On November 18, it published a map of the cemetery under the large headline “The Great National Soldiers’ Cemetery at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.” It describes the purchase of the land and reads, in part, “…It was on this ground that the most severe fighting of the second and third days took place. It not only reported on the speech it reported on the preparations. Lincoln rose after Edward Everett’s two-hour dedication of the cemetery at Gettysburg, and “delivered the ‘few appropriate remarks’ requested of him, and in ten sentences not only did eternal justice to the many who had fallen, but articulated the very basis of the American democracy.Īmong the few newspapers who independently reported on this event was the Philadelphia Inquirer, one of the nation’s leading papers, and one that still exists today.

It was a solemn occasion and Lincoln gave a short speech, but that speech is now the most famous speech given by any American. On November 18, President Lincoln arrived in Gettysburg to dedicate that cemetery, which was the final resting place of many who died that day. So many were killed that it was decided to establish a cemetery specifically for them, the first such cemetery in the United States. It was the bloodiest battle of the Civil War. It saw massive armies converge on the small town of Gettysburg, PA, just hours from Philadelphia, and fight what many consider the turning point in the war, a victory for the Union and defeat for Robert E. The Battle of Gettysburg was fought in July of 1863.

The gettysburg address 1863