Chapter 11

Minerva was in her hotel room at a few minutes past one when the rolling thunder began: the cannonade from Seminary Ridge. The deafening noise reminded her of the clamorous sounds of a heavy Florida thunderstorm, but the subsequent vibrations from the artillery knocked the porcelain ewer from its perch beside the water bowl in her hotel room and the pitcher cracked when it met the floor. Had the artillery caused an earthquake? Minerva wondered. She ran to the window. Smoke was billowing to the south. She saw a flash from a cannon’s barrel on Cemetery Hill and deduced that an artillery exchange was underway. Mr. Greene, on crutches, hobbled into her room.

“It’s started, Minerva!” he exclaimed, excited as a little boy at his birthday party.

“What has, Mr. Greene?”

“The prelude to Pickett’s Charge, the bombardment.”

“Oh,” Minerva said. She was annoyed that gray smoke obscured her view. She was finally interested in witnessing what was happening. At that moment of her irritation, into the room floated another irritant, the ghost of Shelby Foote. The dead historian was smiling and clapping his ghostly hands excitedly.

“You are going to miss it!” Foote warned. “You are going to miss Pickett’s Charge if you stay in your hotel room! It is the chance of a lifetime.”

“It is safer here,” Minerva reasoned, declining Foote’s invitation.

“Minerva’s right, Shelby,” Mr. Greene agreed.

Shelby Foote shook his head in disbelief. “Nathan, are you going to let a little flesh wound and a pair of crutches slow you down? I am talking about the greatest infantry charge in history. And you call yourself a historian, pshaw!”

“I never called myself a historian, Shelby,” Mr. Greene replied. “I call myself a history teacher, Shelby, I do not presume to be a historian.”

“Shucks, Nathan, it is only semantics. You could be a historian if you ever decided to publish. I know that you can’t write anything for publication or they will cancel your passport to the past so to speak. But this is the experience of a lifetime, my boy. This is Pickett’s Charge. Isn’t it worth a modicum of risk?”

“That’s easy for you to say, Mr. Foote,” Minerva interjected, fearful that her teacher might fall under the spell of the Confederate Circe. “A modicum of risk? Mr. Greene came close to being killed yesterday. He’s lucky he still has his leg, and he wouldn’t if he didn’t have an abscess and had to bring along antibiotics. It’s easy for you to say. You are dead already. Neither of us is in any hurry to join you and Mr. Catton on the other side.”

The spirit of Shelby Foote was offended at Minerva’s remarks.

“Suit yourself then,” the ghost grumbled, and floated out of the room in the direction of Seminary Ridge. Minerva watched him fly down Chambersburg Street toward the Lutheran Theological Seminary. Then suddenly, Shelby Foote, returned to the hotel room.

“You didn’t tell her, Nathan?”

“No,” Mr. Greene blushed.

“Didn’t tell me what?” Minerva demanded to know.

Foote smiled. “Your teacher does not have an abscess tooth. He carried the antibiotics for you kids in case anyone got an infection.”

Minerva was horrified. Mr. Greene broke his own rules. Just like when he brought along aspirin to colonial Philadelphia. She stared at her teacher in disbelief, her face registering betrayal. She managed to mutter, “Why?”

“I didn’t have to worry about aspirin,” Mr. Greene replied. “It was available in 1863, but I was concerned that one of you might get an infection. I can’t have my students dying, Minerva, even if I have tenure,” he said trying to lighten the mood.

Minerva said nothing, her face indicating that she required more information.

“As it turns out, I only saved myself, or more precisely, my leg,” Mr. Greene added. “Ironic, really.”

“So you didn’t have an abscess?”

Mr. Greene waffled. “Well, I did, but the pills are what was left of my prescription. The tooth healed a week ago. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you, Minerva.”

Minerva huffed and walked away from the ghost and her teacher.

“She’s pretty steamed up, Nathan,” the ghost observed.

“You think so, Shelby?” Mr. Greene replied sarcastically. “You’ve been a great help, you really have.”

“Well, you pissed me off, Nathan. Sitting on your butt and ignoring Pickett’s Charge,” Shelby Foote complained.

Minerva turned and snapped at the two souls. “Stop arguing, you two are giving me a headache.”

Suddenly Minerva wanted to be somewhere else. Anywhere else. She remembered Julia Culp. Julia could use her help. She needed be useful and get away from the squabbling men. Right now she wanted to get away from Mr. Greene. He was just another adult who had failed her. Mr. Greene had fallen from the pedestal Minerva had built for him. Right now, she would clear her mind by helping Julia. She sensed it was going to be a busy afternoon.

From what she had read about Pickett’s Charge, Minerva recalled that the casualties were staggering. Every nurse would be needed this day, July 3rd, 1863.

“I’m going down to the courthouse, Mr. Greene,” she said over her shoulder as she walked out of the hotel room. Mr. Greene was too busy bickering with the ghost to hear Minerva. Finally, an enormous cannonade ended the quarrel between the teacher and the ghost.

Mr. Greene stuck his head out the window. He ducked his head back in a moment and said to Shelby Foote, “Where’s Minerva?”

“Beats me,” the ghost replied. “I’ll see you later in the afternoon, Nathan,” the ghost of Shelby Foote declared before floating off to join the assembling Confederates on the wood line of Seminary Ridge.

*

At the courthouse Minerva found Julia Culp tending to a patient. She donned an apron, washed her hands over a washbowl and went over to assist Julia.

“Sorry I’m late. I was looking after my uncle.”

Julia smiled slightly. She looked up from the patient whose arm she was bandaging and said, “Ginnie Wade is dead.”

“Who?” Minerva asked.

“Virginia Wade, a gal of twenty or so,” Julia said. “Everyone knew her as Ginnie, with a ‘G,” not Virginia. She was betrothed to Jack Skelly, Daniel Skelly’s older brother. She was baking bread with her mother when a Rebel bullet killed her in her kitchen. Imagine, she was kneading bread on a bread board and she was hit by a Rebel bullet. I heard she died instantly.”

“That’s terrible,” Minerva said, wondering why Julia said “Ginnie” not “Jennie” Wade. After all, Victor told Minerva that he had gone to the Jennie Wade House in Gettysburg, Maybe Victor mixed up the names.

“I never liked her,” Julia went on. “She was kind of stuck on herself, what with her fancy braided hair and all, but I wouldn’t wish her dead, that’s for sure. Mrs. Wade must be devastated, and her looking after Georgia’s baby and all. And what with Mr. Wade in the nut house and all. Drank too much they say,” Julia gossiped.

Minerva sensed Julia knew the whole Wade family. She just nodded. Minerva realized Julia hadn’t received the news about her brother Wesley. She was not about to let that black cat out of the bag. Julia was much too chipper.

Julia smiled. “I have to tell you this or I will burst, simply burst Minerva,” she whispered. “Let’s go out for some air, I don’t want any townspeople hearing.”

Minerva, curious, followed the sixteen-year-old Julia Culp outside. The two girls waited for a lull in the cannonades before attempting to talk. When a respite came, Julia gave Minerva a bear hug and whispered in her ear. “I saw my brother last night.”

“Wesley?” Minerva said aloud.

“Shhh, don’t say his name, Minerva. I live with my aunt on York Street. He got a two-hour pass from his sergeant last night and came to see us—me, my big sister Anna, and Aunt Polly. I cried and cried I was so happy,” Julia said, smiling. She hugged Minerva again. “I don’t care if he is a Rebel, or that people think he’s a traitor, he’s my brother. And blood is thicker than war,” she added.

Minerva had heard that “blood was thicker than water,” but never that blood was thicker than war, but she forgave Julia’s malaprop, happy that Julia had a chance to see her brother, because Minerva knew at that moment Wesley Culp’s body was lying out on Julia’s uncle’s hill. Mr. Greene had told his students the whole tragic story of Wesley and Julia, but he hadn’t said that they met the evening before Wesley died. Truth, Minerva thought, truly was stranger than fiction. Suddenly, Minerva felt guilty about the way she had interacted with Mr. Greene. She tried to look at the situation from his point of view. He was en loco parentis: he was acting in place of their parents. He had to safeguard his students. She wondered what other little tricks Mr. Greene had up his sleeve, what other things he hadn’t told them. She decided to forgive him and she was pleased with herself. She looked at the smiling Miss Culp. She was glad Julia had seen her brother before he died.

“I am happy for you, Julia,” Minerva shouted as cannons resumed their chorus.

“Thank you, Minerva,” Julia yelled back over the din and motioned that they should return to help out in the courthouse.

Back inside, a thought came to Minerva. Since they were behind the Confederate lines, the casualties they would see today would be predominantly Rebels. Having traveled in time from a modern United States of America, Minerva saw no difference between the Federal or Confederate soldiers—they were all Americans to her.

As Julia and Minerva awaited what they both expected would soon be an onslaught of wounded soldiers, they spent their time cutting bed sheets into strips and rolling the strips into bandages for the wounded. Minerva wondered how long it would be before the hotel stripped the sheets from its beds and contributed the sheets to the war effort.

About four thirty p.m. Minerva and Julia took a break from their routine and walked outside. Something was different, Minerva thought, listening. There was silence. Had the fighting ended?

“Listen, Julia, what do you hear?”

Julia concentrated. “Nothing. No cannons, no muskets. Do you suppose it is over?”

“I think so,” Minerva said. “I hope so.”

“So do I.”

Men in butternut uniforms began appearing in the Diamond. Had the Confederates given up? Minerva wondered. Defeat was etched on their faces. There was no bragging of “whipping the damn Yankees” or “killing some Federals before dinner.” These men appeared beaten. Their silence spoke volumes, for Minerva knew that Pickett’s Charge had failed.

But she didn’t know if the battle was truly over, and she wished that Mr. Greene was present to sort it all out. Or even that poltergeist, Mr. Foote. She thought about the dead historian and suddenly he appeared, as if she had rubbed a genie’s magic lamp with her thought.

“Yes, Minerva? You have a question?” Shelby Foote said. “I heard your thought and came to answer your question.

“Is it over Mr. Foote?” Minerva asked, forgetting for a moment the presence of Julia Culp.

“What did you say, Minerva?” Julia asked.

Minerva blushed and then replied to Julia. “I asked if it was over.”

“But why did you say, ‘my foot’?” Julia asked.

“Ah…that means I’m not sure. It’s just a dumb expression I use when I don’t really believe something to be true, I say ‘my foot.’” She smiled, hoping that the addition of the gesture of lifting her foot might put credence to her mendacity.

“That’s rather odd, Minerva.” Julia commented.

Minerva thought quickly, realizing her lie needed a bit more detail. She replied, “My grandmother used to say that.”

“Used to?”

“Yes, she’s dead,” Minerva replied, truthfully, unable to tell the Civil War teenager that, actually, her grandmother hadn’t even been born yet. But then her grandmother hadn’t been born and was also dead. Time travel could be confusing sometimes, she thought.

“I’m sorry for your loss,” Julia said.

“Nana was a wonderful lady,” Minerva answered honestly, and the thought of her beloved grandmother caused a tear to trickle down her face.

Julia gave Minerva a hug. Minerva felt guilty. She didn’t like to lie, but she couldn’t tell her new friend that she was a time traveler. Heck, H.G. Wells wouldn’t even write The Time Machine until 1895. And this was only 1863! She realized she had a strange habit of looking at copyright dates on books and committing them to memory just like Victor did with his silly baseball averages. She thought she remembered more important things than Victor Bridges ever did, and then she scowled as she envisioned Victor kissing the double-crossing Bette Kromer.

“Why are you frowning, Minerva?”

“I was thinking about a boy.”

“A boy? Really? Do tell,” Julia said, but just as Julia was about to interrogate Minerva about her nonexistent love life, a surgeon walked out of the courthouse and called the girls back to duty. More wounded were arriving.

“I heard they are using the Seminary as a hospital,” Julia said as they walked into the courthouses. “Churches, too. The wounded are everywhere. Must be hundreds,” Julia said.

“I think there may be thousands,” Minerva ventured, knowing that the count would exceed twenty thousand casualties. Then she remembered that Sarah Broadhead became a volunteer nurse at the Seminary, and Minerva decided that she would report to the Seminary the next day. She really wanted to meet the lady who kept the day-by-day diary.

For the next few hours Minerva worked alongside Julia, rolling bandages and dispensing cool water to the wounded men. She became numb to the shrieking sounds from the patients undergoing amputations, and despondent at all the suffering that she witnessed. As dusk approached, kerosene lamps were lit and the surgeons continued to ply their gruesome trade, reminding Minerva why doctors earned the sobriquet “sawbones.”

As she and Julia took a break from the horror and stood outside in the twilight, two women approached.

“Hello, Anna, Aunt Polly,” Julia called to them. “What are you doing here at the courthouse?”

Minerva stood silent as Julia’s older sister and aunt approached. She saw their sad faces, their forlorn gazes. The younger of the two women, Anna Culp, said to her sister, sorrowfully, “Wesley is gone, Julia.”

As if hit in her solar plexus by a sledgehammer by the news of her brother’s fate, Julia crumpled to the ground like a rag doll, hitting the earth before Minerva could react. Anna bent down and lifted her limp sister to an upright position, holding her to prevent a repeat of her little sister’s fainting. Julia began to sob.

“Wesley! Wesley, darling Wesley!” she cried and buried her head into her older sister’s bosom.

“Shhh, Julia, baby, I am here,” Anna said, trying to sooth her sister. Instead, she began to cry as well.

But it wasn’t like any crying that Minerva had ever heard. The sound was something primeval. It was a wailing, hopeless, anguished cry to the heavens. Minerva had never heard such a pitiful sound, not even from the wounded and dying men in the courthouse. Feeling an overwhelming empathy for Julia, Minerva began to cry as well. “Oh, Julia, I am so sorry,” she sobbed.

Anna smiled at Minerva. “You must be Julia’s friend, Minerva,” she sniffed. “I am sorry we have to meet like this.”

Julia asked Anna meekly, “Was he killed by the cannons?”

“No, darling,” The dry-eyed Aunt Polly said. “He was killed this morning on Uncle Henry’s hill.”

Culp’s Hill, Minerva realized. Of course the Culp’s would refer to it as Uncle Henry’s hill, not Culp’s Hill.

“That is too awful, does Uncle Henry know?” Julia asked.

“No, darling, Uncle Henry left town before the Rebels arrived,” Aunt Polly replied.

“We must retrieve his body, Aunt Polly. We must.”

“Not tonight, dear,” Aunt Polly said. “It is much too dangerous. You come on along with us now, hear? Say goodnight to your friend.”

Julia turned to Minerva and Minerva thrust out her arms to give her friend a comforting hug. No words were exchanged, just glances of understanding, and a comforting embrace. Minerva felt Julia’s pain.

She watched in silence as Anna Culp and Aunt Polly walked the younger girl back to their home on York Street. Minerva turned to return to the courthouse and then stopped. She decided she had seen enough of war for one day. Instead of entering the courthouse, she walked on to the Gettysburg Hotel, thankful to find the kerosene lamp lit in her hotel room.

She pulled her pamphlet from her dress pocket and began to read the entry for July 4th, remembering as Scarlett O’Hara used to say, “Tomorrow is another day.”

Diary of Sarah Broadhead

July 4, 1863

This morning, about 6 o’clock, I heard a great noise in the street, and going to the door I saw a Rebel officer on horseback hallooing to some soldiers on foot, to “Hurry up, the Yankees have possession of the town and all would be captured.” I looked up the street and saw our men in the public square, and it was a joyful sight, for I knew we were now safe. Soon after, the Rebels sent in a flag of truce, but what was communicated we did not know, and, in consequence, the people were more scared than ever, the report spreading that it was to give notice to remove the women and children before shelling the town. As soon as the flag of truce had gone, our sharpshooters were pushed out to this side of town, and were all around us. We were between two fires, and were kept close prisoners all day, not daring to either go out, or even look out the windows, on account of the bullets fired at every moving object. The people of other parts of town could go where they pleased. It has been a dreadfully long day. We know, however, that the Rebels are retreating, and that our army has been victorious. I was anxious to help care for the wounded, but the day is ended and all is quiet, and for the first time in a week I shall go to bed, feeling safe.