Basil Biggs

Basil Biggs (HMKWF)

Location: Gettysburg, PA 17325 Adams County
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Country: United States of America
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N 39° 49.567', W 77° 14.133'

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Inscription
In the days after the Confederate Army retreated from the North in July 1863, civilians labored to bury the thousands of soldiers lying dead in towns and hillsides across south-central Pennsylvania. It was an enormous task, and most of the bodies ended up in shallow mass graves. Soon enough, though, the challenge of proper burial dovetailed with the Union's desire to honor the fallen of this long-awaited victory.

A Gettysburg attorney, David Wills, purchased 17 acres of the battlefield for a Union cemetery. To disinter the more than 3,500 fallen Union soldiers buried elsewhere, the government contracted with local farmer F.W. Biesecker who employed Samuel Weaver as superintendent of burials. They hired a number of African American laborers including Basil Biggs, reportedly an agent on the Underground Railroad who lived near Gettysburg, to remove bodies from both makeshift and established cemeteries around the region — including a small number in Hanover — and transport them to Gettysburg.
Details
HM NumberHMKWF
Tags
Year Placed2009
Placed ByPennsylvania Civil War Trails
Marker ConditionNo reports yet
Date Added Friday, September 26th, 2014 at 12:35am PDT -07:00
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Locationbig map
UTM (WGS84 Datum)18S E 308682 N 4410849
Decimal Degrees39.82611667, -77.23555000
Degrees and Decimal MinutesN 39° 49.567', W 77° 14.133'
Degrees, Minutes and Seconds39° 49' 34.02" N, 77° 14' 7.98" W
Driving DirectionsGoogle Maps
Area Code(s)717
Closest Postal AddressAt or near 412-426 Long Ln, Gettysburg PA 17325, US
Alternative Maps Google Maps, MapQuest, Bing Maps, Yahoo Maps, MSR Maps, OpenCycleMap, MyTopo Maps, OpenStreetMap

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