Chapter 68: On November 19, 1863 Abe Delivers His Gettysburg Address

Citizens of Gettysburg decide to honor the fallen heroes with a ceremony at the new National Cemetery in town. The fanfare is to be led by famed orator, Edward Everett, former president of Harvard, U.S. Senator and Secretary of State. After which President Lincoln is asked to deliver a few closing remarks.

Everett speaks for two hours straight, as usual from memory, without notes.

When he ends, the restless crowd of some 15,000 mills around as Lincoln reaches the lectern. His address contains 277 words and lasts a little over two minutes.

While hailing “a re-birth of freedom” and “a new nation dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal,” he slips in the humble observation “the world will little note, nor long remember what we say here.”

He is disappointed with his effort telling friends “that speech won’t scour.” But Everett tells him “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.”

And within days the national press prints the speech and it becomes another tribute to his unique capacity to capture the words that move men’s souls.