The National Park Service sponsors a "Adopt a Position" program,
under which private individuals and organizations assist the NPS
in its important task of preserving our nation's heritage. For the
first time, the NPS is getting a hand from cyberspace! An Internet
Web Page has adopted an important
monument at Gettysburg.
The "Harvard Regiment" Home Page
has a detailed site on the
Internet honoring one of the most famous Union army regiments in
the Civil War, the 20th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry.
The 20th
was the "Harvard Regiment" due to the presence of such
Harvard officers as future Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell
Holmes, Jr. At Gettysburg, the 20th Mass. helped to defeat "Pickett's Charge".
Near the famous copse of trees, the "High Water" Mark of the Confederacy,
stands the 20th Mass Monument: a 30 ton boulder made of
"Roxbury Puddingstone", a type of rock native to Massachusetts, and
brought to the site by train in the 19th Century.
The Harvard Regiment Web site has images and the full story behind this
unique monument. The Web site
is found at http://www.med.virginia.edu/~mmd5f
Bob Dame, descendant of a 20th Mass. soldier and developer of the Web Page, will coordinate efforts to help the National Park Service
protect and preserve this fitting memorial to Bay State men who made the supreme sacrifice.