July 3, 2024 • 17 mins
Welcome to our Best of Summer series, where we will be posting some of our favorite past episodes of the LoveX2 podcast, as we prepare for the big launch of our brand-new season in September. Today, we're celebrating Independence Day by sharing Mike's top 10 favorite Civil War sites to visit. These sites offer a unique glimpse into a time when our nation grappled with human slavery. Each site holds a special place, and we hope they inspire you to think deeper on their meaning and how it correlates to today's struggle to value all human life, including unborn children.
From the pivotal battlefields of Gettysburg and Fredericksburg to the solemn grounds of Andersonville and Antietam, join Mike as he recounts the significance of each location. Whether you're planning a summer road trip or simply interested in American history, this episode is packed with insights and personal anecdotes from visits.
So buckle up and get ready for an enlightening journey through some of America's most important Civil War locations. And remember, as we honor our past, we also look forward to a future where the life of every mom and every baby is cherished and protected. Happy Independence Day, America!
Make A Gift To The LoveX2 Project Music Title: Children of the Son Author: Pipe Choir Souce: www.pipechoir.com Licenses: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hey, this is Mike. I hope your summer is going really well. Welcome to our Best
of Summer series, where we will be posting some of our favorite past episodes
of the Love Times 2 podcast, as we prepare for the big launch of our brand new season in September.
You don't wanna miss a single episode, so be sure to subscribe to this podcast
on whatever platform you're listening to.
(00:22):
Music.
Welcome to the official podcast of the Love Times 2 Project.
Change the culture and the politics will follow.
Hey, welcome to a very special edition of the Love Times 2 Podcast.
(00:43):
We are on a mission, a big time mission, to make the world a better place for
every mom and every baby.
And along the way, we're looking for God to do some really, really amazing things.
So welcome to the podcast.
I hope this becomes one of your favorites, and I hope that you're sharing this
within your social networks as well.
But today, this is unlike any other podcast episode that we've done because
(01:05):
we're celebrating Independence Day.
Well, you know, we commonly now just kind of refer to it as the 4th of July,
but it's Independence Day. And I really think that's something worth celebrating.
So, you know, just as a reminder, today is, it's not just about fireworks and
picnics and a day off work.
All of that's cool. I mean, there's nothing, I love all of those,
but it's about honoring the Declaration of Independence, which includes these words. Here it comes.
(01:31):
We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal,
that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights that
among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
That is some pretty awesome stuff. So if you're wondering why I'm so excited
about Independence Day, this is it.
(01:52):
And to celebrate, I thought that what I'd do is share with you my top favorite Civil War sites.
How's that for a change of pace? You probably didn't see that coming.
I mean, I know you may have been expecting, I don't know, maybe a lengthy dissertation
on the history of Independence Day.
And you know, actually, that would be a very cool thing to do, but not today.
Today, we're going to be talking about a time in American history when we were
(02:16):
are grappling with another human rights issue that undermined these great words
in the Declaration of Independence,
undermined the entire context that all men are created equal.
Now, before I get started, have you noticed how popular top 10 lists are?
I've seen them from, I don't know, for just about anything in the world,
(02:36):
from the top 10 vacation spots to top 10 small towns to visit to top 10 roller coasters in the world.
I enjoy the top 10 list because they really boil everything down to just one
concise, easy package to understand.
Now, if you combine the top 10 list with history, now you're talking some pretty
serious language and you've got my attention.
(02:57):
That's where we're going to go today, jumping into the spirit of Independence Day.
Here are my top 10 Civil War sites to visit.
And just to say right up front, yes, I've been to every one of these.
So just in case you're wondering if, hey, Mike's just sitting there making it
up and, you know, I pulled it up on Wikipedia to show which of these sites to go to.
Nope, I've actually been to every one of these sites, most of them multiple
(03:20):
times, because I think they're so significant.
So it's my pleasure to share these with you today. And maybe,
I don't know, maybe this is feel for thought for you to think about possible road trips this summer.
Hey, that sounds great. So anyways, here we go. Top 10 Civil War sites to visit,
according to Mike. Okay. Number one, Gettysburg.
Okay. This didn't surprise anyone who knows me, but Gettysburg is the number
(03:43):
one site that every American I believe should visit. Really, I'm serious about that.
When you understand what happened to Gettysburg, when you understand how important
it was, how pivotal it was to the entire Civil War effort.
It's just a it's an amazing place to go and it's really one
of the few civil war battlefields that you can go
to and actually visualize almost the entire battlefield just the way that it's
(04:07):
laid out and so forth and that's significant because some of the battlefields
for example the wilderness there's not much left of it anymore the last time
i stopped at the wilderness marker i think there were maybe just a few acres
of a field that's left of that and everything else is being developed.
Gettysburg does a nice job in really protecting the integrity of the battlefield.
(04:27):
So when you think Gettysburg, you think, you know, little round top,
High Watermark, Peach Orchard, Wheatfield, Devil's Den.
I mean, nothing more really needs to be said. It's a powerful place to go.
So I encourage you to go to Gettysburg.
And if you can, go July 1st, 2nd, or 3rd, because those are the anniversary
dates of the actual battle.
And that's just a powerful time to be there. And you can visualize what it was
(04:50):
like during that time of year when this clash occurred at the town of Gettysburg.
Now, number two, Fredericksburg. The Battle of Fredericksburg in Fredericksburg,
Virginia was a significant battle in the war as well.
In fact, there were two battles there, major battles there.
And when I think of Fredericksburg, I think of Maury's Heights,
(05:10):
just this place of the battlefield, the focal point most people think about,
in which Union troops were faced with Lee's entrenched artillery up these heights
that just became a killing field.
I mean, when you stand there and you realize that these guys were ordered repeatedly
to charge up these heights, knowing that there was probably very little possibility
(05:31):
they would survive, it's just amazing.
So when you go there, you see the stone wall, you see the statue to the angel
of Fredericksburg, so much history there, and what a powerful,
history-rich, I guess I should say, area of Virginia. you.
So Fredericksburg is my number two. Number three, Ford's Theater.
Wow. I mean, the setting that some call the last act of the war,
(05:53):
not quite, but it is just a powerful place to go.
I mean, of course, this is where President Lincoln was assassinated.
The Park Service does a wonderful job in maintaining the historical integrity of Ford's Theater.
You can visit the theater in a ranger-led tour. You can see important artifacts there.
You can cross the street to the Peterson house where they carried President
(06:15):
Lincoln and where he eventually died and visit all of that.
And it's just a powerful way to spend a morning or an afternoon in Washington.
So if you're taking the family, if you're going by yourself to a road trip.
Or maybe with some friends to DC, it's well worth your time.
Take in Ford's Theater. It's a powerful place to go.
Number four is Antietam. Of course, Antietam in Maryland is the place where
(06:37):
you may have heard it commonly referred to as the bloodiest single day of the war.
Antietam was just a horrible slaughter. I mean, what a horrible slaughter that
happened there. And there's just so much, so much to take in.
And when you understand again what actually happened, and with all of these
sites, what I really encourage folks to do is to read about the sites before you go there.
(06:58):
Because when you arrive at a place like Antietam, if you really don't know what
happened there, you see the sunken lane, the bloody lane where really just the
dead were just piled up like cordwood.
You really don't have a context for it unless you know what happened there.
Otherwise, you're just looking at a depression in the ground and not really
knowing, you know, what even happened there.
Now, being from Indiana, Antietam has special significance to me because it's
(07:22):
a place where so many Indiana boys charged to the cornfield,
and that was the last charge that they ever made.
I mean, it was just a powerful, that cornfield, you read historical accounts
of it, and it was cut down to within an inch of the ground as if a reaper had just come through.
It was just a horrible slaughter there, but Antietam is a powerful place to
visit. it. Number five is Andersonville, the infamous Civil War prisoner camp in southern Georgia.
(07:48):
And I'm not sure how many people actually visit Andersonville because it's off the beaten path.
I mean, not horribly so, but it's probably an hour off the I-75 corridor.
And for most people from at least the Midwest and the North and so forth,
if you're traveling through Georgia, I mean, apologies to Georgia,
(08:09):
but mainly you're traveling through Georgia to get to Florida on vacation.
I mean, that's just what people do. You road trip for spring break or summer
vacation or a trip to Magic Kingdom or wherever you're going.
But, you know, Georgia is something you have to drive through to get to Florida.
And a lot of great stuff about Georgia. So hope no one takes offense by that,
but it's just reality. And the Andersonville camp is probably,
(08:32):
again, an hour off the I-75 corridor.
So it can be conveniently planned into a road trip if you are heading, say, to Florida.
It very easily can be worked into your trip to go to Andersonville.
And, you know, Andersonville, there were so many thousands of troops that were
starved, that were exposed to the elements with no clothing in many cases,
(08:53):
that were forced to drink water, that was polluted with sewage and so forth.
Just a horrible place that became the symbol of brutality and prisoner of war
camps during the Civil War.
Did they really understand the misery of what happened at Andersonville?
You really need a visit in mid-July or August when the Georgia heat is at its strongest.
(09:14):
And when you go there and you realize these guys are just packed like animals into this field, wow.
I mean, it just gives you a feel for what type of misery they had to endure there.
Number five is Grant's statue at the steps of the Capitol building.
I mean, this is just, to me, one of the most powerful and significant statues
of General Grant of any historical figure in the United States that you're going to find.
(09:37):
In fact, if you take the time, which I've done on numerous occasions,
just to sit and study Grant's statue as it looks across the mall towards the
Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial,
what you'll see is just this grit and resolve of General Grant that is just
captured in this statue.
(09:58):
You see the slouch hat, you see the collar pulled up.
It's not trying to be one of these glorious statues of some type of holier-than-thou type of leader.
What you see is the statue of a general who knew how to fight and a president
of this country that had grit and resolve.
So it's a very powerful, if you're visiting the Capitol building,
if you're in DC, if you're on the mall, make sure you take the time to see Grant's
(10:21):
statue. I guarantee you it'll be well worth it for you.
Number seven is the Shenandoah Valley. And that's a general statement anywhere
in the the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia. It is just full of history.
I mean, it's just an amazing place. It's beautiful.
The corridor, the interstate corridor that runs through there,
it seems like there's history at almost every single exit.
And you see these old Virginia farmhouses and so forth.
(10:43):
Just so much happened in the Shenandoah Valley and that entire region.
You know, it's just, you can spend a lot of time there. Let's put it that way.
So the Shenandoah Valley is well worth traveling through for the beauty and
for the historical significance. Now, number eight is Bull Run or Manassas,
whichever one you want to call it.
Bull Run or Manassas is where I consider the war really lost its innocence right
(11:06):
off the bat, because there were two major battles fought there.
But the first one, the first Battle of Bull Run,
was the battle that, you know, it was the battle that sort of eliminated these
rose-colored glasses that this was going to be a very short battle, the war,
or this was going to be sort of just like a fisticuffs match on the playground
(11:27):
or something like that, that one side would win and then everybody would quit and go home.
You know, it was even a spectator sport to some folks that just came from the
Capitol to see, you know, what a good old fight would look like sort of thing.
What the world learned, what the United States learned at that point was that
Bull Run exposed the horrors of war.
(11:47):
It exposed what it looks like to see men die by the thousands and just the carnage
that occurs as a result of that.
So Bull Run, Manassas, it is the place where the war lost its innocence.
And just as a footnote to that, I just recently saw that the battlefield has
uncovered burial pits of aborted limbs accidentally. They don't encourage and
(12:11):
don't allow digging on site, but I think they were retrenching something there at the battlefield.
So it was an accidental discovery, but they found bones that were just shattered
in so many different places.
And it was just a horrific reminder of the carnage that took place there.
Number nine is Fort Donelson. Now, some of you have never heard of Fort Donelson.
It's down in the, I think technically it's in Dover, Tennessee.
(12:34):
It's right down in Tennessee, Kentucky border by the land between the lakes,
southern end of that. But Fort Donaldson is where Ulysses S.
Grant earned his reputation as a fighter, and it's actually where he earned
his nickname, Unconditional Surrender Grant.
And you can go there. There's a national cemetery there. You can stand in some
of the rifle pits that still remain.
(12:55):
You can stand in some of the gun turrets where cannon had been placed to guard the river.
And so you can visualize very clearly when you're there how this this battle
went down But of particular note of fort donaldson is that this is where grant
proved that he would fight and now last on the list, but.
Very important to the point I want to make with this whole discussion is Appomattox.
(13:18):
Appomattox Courthouse, it's the place where it all ended, where the surrender happened.
Rifles were stacked up, men openly cried, and the killing began to grind to a halt.
Now, historians will know that even though the surrender of Lee to Grant happened,
there were still armies in the field, so there was still quite a bit that still
needed to happen to bring all of the killing, all of the fighting,
(13:40):
all of the Civil War to an end. quite a bit that still needed to happen.
I mean, armies in the field at that time had no idea what was happening in Appomattox,
and they were still fighting.
And I don't know, many of you may know this, there were actually more than a
few people that were advocating that the South go into more or less guerrilla warfare mode,
that the armies just would sort of be absorbed into the countryside and just
(14:04):
conduct guerrilla raids from that point forward,
which would have made the war go on to a horrific degree for a much longer period of time.
But the Appomattox Courthouse is someplace that is very powerful to visit.
Now, it's very curious to me that, at least from my experience,
Appomattox Courthouse, as important as it is, seems to be among the least visited
(14:26):
Civil War sites that are out there.
And I don't know, it's always kind of, I've always kind of wondered about that.
Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe it's just my experience of when I've been there.
And it's not in the easiest location or it's not hard to get to let's put it
that way But it's not you know, it's not like next to a tourist attraction type of deal. So, you know in.
(14:46):
1865. I don't think they were really looking at picking a spot that would be
convenient to an interstate so that people could visit it down the road.
So it is what it is. And you have to drive and you have to get into the Virginia
countryside if you want to visit Appomattox.
But it's just a powerful place to go.
The farmhouse where Lee surrendered to Grant is still there.
(15:07):
And you can just really absorb so much history when you're there.
So with all of that said, Appomattox is so key to all of this,
because it reminds me that in a great human rights struggle in our past,
that ultimately there was victory.
And when I think of just this work to extend love to every mom and every baby,
(15:29):
born and unborn, it's an ongoing effort, something that just seems like it grinds out longer and longer.
But I just like to remind myself, I want to remind you, Victory is coming slowly,
steadily, relentlessly.
Victory is coming in this human rights issue and discussion.
And just as Appomattox marks a new day for our nation,
(15:50):
there will one day be a place where the work to protect and extend protection
to every mom and every baby will finally and mercifully conclude with liberty and justice for all.
Hey, never forget that that victory is coming. and never forget that when you
change the culture, the politics will follow. Hey, happy Independence Day, America.
(16:15):
Hope you're safe. Have a great day.
Music.
Thanks for listening to the official podcast of the Love Times Two Project.
Be sure to subscribe to the podcast so you never miss an episode.
And never forget, change the culture and the politics will follow.
Music.
(16:38):
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(17:00):
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Music.
Hey, this is Mike. I hope your summer is going really well. Welcome to our Best
of Summer series, where we will be posting some of our favorite past episodes
of the Love Times 2 podcast, as we prepare for the big launch of our brand new season in September.
You don't wanna miss a single episode, so be sure to subscribe to this podcast
on whatever platform you're listening to.
(00:22):
Music.
Welcome to the official podcast of the Love Times 2 Project.
Change the culture and the politics will follow.
Hey, welcome to a very special edition of the Love Times 2 Podcast.
(00:43):
We are on a mission, a big time mission, to make the world a better place for
every mom and every baby.
And along the way, we're looking for God to do some really, really amazing things.
So welcome to the podcast.
I hope this becomes one of your favorites, and I hope that you're sharing this
within your social networks as well.
But today, this is unlike any other podcast episode that we've done because
(01:05):
we're celebrating Independence Day.
Well, you know, we commonly now just kind of refer to it as the 4th of July,
but it's Independence Day. And I really think that's something worth celebrating.
So, you know, just as a reminder, today is, it's not just about fireworks and
picnics and a day off work.
All of that's cool. I mean, there's nothing, I love all of those,
but it's about honoring the Declaration of Independence, which includes these words. Here it comes.
(01:31):
We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal,
that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights that
among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
That is some pretty awesome stuff. So if you're wondering why I'm so excited
about Independence Day, this is it.
(01:52):
And to celebrate, I thought that what I'd do is share with you my top favorite Civil War sites.
How's that for a change of pace? You probably didn't see that coming.
I mean, I know you may have been expecting, I don't know, maybe a lengthy dissertation
on the history of Independence Day.
And you know, actually, that would be a very cool thing to do, but not today.
Today, we're going to be talking about a time in American history when we were
(02:16):
are grappling with another human rights issue that undermined these great words
in the Declaration of Independence,
undermined the entire context that all men are created equal.
Now, before I get started, have you noticed how popular top 10 lists are?
I've seen them from, I don't know, for just about anything in the world,
(02:36):
from the top 10 vacation spots to top 10 small towns to visit to top 10 roller coasters in the world.
I enjoy the top 10 list because they really boil everything down to just one
concise, easy package to understand.
Now, if you combine the top 10 list with history, now you're talking some pretty
serious language and you've got my attention.
(02:57):
That's where we're going to go today, jumping into the spirit of Independence Day.
Here are my top 10 Civil War sites to visit.
And just to say right up front, yes, I've been to every one of these.
So just in case you're wondering if, hey, Mike's just sitting there making it
up and, you know, I pulled it up on Wikipedia to show which of these sites to go to.
Nope, I've actually been to every one of these sites, most of them multiple
(03:20):
times, because I think they're so significant.
So it's my pleasure to share these with you today. And maybe,
I don't know, maybe this is feel for thought for you to think about possible road trips this summer.
Hey, that sounds great. So anyways, here we go. Top 10 Civil War sites to visit,
according to Mike. Okay. Number one, Gettysburg.
Okay. This didn't surprise anyone who knows me, but Gettysburg is the number
(03:43):
one site that every American I believe should visit. Really, I'm serious about that.
When you understand what happened to Gettysburg, when you understand how important
it was, how pivotal it was to the entire Civil War effort.
It's just a it's an amazing place to go and it's really one
of the few civil war battlefields that you can go
to and actually visualize almost the entire battlefield just the way that it's
(04:07):
laid out and so forth and that's significant because some of the battlefields
for example the wilderness there's not much left of it anymore the last time
i stopped at the wilderness marker i think there were maybe just a few acres
of a field that's left of that and everything else is being developed.
Gettysburg does a nice job in really protecting the integrity of the battlefield.
(04:27):
So when you think Gettysburg, you think, you know, little round top,
High Watermark, Peach Orchard, Wheatfield, Devil's Den.
I mean, nothing more really needs to be said. It's a powerful place to go.
So I encourage you to go to Gettysburg.
And if you can, go July 1st, 2nd, or 3rd, because those are the anniversary
dates of the actual battle.
And that's just a powerful time to be there. And you can visualize what it was
(04:50):
like during that time of year when this clash occurred at the town of Gettysburg.
Now, number two, Fredericksburg. The Battle of Fredericksburg in Fredericksburg,
Virginia was a significant battle in the war as well.
In fact, there were two battles there, major battles there.
And when I think of Fredericksburg, I think of Maury's Heights,
(05:10):
just this place of the battlefield, the focal point most people think about,
in which Union troops were faced with Lee's entrenched artillery up these heights
that just became a killing field.
I mean, when you stand there and you realize that these guys were ordered repeatedly
to charge up these heights, knowing that there was probably very little possibility
(05:31):
they would survive, it's just amazing.
So when you go there, you see the stone wall, you see the statue to the angel
of Fredericksburg, so much history there, and what a powerful,
history-rich, I guess I should say, area of Virginia. you.
So Fredericksburg is my number two. Number three, Ford's Theater.
Wow. I mean, the setting that some call the last act of the war,
(05:53):
not quite, but it is just a powerful place to go.
I mean, of course, this is where President Lincoln was assassinated.
The Park Service does a wonderful job in maintaining the historical integrity of Ford's Theater.
You can visit the theater in a ranger-led tour. You can see important artifacts there.
You can cross the street to the Peterson house where they carried President
(06:15):
Lincoln and where he eventually died and visit all of that.
And it's just a powerful way to spend a morning or an afternoon in Washington.
So if you're taking the family, if you're going by yourself to a road trip.
Or maybe with some friends to DC, it's well worth your time.
Take in Ford's Theater. It's a powerful place to go.
Number four is Antietam. Of course, Antietam in Maryland is the place where
(06:37):
you may have heard it commonly referred to as the bloodiest single day of the war.
Antietam was just a horrible slaughter. I mean, what a horrible slaughter that
happened there. And there's just so much, so much to take in.
And when you understand again what actually happened, and with all of these
sites, what I really encourage folks to do is to read about the sites before you go there.
(06:58):
Because when you arrive at a place like Antietam, if you really don't know what
happened there, you see the sunken lane, the bloody lane where really just the
dead were just piled up like cordwood.
You really don't have a context for it unless you know what happened there.
Otherwise, you're just looking at a depression in the ground and not really
knowing, you know, what even happened there.
Now, being from Indiana, Antietam has special significance to me because it's
(07:22):
a place where so many Indiana boys charged to the cornfield,
and that was the last charge that they ever made.
I mean, it was just a powerful, that cornfield, you read historical accounts
of it, and it was cut down to within an inch of the ground as if a reaper had just come through.
It was just a horrible slaughter there, but Antietam is a powerful place to
visit. it. Number five is Andersonville, the infamous Civil War prisoner camp in southern Georgia.
(07:48):
And I'm not sure how many people actually visit Andersonville because it's off the beaten path.
I mean, not horribly so, but it's probably an hour off the I-75 corridor.
And for most people from at least the Midwest and the North and so forth,
if you're traveling through Georgia, I mean, apologies to Georgia,
(08:09):
but mainly you're traveling through Georgia to get to Florida on vacation.
I mean, that's just what people do. You road trip for spring break or summer
vacation or a trip to Magic Kingdom or wherever you're going.
But, you know, Georgia is something you have to drive through to get to Florida.
And a lot of great stuff about Georgia. So hope no one takes offense by that,
but it's just reality. And the Andersonville camp is probably,
(08:32):
again, an hour off the I-75 corridor.
So it can be conveniently planned into a road trip if you are heading, say, to Florida.
It very easily can be worked into your trip to go to Andersonville.
And, you know, Andersonville, there were so many thousands of troops that were
starved, that were exposed to the elements with no clothing in many cases,
(08:53):
that were forced to drink water, that was polluted with sewage and so forth.
Just a horrible place that became the symbol of brutality and prisoner of war
camps during the Civil War.
Did they really understand the misery of what happened at Andersonville?
You really need a visit in mid-July or August when the Georgia heat is at its strongest.
(09:14):
And when you go there and you realize these guys are just packed like animals into this field, wow.
I mean, it just gives you a feel for what type of misery they had to endure there.
Number five is Grant's statue at the steps of the Capitol building.
I mean, this is just, to me, one of the most powerful and significant statues
of General Grant of any historical figure in the United States that you're going to find.
(09:37):
In fact, if you take the time, which I've done on numerous occasions,
just to sit and study Grant's statue as it looks across the mall towards the
Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial,
what you'll see is just this grit and resolve of General Grant that is just
captured in this statue.
(09:58):
You see the slouch hat, you see the collar pulled up.
It's not trying to be one of these glorious statues of some type of holier-than-thou type of leader.
What you see is the statue of a general who knew how to fight and a president
of this country that had grit and resolve.
So it's a very powerful, if you're visiting the Capitol building,
if you're in DC, if you're on the mall, make sure you take the time to see Grant's
(10:21):
statue. I guarantee you it'll be well worth it for you.
Number seven is the Shenandoah Valley. And that's a general statement anywhere
in the the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia. It is just full of history.
I mean, it's just an amazing place. It's beautiful.
The corridor, the interstate corridor that runs through there,
it seems like there's history at almost every single exit.
And you see these old Virginia farmhouses and so forth.
(10:43):
Just so much happened in the Shenandoah Valley and that entire region.
You know, it's just, you can spend a lot of time there. Let's put it that way.
So the Shenandoah Valley is well worth traveling through for the beauty and
for the historical significance. Now, number eight is Bull Run or Manassas,
whichever one you want to call it.
Bull Run or Manassas is where I consider the war really lost its innocence right
(11:06):
off the bat, because there were two major battles fought there.
But the first one, the first Battle of Bull Run,
was the battle that, you know, it was the battle that sort of eliminated these
rose-colored glasses that this was going to be a very short battle, the war,
or this was going to be sort of just like a fisticuffs match on the playground
(11:27):
or something like that, that one side would win and then everybody would quit and go home.
You know, it was even a spectator sport to some folks that just came from the
Capitol to see, you know, what a good old fight would look like sort of thing.
What the world learned, what the United States learned at that point was that
Bull Run exposed the horrors of war.
(11:47):
It exposed what it looks like to see men die by the thousands and just the carnage
that occurs as a result of that.
So Bull Run, Manassas, it is the place where the war lost its innocence.
And just as a footnote to that, I just recently saw that the battlefield has
uncovered burial pits of aborted limbs accidentally. They don't encourage and
(12:11):
don't allow digging on site, but I think they were retrenching something there at the battlefield.
So it was an accidental discovery, but they found bones that were just shattered
in so many different places.
And it was just a horrific reminder of the carnage that took place there.
Number nine is Fort Donelson. Now, some of you have never heard of Fort Donelson.
It's down in the, I think technically it's in Dover, Tennessee.
(12:34):
It's right down in Tennessee, Kentucky border by the land between the lakes,
southern end of that. But Fort Donaldson is where Ulysses S.
Grant earned his reputation as a fighter, and it's actually where he earned
his nickname, Unconditional Surrender Grant.
And you can go there. There's a national cemetery there. You can stand in some
of the rifle pits that still remain.
(12:55):
You can stand in some of the gun turrets where cannon had been placed to guard the river.
And so you can visualize very clearly when you're there how this this battle
went down But of particular note of fort donaldson is that this is where grant
proved that he would fight and now last on the list, but.
Very important to the point I want to make with this whole discussion is Appomattox.
(13:18):
Appomattox Courthouse, it's the place where it all ended, where the surrender happened.
Rifles were stacked up, men openly cried, and the killing began to grind to a halt.
Now, historians will know that even though the surrender of Lee to Grant happened,
there were still armies in the field, so there was still quite a bit that still
needed to happen to bring all of the killing, all of the fighting,
(13:40):
all of the Civil War to an end. quite a bit that still needed to happen.
I mean, armies in the field at that time had no idea what was happening in Appomattox,
and they were still fighting.
And I don't know, many of you may know this, there were actually more than a
few people that were advocating that the South go into more or less guerrilla warfare mode,
that the armies just would sort of be absorbed into the countryside and just
(14:04):
conduct guerrilla raids from that point forward,
which would have made the war go on to a horrific degree for a much longer period of time.
But the Appomattox Courthouse is someplace that is very powerful to visit.
Now, it's very curious to me that, at least from my experience,
Appomattox Courthouse, as important as it is, seems to be among the least visited
(14:26):
Civil War sites that are out there.
And I don't know, it's always kind of, I've always kind of wondered about that.
Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe it's just my experience of when I've been there.
And it's not in the easiest location or it's not hard to get to let's put it
that way But it's not you know, it's not like next to a tourist attraction type of deal. So, you know in.
(14:46):
1865. I don't think they were really looking at picking a spot that would be
convenient to an interstate so that people could visit it down the road.
So it is what it is. And you have to drive and you have to get into the Virginia
countryside if you want to visit Appomattox.
But it's just a powerful place to go.
The farmhouse where Lee surrendered to Grant is still there.
(15:07):
And you can just really absorb so much history when you're there.
So with all of that said, Appomattox is so key to all of this,
because it reminds me that in a great human rights struggle in our past,
that ultimately there was victory.
And when I think of just this work to extend love to every mom and every baby,
(15:29):
born and unborn, it's an ongoing effort, something that just seems like it grinds out longer and longer.
But I just like to remind myself, I want to remind you, Victory is coming slowly,
steadily, relentlessly.
Victory is coming in this human rights issue and discussion.
And just as Appomattox marks a new day for our nation,
(15:50):
there will one day be a place where the work to protect and extend protection
to every mom and every baby will finally and mercifully conclude with liberty and justice for all.
Hey, never forget that that victory is coming. and never forget that when you
change the culture, the politics will follow. Hey, happy Independence Day, America.
(16:15):
Hope you're safe. Have a great day.
Music.
Thanks for listening to the official podcast of the Love Times Two Project.
Be sure to subscribe to the podcast so you never miss an episode.
And never forget, change the culture and the politics will follow.
Music.
(16:38):
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(17:00):
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