Vicksburg National Military Park

 

Hi!  It's Ivy Rose here.  Our humans took my sister, Izzy, and I with them to the Vicksburg National Military Park.  It is a great place to run around like wild dogs and have a great time except for one little problem called a leash!  Anyway, all four of us had a great time.  Here are some photos of Izzy and me enjoying the sights:

Photo by Jan

Photo by Jan

Photo by Jan

Photo by Jan

Yea, you can always tell when we've had a good time...our tongues hang out!  Hey, it's a dog thing okay!?  Anyway, here is some of what we all saw as we traveled through the Vicksburg National Military Park.  The park commemorates campaign, siege and defense of Vicksburg in 1863.  It includes over 1,340 monuments, markers and plaques.  It contains a sixteen mile tour road, a restored Union gunboat, and a national cemetery.  It is a legacy of the past as Vicksburg National Military Park preserves the site of the American Civil War Battle of Vicksburg, waged from May 18 to July 4, 1863.  Below, the Memorial Arch located at the entrance to the park.

Photo by Jan



 

Here is an example of the many plaques located throughout the park.  Blue represents the Union Army and Red represents the Confederate Army.  As I write this I realize I never snapped a photo of a red plaque, but both blue and red plaques state the campaign, siege, attack, redan (an arrow-shaped embankment

forming part of a fortification),  redoubt (a temporary or

supplementary fortification, typically square or polygonal and without flanking defenses), approach, names, battalions, batteries,



                                                                                                       Photo by Jan

successes and defeats of that particular spot in the park.  These plaques are not just in the park though.  As you ride or walk the City of Vicksburg you see them all over the city, on the road sides, in yards, near stores....basically everywhere.

 

Monuments:  Below is the Illinois Memorial. Stone Mountain (GA) granite forms the base and stairway. Above the base is Georgia white marble. There are forty-seven steps in the long stairway, one for each day of the Siege of Vicksburg. Modeled after the Roman Pantheon, the monument has sixty unique bronze tablets lining its interior walls, naming all 36,325 Illinois soldiers who participated in the Vicksburg Campaign. The monument stands sixty-two feet in height, and originally cost $194,423.92, paid by the state of Illinois.

Photo by Jan



Here is a sampling of a few other monuments in the park.  There are many more not represented here but also worthy of seeing if you are able to visit.  There are memorials for each of the 26 states that participated in this war located around the park.  Some states have more than one memorial.

Photo by Jan

Photo by Jan

Photo by Jan

Photo by Jan

Photo by Jan

 

Photo by Jan

 

This was the war where brothers fought brothers, fathers fought sons, sons fought fathers, and friends fought friends.  Throughout the park this is remembered in bronze, marble and granite memorials



Photo by Jan



Photo by Jan

Photo by Jan

Photo by Jan

Photo by Jan

 

Photo by Jan

 

Photo by Jan

 

Photo by Jan

Photo by Jan

Photo by Jan

 

 

There are also many statues of the leadership and brave men of this war.  Below is Jefferson Davis.

Photo by Jan

 

Photo by Jan

Commemorating the participation for freedom by thousands of black men.

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A union soldier.

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A Confederate soldier.

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General Ullissus S. Grant, commander of the Union forces.

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The battlefields that now look peaceful and lovely, but during the war were covered in blood.

Photo by Jan



Photo by Jan

Photo by Jan



Recreation of a portion of a redought.

Photo by Jan

Photo by Jan

 

 

The Shirley House:  Union troops called it "the white house".  It is the only surviving war time structure in the park.  During the siege it served as headquarters for the 45th Illinois infantry, members of which built hundreds of bombproof shelters to protect themselves against Confederate artillery fire.  Shirley House is restored to its 1863 appearance.

Photo by Jan

 

 

 

Vicksburg National Cemetery


Photo by Jan

Of the nearly 17,000 Union soldiers buried here, about 13,000 are unknown.  Established in 1866, the cemetery is also the final resting place for veterans of the Spanish-American War, World Wars I and II, and the Korean Conflict.  It was closed to burials in 1961.  Why are there no Confederate soldiers buried in this cemetery?  Here is the answer to that question:  National cemeteries initially served as the final resting place for "soldiers who shall die in the service of the country," and by this definition, did not include those states which had seceded from the Union. In 1873, the right of burial in a national cemetery was extended to all honorably discharged Union veterans of the Civil War, and, over the years, Congress passed legislation that gradually extended burial privileges to a larger portion of the population. This would include Confederate veterans who served in the army or navy of the United States in later wars.

 

Photo by Jan

Photo by Jan

Photo by Jan

Photo by Jan

Photo by Jan

Photo by Jan

Our next chapter will be about an Ironclad that was sunk in the Mississippi!!!

More soon :)