Hanover photographer Peter S. Weaver recorded a view on February 6, 1864, showing Samuel Weaver, his father, who supervised the exhumation and reburial of more than 3,500 Union soldiers in Gettysburg National Cemetery. Workers used long hooks to pull decomposed bodies from graves. Nineteen Union cavalrymen were reported killed or mortally wounded in Hanover on June 30, 1863; although some bodies had been moved elsewhere, eleven still remained buried there in 1864. On the evening of the battle, citizens took the Union dead to J.P. Flickinger's foundry on York Street, and by 9:00 p.m. the bodies had been placed in caskets ordered by Henry Wirt. Reverend W. K. Zieber of Emmanuel Reformed Church conducted ceremonies at the Reformed Cemetery, and two soldiers were also buried in St. Matthew Church Cemetery. Those buried at Hanover were later taken up, placed in coffins, conveyed to Gettysburg, and reinterred in the National Cemetery there.

Photo: Beverly Pfingsten

Photo: Beverly Pfingsten

Photo: Beverly Pfingsten

Photo: Beverly Pfingsten

Pennville, Pennsylvania · USA