soldiers were so severely wounded that they could not be moved from Gettysburg. A central field hospital for them was established on July 22 at the George Wolf farm a mile east of town on the York Pike. It was 150 yards from the railroad track so that supplies and personnel could arrive there and the wounded could be evacuated once they recovered enough. The hospital was named Camp Letterman General Hospital after Major Jonathan Letterman, the Medical Director of the Army of the Potomac. Dr. Henry Janes, the Medical Director of all field hospitals around Gettysburg, placed Dr. Cyrus N. Chamberlain in charge of Camp Letterman. It was the largest field hospital in North American history, comprised of multiple rows of more than 400 tents. By August 10, all the corps field hospitals had been closed and Camp Letterman was the only field hospital remaining in Gettysburg. It had over 4,000 patients, more than a third of whom were Confederates. At this point, most of the army surgeons were relieved and volunteers took over. The USSC and the USCC each had a section of tents and their efforts continued to be very prominent. Since the cases which remained were the direst ones, Camp Letterman had a very high mortality rate. Careful records were kept because of the severity of the cases. These records were sent to the Surgeon General’s office and later reported in The Medical and Surgical History of the War of the Rebellion, 1861–65. A temporary hospital cemetery was established that had about 1,200 graves. The Union dead were later reinterred at the Soldier’s National Cemetery while many Confederate dead were removed to the South. The Union and Confederate soldiers were not separated in its facilities, but were housed and treated together. A friendship developed among the soldiers, who were all struggling for their lives. The USCC had a banquet for all the wounded soldiers at Camp Letterman. This was the first such incident, which would parallel those at the Gettysburg reunions that occurred numerous times after the war. The last soldiers were evacuated from Camp Letterman by November 20, the day after dedication of the National Cemetery. The hospital was then closed and the remaining supplies were sent back to Washington. The remaining doctors and nurses left for other battlefields. The War Department erected a monument to designate the Camp Letterman site in 1914. In spite of Camp Letterman’s existence for over four months after the battle and its great significance, it has been largely forgotten in the annals of the Battle of Gettysburg and the Civil War. It is also unknown to most Gettysburg visitors today. In 1933, Daniel Skelly, who was a young boy living in Gettysburg in 1863, wrote of the Camp Letterman site, “It has always been a wonder to me that the government, when it was acquiring the historic fields upon which the battle was fought and other sections now included in the reservation, did not buy these woods, one of the most historic and sacred spots on the field.” In 2006, Camp Letterman was the proposed site of a casino. It was also considered as the site of a Target Store, which was later built east of the site. It was also previously the site of a mobile home community which has since been removed. There is now a Giant Food Store on the site of the hospital tents. Of the remainder of the Camp Letterman site, eight acres are owned by the Gettysburg Battlefield Preservation Association (GBPA), which has been trying to preserve the site for twenty years. The remaining seventeen acres are owned by S&A Homes, which purchased them to build a housing development. The development is temporarily on hold because the GBPA is attempting to purchase the land from them. The GBPA is asking people to write to S&A Homes and ask them to preserve the site by selling it to the GBPA at a reasonable price. The GBPA then seeks to turn the site over to the National Park Service for incorporation into the Gettysburg National Military Park. In addition to being the site of Camp Letterman, Graham’s Battery and Nelson’s Artillery Battalion were positioned there on July 3, 1863, and comprised the left end of the Confederate artillery line during the barrage preceding Pickett’s Charge. Thus, it is a significant part of the battlefield itself. Interested parties can write to the developer at: S&A Homes Bob Poole, CEO Suite 200 2121 Old Gatesburg Road State College, PA 16803 Telephone: 814-231-4780 Writer profile: Timothy A. Duskin is from Northern Virginia and has a B.A. in history from American Christian College, Tulsa, Okla., and a M.A. in international relations from the University of Oklahoma. He worked for 22 years as an Archives Technician at the National Archives and Records Administration in Washington, D.C. He is a founding member of the Bull Run Civil War Round Table in Centreville, Va., and is a contributor to its newsletter, The Stone Wall. He is also a founding member of the Seminary Ridge Museum in Gettysburg and a member of the Civil War Trust.