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Classic Audiobook Collection - The Gettysburg Address by Abraham Lincoln ~ Full Audiobook [speeches]
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The Gettysburg Address by Abraham Lincoln ~ Full Audiobook [speeches]

Classic Audiobook Collection

08/30/22

5m

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The Gettysburg Address by Abraham Lincoln audiobook.

Genre: speeches

It was a cloudy November day in 1863 when thousands gathered to hear renowned orator Edward Everett dedicate a national cemetery at the site of a pivotal battle early in July of that year. Also present to deliver 'a few appropriate remarks' was the President of the United States, Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln spoke but 278 words; Everett later wrote to the President, 'I should be glad, if I could flatter myself that I came as near to the central idea of the occasion, in two hours, as you did in two minutes.' Though there are surviving transcripts of Everett's lengthy speech, it is Lincoln's words which have come to be known as 'The Gettysburg Address'

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Chapters (Approximate)

(00:00:00) Chapter 1

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Previous Episode

Chancellorsville and Gettysburg by Abner Doubleday audiobook.

Genre: history

Abner Doubleday began the Civil War as a Union officer and aimed the first cannon shot in response to the bombardment opened on Ft. Sumter in 1861. Two years later, after a series of battles (including Antietam, where he was wounded), Doubleday took over a division in the Army of the Potomac's 1st Corps.

These are his memoirs of service in two of the War's great campaigns. At Chancellorsville, a very promising start made by General Hooker against Lee's Confederate forces fell to a defeat when, in Doubleday's estimation, normal and prudent precautions against surprise in the heavily-wooded battlefield were not carried out; he also seemingly apologizes for Hooker's lack of leadership during the battle as a result of his having been stunned by a cannon ball hitting the post against which he was leaning.

After Chancellorsville, Hooker was replaced as Army Commander by General George Meade. Doubleday describes the curious circumstances that led the two opposing armies to meet at Gettysburg in Pennsylvania. When Doubleday's superior, General John Reynolds, was killed by a sharpshooter on the first day's battle, he took over the 1st Corps and fought it well against converging Confederate divisions that badly outnumbered him. The Corps was forced by battle losses to retire, but its desperate fight bought the time needed for Union reinforcements to pour into Gettysburg and thus prevent a defeat in detail.

General Howard of the XIth Corps replaced Doubleday as the senior commander on the field, and mistakenly wrote to Meade that 1st Corps had routed after practically no fighting. Thus, when Meade arrived, he removed Doubleday from command of 1st Corps, replacing him with a more junior general from another Corps. The snub would embitter Doubleday against Meade. This book is in part Doubleday's revenge, as he picks apart Meade's indecision after the battle was essentially won, with the repulse of the famous Pickett's Charge. In his view, Meade could have won the war at that moment.

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Chapters (Approximate)

(00:00:00) Chapter 00

(00:04:40) Chapter 01

(00:23:31) Chapter 02

(00:38:34) Chapter 03

(00:48:30) Chapter 04

(01:08:57) Chapter 05

(01:20:41) Chapter 06

(01:28:41) Chapter 07

(02:04:18) Chapter 08

(02:29:35) Chapter 09

(02:40:55) Chapter 10

(02:47:53) Chapter 11

(03:08:51) Chapter 12

(03:44:41) Chapter 13

(03:57:43) Chapter 14

(04:27:57) Chapter 15

(05:00:22) Chapter 16

(05:27:08) Chapter 17

(05:57:32) Chapter 18

(06:32:06) Chapter 19

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Next Episode

The Emancipation Proclamation by Abraham Lincoln audiobook.

Genre: speeches

After having written and released an initial draft of this proclamation in September of 1862, minor changes were made and Lincoln signed it on January 1st, 1863. It declared free the slaves in 10 states not then under Union control, with exemptions specified for areas already under Union control in two states. Lincoln spent the next 100 days preparing the army and the nation for emancipation, while Democrats rallied their voters in the 1862 off-year elections by warning of the threat freed slaves posed to northern whites.

Once the abolition of slavery in the rebel states became a military objective, as Union armies advanced south, more slaves were liberated until all three million of them in Confederate territory were freed. Lincoln's comment on the signing of the Proclamation was: 'I never, in my life, felt more certain that I was doing right, than I do in signing this paper.'

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Chapters (Approximate)

(00:00:00) Chapter 01

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