V. Civil War Monument

I went to the Civil War Monument on Gorham campus with my History of Maine class so when I went to the site, it was full of people looking at the names and learning about the monument's history. Generally though, I never see anyone there. In fact, I didn't even know it existed until this year when I heard Libby speaking about it. I'd walk by it and see it but I never really noticed it. What I did learn when I took the time to view it was that it was probably the first Civil War monument in the state and one of the earliest in the nation. Most Civil War monuments, and war monuments in general, were not built until five, ten, twenty years after the war had ended. This one though was built in 1866, less than a year after the fighting had stopped.

The monument on campus was constructed and set up in front of what was then Gorham Town Hall by Toppan Robie, father to Frederick Robie who commissioned Robie dormitory hall. It lists the names of all soldiers of Gorham who died in battle or of complications from battle in the Civil War. The gate around it was added later. Joshua Chamberlain spoke at it's opening as his company was one of many from Maine who lost men in the war. It was really hard to retrieve any information about the monument itself but I did find a photograph of Joshua Chamberlain and the 20th Maine in Gettysburg from a reunion of soldiers in 1889.

Although this was only one group of soldiers from Maine involved in the fighting, I found two men on the statue that belonged to this group of soldiers who fought at Little Round Top in Gettysburg.