So I walked on, looking at one and another, each lying in a different attitude, each attitude seeming to show the last thought and feeling which was in the mind of the poor fellow as he died. To us, these men are only rebels; but each of them had a home, mother, wife, children. They look out of their cabin-window, like the mother of Sisera, and say, “When will he come back?” The little children say, “When will papa come back? and what will he bring me?” The mother says, “He has gone into Pennsylvania with Gen. Lee, and he will bring back something for us.” “Have they not sped? have they not divided the prey?” Poor desolated homes, South as well as North! Long will they look, and look in vain, for the return of those, dear to them as ours to us, who lie undistinguished, cumbering the bloody field.

Clarke, James Freeman. After the Battle: A Visit to Gettysburg. Monthly Journal of the American Unitarian Association, Vol. 4, 1863. Page 402.

ARB — 11 Nov 2020