Chapter 3

As the students entered the portable they found Mr. Greene, derby atop his head, looking like a dashing dandy in his trousers, held up by suspenders and covered by a waistcoat. He took his sword cane and nudged his derby to a rakish tilt. He wore Civil War–era frame spectacles with the circular lenses.

“Suave, Mr. G,” Bette said. “Very suave.”

He passed around a bottle of peppermint oil. “Everyone take a drop and place it on a finger and then apply that finger to your top upper lip. There may be a residual stench in the Gettysburg area even months after the battle from the rotting corpses, both human and equine. This will keep you from gagging, I’m afraid.”

Mr. Greene did not, however, disclose to his students that he carried an antibiotic, which he was taking to relieve an infection in an abscessed tooth. Greene knew the medication was against the rules, as 1863 was six decades before Alexander even discovered penicillin, but Greene was not about to take his chances with 19th century dentistry. Heck, the most famous dentist of the 19th century was John Holiday, aka Doc Holiday, who was afflicted with tuberculosis. He was a gun fighter at the O.K. Corral shootout in Tombstone, Arizona.

Minerva bought a light brown hoop dress on eBay, and its hem dragged across the floor as she walked. Her shoes were totally covered. She had learned from walking along the streets during the Philadelphia trip that there was a good chance of having her dress soiled, and brown did not show the dirt, or horse excrement, as other colors did.

Bette, in a magenta dress, pulled up her skirt to show that she was wearing black New Balance sneakers. She had taken Mr. Greene’s admonition to heart and worn comfortable shoes.

“How are the hoop skirt dresses, girls?” Mr. Greene asked.

“I have worn mine before,” Bette said. “My uncle is a Civil War reenactor, and they have Saturday night balls after their battles. My aunt couldn’t attend one last year, and I went in her place, I wore her dress.”

“It is a bit over the top,” Minerva said, enviously.

“Your brown dress is much more practical,” Bette conceded. “But I wanted to look great for Mr. Lincoln.

Minerva frowned. The girls were friends, but also rivals.

Victor wore a modified three-piece dark-blue sack suit, which included a coat, vest and button-fly trousers. On his feet were black brogans, common men’s footwear of the time.

Mr. Greene walked over to Victor and gave his costume a cursory inspection, nodding his head in approval. Then he asked, “Did you finish your reading assignment, Victor?”

“Yes, Mr. Greene.”

“Including Sarah Broadhead’s diary and Daniel Skelly’s reminiscences?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good lad,” Greene said.

Into the portable floated the ghosts of Bruce Catton and Shelby Foote. The two dead historians were selected to serve as guides for the journey. Mr. Catton was a bald spirit with an angular nose, and wore unnecessary glasses; whereas, Shelby Foote’s spirit had a full head of hair parted down the middle and a rich well-trimmed, gray beard. While Catton’s gaze seemed stern, Foote’s visage had a twinkle in the eyes, as if he had just participated in something mischievous. Catton was a no-nonsense Yankee historian; whereas, Foote was a Southern novelist by trade, as well as a historian, and when he was alive, had a reputation as a storyteller, having charmed Ken Burns and his viewers in the PBS Civil War series, which, ironically, had made Foote a star. Both men had written extensively on the Civil War, but Mr. Greene cautioned his students that the two historians might disagree about the battle of Gettysburg, and both could be biased and loyal to their sections of the country, Catton to the North and Foote to the South.

The two historians were amiably mumbling to each other when they floated into the portable classroom.

Mr. Greene formally introduced the ghosts, and the two historians nodded in response, continuing their mumbling.

Victor heard them mumble something about Pickett’s Charge and how Mr. Catton wished he could see it as it happened.

Wouldn’t we all! Victor thought. Pickett’s Charge! That would be really cool! But Mr. Greene couldn’t risk their lives. Victor sure would like to see the greatest charge in American history. He sure would. That would be great.

Mr. Greene produced a “minie ball,” and explained. “I purchased this bullet in Gettysburg from a reputable dealer. It was dug out of the trunk of a tree in the town of Gettysburg. It will be our talisman for our journey.”

The ghosts floated over to Mr. Greene to examine the minie ball. They nodded their approval.

“You realize, Mr. Greene,” Catton said, “that there have been reports of local folks making minie balls and selling the counterfeits to naive tourists.”

“I have heard the stories, Mr. Catton, “but as I said, this was a reputable dealer. Buckle up, students,” Greene said as he programmed the computer for the coordinates of the field west of the Lutheran Theological Seminar where he planned to land the portable, programming a return for 8 p.m., November 19, 1863.

Catton and Foote watched closely as Greene programmed the computer, nodding to each other. When Greene’s back was turned, Victor noticed that Catton seemed to touch the computer screen, but he wasn’t sure as, after all, Mr. Catton was an apparition.

There was a good deal of turbulence on this trip and Mr. Greene informed everyone that he discovered Tesla’s device had an automatic pilot and it would bring the classroom down precisely at the location typed in.

What surprised Mr. Greene, however, was that it was still dark when they descended to the field west of Gettysburg. He peered out a class window and saw the cupola of the Lutheran Theological Seminary, which was clearly visible due to a full moon. Greene hadn’t checked on the moon for November 1863, as he assumed they would be landing in the daylight. He wondered what had occurred, but he thought perhaps he had typed in the wrong time, perhaps 6 a.m. instead of 8 a.m. They only had five minutes before the programmed computer would return the portable classroom to its space at Cassadaga Area High School.

“Looks like we are here before dawn. Well, no matter: All we have to do is walk to the seminary and from there then down the ridge into town,” Greene said optimistically.

As they departed the portable, Bette commented, “Sure is warm, Mr. Greene.

Mr. Greene and the students walked in the direction of the Lutheran Theological Seminary.

Victor thought the peppermint oil was working well, for he didn’t detect any offensive odors in the air. He turned around and looked back at the portable and caught a glimpse of it before it disappeared. The sound of a whoosh filled the air and Mr. Greene remarked, “The classroom will return at 8 p.m. tonight, students.” The teacher looked beyond the portable down the Chambersburg Pike. That was odd, he thought. Campfires to the west. It must be some of the tourists in town for the dedication of the National Soldiers Cemetery. He swiveled his head around and, as dawn broke, Greene glimpsed Union soldiers to the front. Bruce Catton and Shelby Foote floated by, smiling.

“John Buford’s brigade,” Catton said to Foote.

“We did it,” Foote said.

“We sure did!” Catton said.

“Did what?” Greene demanded.

“I’m afraid we tinkered with the timeline, Mr. Greene,” Catton admitted.

“We weren’t sure we could do it,” Foote added.

“But we did!” Catton said.

“Did what?” Greene repeated, exasperated.

“Why y’all are gonna get to see the Battle of Gettysburg,” Foote said. “It’s the morning of July 1 and you folks best pick up the slack ’cause Harry Heth’s men will be along directly. You see, students, the Civil War defined us as what we are and it opened us to being what we became, good and bad things. It was the crossroads of our being, and it was a hell of a crossroads. And Gettysburg is the crossroads town!” he added excitedly.

“And John Buford’s men are up ahead,” Catton chimed in. “Good old Buford! He hanged a spy in Frederick. Hanged him from a tree naked as a jaybird, Buford did.”

Whoa! Victor thought, instinctively raising his hands as he detected in the dawn’s early light, a Union soldier pointing a carbine in his direction.

“Children, “Greene said, stopping the group. “It appears our guides have betrayed us. Forget our other story. We are now refugees from Chambersburg, we fled without even bothering to pack a bag. Let me do the talking.” He led the students a few more yards when he heard the command.

“Halt, who goes there?”

“Unionist refugees from Chambersburg,” Greene lied.

“Advance with your hands raised.”

The sun was rising in the east and the day had truly begun. The ghosts, Victor realized, had deserted them and they were nowhere within sight. Mrs. Beard had been a bit daffy, but she hadn’t deserted them. Catton and Foote were AWOL, absent without leave, without so much as a “by your leave,” Victor thought. He glanced at Minerva; she appeared frightened. Bette, on the other hand, seemed delighted at the change in plans.

“We get to see the battle! Wow!” Bette said.

A captain of the Union cavalry came over to question Greene and his students.

“What is your name, sir?”

“Nathan Greene, captain.”

“Are these your children? “

“They are my nephew and my nieces, captain, their mother, my poor sister, was taken ill last winter with typhus and went to her reward. We are trying to escape the pestilence, captain, trying to avoid the slaveholding horde.”

“Your occupation, Mr. Greene?”

“I am a circuit preacher, captain.”

“Well, preacher, you and your nephew and nieces seem a little short on baggage.”

“We fled with only the clothes on our backs,” Greene said theatrically. “The poor girls,” he added.

Victor wondered if the captain was swallowing Mr. Greene’s baloney. “How far back are the rebels?” the captain asked.

“Captain, I would think they would be here by eight o’clock,” Greene said.

From his summer reading, Victor had learned that Heth’s men opened fire at about 8 a.m. on the first of July. History was the source of Mr. Greene’s prescience, although, of course, the history had not yet happened.

The captain nodded. “Thank you for your information, Mr. Greene. You and your party may pass. I think you might find lodging in one of the hotels in town, as many of the residents have fled the area.”

They proceeded east on Chambersburg Pike, passing through a Union picket line, which was manned by John Buford’s cavalry brigade. When they were beyond hearing range of the soldiers, Mr. Greene said, “You can see the hotel on the other side of the Chambersburg Pike across from the Seminary. Well, by this afternoon it will be in Confederate hands. We will do best if we head into town into Lincoln Square…excuse me, that’s what it is called today. It was the Diamond back in 1863. We will take two rooms at the Gettysburg Hotel and try to figure out how we are going to get home.”

“But the portable is programmed to return on November 19th, Mr. Greene,” Victor said. “Are we stuck here in July?”

Mr. Greene grimaced. “Students, I’m afraid our dead historians really left us in the lurch. We may be stuck here for months.”

“No, Mr. Greene,” Minerva complained. “I am scheduled to visit Duke and Penn in August. This is terrible.”

“Buck up, Minerva,” Bette said. “This might be fun, living in the past for a few months.”

“A few?” Minerva said, exasperated. “Try five months, July, August, September, October and November!”

“Now, Minerva,” Mr. Greene said, trying to comfort her. “There does not seem to be much that we can do about our situation.”

“Yeah,” Victor agreed. “Might as well enjoy the battle, Minerva.”

“Enjoy the battle! Are you crazy, Victor Bridges? Did you actually read Residents of History? There was nothing enjoyable about the battle Victor. Just death and disease. Why did Mr. Catton and Mr. Foote do this to us?”

“I honestly don’t know, Minerva,” Greene said.

They walked down into town on the dirt road, passing houses and stores, including the Fahnestock Building, which was a large general store that specialized in “dry goods.” As they neared the center of town, they passed streetlamps.

“They only put up streetlights three years ago, in 1860,” Mr. Greene said. “Kerosene replaced whale oil in lighting, and Pennsylvania College, the Lutheran Seminary and the homes of the wealthier inhabitants of Gettysburg had gas lighting. The flame burned inside a chimney glass cover.”

They walked into the center of town, passing hitching rails for horses that dotted the public square.

“When I was a student, I used to come up to the Gettysburg Hotel, for the hotel had the best hot fudge sundaes,” Mr. Greene reminisced. He pointed north in the direction of Carlisle Street. “Down there was the Majestic Theater, a favorite haunt of college students. Past that was the Varsity Diner, which we called the V.D. They renamed it the Lincoln Diner. As a matter of fact, they renamed many of the town’s streets after the battle to honor the men who fought here.” Green told his students about a study done by his college sociology class for White’s Motel. The motel wasn’t filling its rooms until the professor and the students suggested the owner change the name from White’s Motel to the Heritage Motel. After the name change, the motel was consistently filled.

“The V.D.!” Bette laughed. “Great name for a restaurant. Better than the STD Diner I guess,” she added.

As they entered the square, Mr. Greene stopped, pulled out his leather pouch from a coat pocket and handed each of his students a twenty-dollar gold piece. “Keep this in case we get separated. Twenty dollars in gold was a good bit of money back then,” he said.

They checked in at the Gettysburg Hotel taking two rooms, saying they were refugees from Chambersburg.

“The hotel goes back to 1797,” Mr. Greene said. “It is one of the oldest buildings in the town. It was a favorite hotel for visiting dignitaries. Of course, to my knowledge there was no indoor plumbing in 1863. You girls are used to privies. Remember Philadelphia in 1776?”

“Yes, it was wonderful. I can’t wait to use an outhouse again,” Minerva said sarcastically.

“Ah, the flies,” Bette added. “Not to mention the odor. What a bouquet. It would be great if movies could capture the stink of the past and not just its costumes.”

“Well at least at the hotel you will have chamber pots beneath your beds,” Mr. Greene said, adding, “and probably a potty seat. Place the chamber pot beneath the seat…oh, never mind,” he went on, blushing. “You two girls will figure it out.”

They had adjoining rooms, which looked out over the town square. Mr. Greene and Victor inspected their room. They had to share one large bed, but thankfully, two separate chamber pots. A dry sink contained a mirror and an ewer filled with water and a bowl in which to wash one’s hands and face. In a corner of the room was an odd piece of furniture, which Mr. Greene explained was a sitz bath, a shallow tub where a guest would take a bath in a sitting position. Mr. Greene added that a sitz bath was used to cleanse one’s perineum, the space between one’s rectum and his genitals. Victor winced at the description. “Water,” Mr. Green said, “would be brought to the room from the kitchen after being heated over a flame. Baths were not as common in 1863 as in modern times and a man who took a bath or shower more than once a week was considered somewhat prissy.

“This is going to take some adjustment,” Greene admitted, bringing forth a pocket watch. Five minutes to eight. He walked over to the window to look out on the town square. “Victor, the Confederates will open fire any time now. As a result, the Diamond, the town square below us, will be in the hands of the Rebels by the late afternoon. It will be the second time in a week.”

“Second time?” Victor asked.,

“On June 26th, Jubal Early’s division marched into Gettysburg and occupied the town. The Rebels took down the Stars and Stripes and raised up the battle flag of Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia. To the chagrin of the people of Gettysburg, the Confederate army even played ‘Dixie’ as well. It was very humiliating.”

“Don’t you think we should be out of here by the afternoon then, Mr. Greene?”

“That depends.”

“Depends on what?”

“In which direction we decide to go…we can’t go west, because the Rebels are out there. Jeb Stuart and his cavalry are riding all over Adams County about now. In fact, Stuart’s romp over the countryside will cost General Lee his eyes. His army will be blind without Stuart’s intelligence of the Union Amy’s whereabouts. We could go south past Cemetery Hill, I suppose. That way we would stay behind the Union lines. They will line up behind Cemetery Ridge from Culp’s Hill to Little Round Top.”

“Then we go south,” Victor agreed.”

“Yes. But we can never disclose what we know about the battle ahead, Victor. We might be taken for spies. If we did anything to inadvertently help the Confederates win the Battle of Gettysburg the United States as we know it might not even exist to go back to. Who knows how the history of the world would have been different if the Confederates had won the Civil War and the nation was permanently divided. You know a historian named McKinley Kantor wrote a Look Magazine article on the that very subject…if the South had won the Civil War. Kantor also wrote a novel called Andersonville.”

“About the prisoner of war camp in Georgia?” Victor asked.

“Yes, Victor. Did you know the Yankees tried the camp commander named Wirz for war crimes, eighty years before the Nazis were tried at Nuremberg? The Yankees hanged Wirz, too, just like the Allies hanged the Nazis who were convicted of war crimes. Henry Wirz.”

“Even sounds German,” Victor said.

“He was actually born in Switzerland,” Greene added.

“I read about Andersonville, it was more concentration camp than prisoner of war camp,” Victor said. “A terrible place.”

“The Confederates had another nasty prison, Libby Prison in Richmond, Virginia. It was pretty notorious as well, but not as bad as horrid Andersonville. The Yankee prisoners taken over the next three days will wind up in Libby Prison. The Civil War was brutal, Victor. It has been glamorized by Hollywood, but it was horrific. I am afraid we are going to witness the horror, the horror I had hoped to shield you from by merely coming to the cemetery dedication.”

“It’s not your fault, Mr. Greene. It was the ghosts.”

The roar of a cannonade interrupted their conversation and sent the girls scurrying into the males’ room.

“What is that?” Minerva demanded.

“Cannons,” Victor said calmly.

“Wow!” Bette said in an excited voice. She moved over to the window to peer out to the west. Smoke was beginning to obscure the view of the Lutheran Theological Seminary on Seminary Ridge west of town.”

“We should go to the Fahnestock Building on Baltimore Street,” Mr. Greene said. “They had an observatory on their roof. Who wants to go?”

Victor and Bette raised their hands. Minerva did not. “I will stay here if it is okay with you, Mr. Greene.”

“Certainly, Minerva.”

Mr. Green walked over to the dry sink and poured a glass of water. From his inside coat pocket, he withdrew a plastic bottle, popped the cap and shook out one capsule into his hand then swallowed the pill, chasing it down with a swig of water.”

“Mr. Greene, what kind of medicine is that?”

“An antibiotic, Victor. From my dentist. I have an inflamed tooth.

“You can’t have that here, Mr. Greene,” Victor said. “Penicillin wasn’t discovered until the 1930s.”

“Alexander Fleming discovered it in 1928, actually.”

“Whatever,” Victor said. “You know the rules, Mr. Greene. You can’t take a modern drug back in time.”

“My tooth was killing me, Victor. I almost canceled the trip.”

“I sure wish you had,” Minerva groused.

Bette looked at Minerva and said, “Oh, stuff it, Minerva! We’re here and I intend to have a good time,” she said. “So stop whining and enjoy the war.”

Minerva snapped back. “Bette Kromer, are you as mad as Victor Bridges? ‘Enjoy the war’? Good heavens!”

Mr. Greene intervened. “Okay, let’s not argue. In retrospect, I should have canceled the trip with my tooth ache, but I thought we were only going to be gone for the day. I just grabbed my pills as I walked out my door.”

“How many pills do you have, Mr. Greene?”

Greene looked at the bottle. “Ninety, minus three or four I have taken today and yesterday.”

“Maybe they will come in handy,” Victor said.

“How so?” Mr. Greene asked.

Bette spoke up. “I think I know what Victor is getting at, Mr. Greene. If any of us gets shot, the antibiotic would prevent infection, and from what I read gangrene is the danger. There are no antibiotics in the Civil War. Antiseptics, sure, but not antibiotics. If a limb became infected, the surgeons just hacked off the arm or leg. I saw it on PBS…Mercy Street.”

“Cool show,” Victor agreed, looking directly at Minerva to gauge her reaction. “I call it Blue and Grey’s Anatomy.”

Victor’s joke made even Minerva laugh, for Grey’s Anatomy was Minerva’s favorite television show.