Harrisburg and the Civil War: Defending the Keystone of the Union Lecture

Answering Lincoln’s call for volunteers, men swarmed into the Pennsylvania capital to fight for the Union. The cityscape was transformed as soldiers camped on the lawn of the Capitol and schools, churches were turned into hospitals and the local fairgrounds became the training facility of Camp Curtin. For four years, Harrisburg and its railroad hub served as a continuous facilitation site for thousands of Northern soldiers on their way to the front lines. This vital role to the Union war efforts twice placed the capital in the sights of the Confederates—most famously during the Gettysburg Campaign when Southern forces neared the city’s out­skirts. Join 15 year old Cooper Wingert for his illus­trated talk, “Harrisburg and the Civil War,” to explore the many fascinating features of Harrisburg during the 1860s, including Camp Curtin--which would become the largest training camp in the Civil War North--as well as the city’s close call during the Gettysburg campaign.