Pod Insights Jocko Podcast 393: 4th of July, 1863 About this episode >Join Jocko Underground< https://www.jockounderground.com/subscribe
Amongst the scene of unsupportable horror.
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Transcript 13,602 words · 2 speakers
Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.
0:00 Jocko Willink? This is Jocko Podcast number 393 with Kerry Helton and me Jocko Willink. Good evening Kerry. Good evening.
0:08 Jocko Willink? On the 4th of July, we took part in a reconnaissance over the wreck strewn field amidst the scene of unsupportable horror.
0:17 Jocko Willink? Pushing as far out as Willoughby's Run, finding no enemy, we returned to our ground. We were now told to rest and be ready to move from the field the next day.
0:31 Jocko Willink? But there was neither removal nor rest for us till we had gone up the round top slopes to bid farewell to our dead. We found them there on sheltered lawn where we had laid them, on the velvet moss fringed by low cedars that veiled the place with peace and beauty. I rode up near and flinging the rein upon my horse's neck, dismounted to bend over them for a soldier's farewell.
1:01 Jocko Willink? There they lay, side by side, with touch of elbow still. Brave bronzed faces where the last thought was written. Manly resolution, heroic self-giving, divine reconciliation. Or where on some young face the sweet mother look had come out under death's soft whisper.
1:29 Jocko Willink? We buried them there in a grave alas too wide on the sunny side of a great rock. Eternal witnesses of their worth, the rock and the sun. Rude headboards made of ammunition boxes rudely carved under tear dimmed eyes marked and named each grave and told each home.
1:57 Jocko Willink? I went, it is not long ago, to stand again upon that crest whose one day's crown of fire has passed into the blazoned coronet of fame, to look again upon the rocks whereon we laid as on the altar of lives of Vincent and O'Rourke, of Weed and Haslett, all the chief commanders. And farther on were my own young heroes mounted to fall no more: Billings, the valor of whose onward-looking eyes not death itself could quench; Kendall, almost maiden-sweet and fair, yet heating not the bolts that dashed his life-blood on the rocks;
2:41 Jocko Willink? Estes and Steele, and Noyes and Buck, lifted high above self, pure in heart as they that shall see God.
2:52 Jocko Willink? And far up the rugged sides of Great Round Top, swept in darkness and silence like its own, where the impetuous Linscott had halted at last before the morning star.
3:08 Jocko Willink? I thought of those other noble men of every type, commanders all, who bore their wounds so bravely, many to meet their end on later fields, and those on whose true hearts further high trusts were to be laid. Nor did I forget those others, whether their names are written on the scrolls of honour and fame or their dust left on some far field and nameless. Nameless never to me, nor nameless I trust in God
3:48 Jocko Willink? where they are to-night.
3:57 Jocko Willink? So that right there is an excerpt from Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain's book, Bayonet Forward. And that is a section where he recounts the burying of his men on the 4th of July after the Battle of Gettysburg. And this is what I think of now, on the 4th of July.
4:25 Jocko Willink? I know that we celebrate our freedom. I know we cook hot dogs. I know we watch fireworks. And I know that we enjoy the incredible blessings of this great nation.
4:38 Jocko Willink? But I remember also that on this day, 160 years ago,
4:44 Jocko Willink? a brave commander buried the men he had lost.
4:51 Jocko Willink? Men who were defending a hill, defending the Union flank, defending the Union Army,
4:58 Jocko Willink? and preserving the United States of America.
5:04 Jocko Willink? And I've talked about Chamberlain before. We covered parts of this book on Podcast 323 with Jason Gardner. I also covered this broadly, talking about the Battle of Gettysburg on the Civil War excursion with JD, Episode 6. Chamberlain was kind of epic, to be honest with you.
5:33 Jocko Willink? Soldier, leader, warrior, also a scholar. He received the Medal of Honor for his leadership at Gettysburg for specifically Little Round Top. But he also fought, that wasn't all for him. He also fought Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, Spotsylvania, Cold Harbor, Petersburg, Five Forks. He was wounded five times in battle. And two of those times where he was wounded, they probably should have been fatal.
6:06 Jocko Willink? Of all the soldiers and officers, it was Chamberlain who was chosen to receive the flag of surrender at Appomattox on April 12th, 1865. And after the war,
6:24 Jocko Willink? Chamberlain went back to Maine, where he was elected governor four times.
6:31 Jocko Willink? He was also a lawyer. He was a real estate developer, served as president of Bowdoin College, and he's incredibly articulate, incredible writer and communicator. And his writing is a little bit lofty for us today. Just a little bit, not, not too much.
6:53 Jocko Willink? But like Shakespeare, he has a command of language that we have to work a little bit to appreciate.
7:01 Jocko Willink? But when we do the work, we are rewarded with enlightenment through his words.
7:11 Jocko Willink? So, back to the context of the 4th of July, this gruesome and heroic battle for Little Round Top. And the message that Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain delivers is one that we must never forget. So, let's set the stage, Gettysburg. After victory for the Confederates in Chancellorsville in May of 1863, General Lee, the commander of the Confederates, the Army of Northern Virginia, he wanted to invade the North. That's what he wanted to do. He was tired of fighting down in the South. When these wars took place back then, like the Civil War,
7:56 Jocko Willink? the soldiers and the horses, they, they basically were like locusts moving through the land. They would just, just eat everything in sight. And General Lee wanted to take the pressure off of the South, especially his home state of Virginia. And he thought that if he could do that, some of the Northern politicians...
8:20 Jocko Willink? They would think to themselves, look, this is too much trouble. I want this kind of, I don't want this kind of beef. Right? We don't need this. Let's just let the South go. Just let them go. Let them go do their own thing. That's fine. He was hoping that the northern politicians would be convinced in that, of that if generally invaded.
8:39 Jocko Willink? So that's what he did. He marched his army to the north. Eventually, they, they massed about 70,000 troops. This battle of Gettysburg started on July 1st, 1863. The Union's General Buford, who was a cavalry commander, spotted the Confederates.
9:01 Jocko Willink? And instead of doing what cavalry is supposed to do, which is go back and tell headquarters what's going on. Instead, he knew that they need to be slowed down. He needed to slow down the Confederates. And so that's what he did. He attacked them. Sort of set up little picket lines and would harass them for a while. And then run away and then harass them some more and then run away and harass them some more. And it did slow down the Confederates and it allowed the Union troops time to move into position, which is what they did. And on the second day of the battle, which is July 2nd.
9:36 Jocko Willink? Most of both armies had been assembled and the Union army was on the high ground.
9:45 Jocko Willink? Well, a stretch of high ground Cemetery Ridge and Culp's Hill and eventually Little Round Top down there to the south. And the Confederate forces were aligned on Seminary Ridge. And it was on that second delay, second day of the battle, July 2nd, 1863. That the 4th, the 15th and the 47th Alabama regiments, along with the 4th and 5th Texas regiments attacked the left flank of the Union line.
10:20 Jocko Willink? And it was a storm of close combat that lasted almost three hours.
10:26 Jocko Willink? And it's our duty today that their deeds and their names are captured
10:33 Jocko Willink? in those scrolls of honor, as Chamberlain said, and in this case, the scrolls written by Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain himself. So let's go to the book. As Chamberlain takes position on Little Round Top, again, remember, this is the second day of battle. There is already chaos going on and they recognize, the Union recognized that they had to get troops down there to this left flank so that they could hold the left flank because they knew if they got, if they got overtaken on their left flank, they would probably get rolled up very, very quickly. And so this is now Chamberlain moving his troops into position on Little Round Top.
11:19 Jocko Willink? And I'm going to do my best. It's a weird, it's a weird balancing act because I just want to read it, but I also want to take time to discuss what he's saying. And even when I got done with that first passage, I was like, man, there's so many things I want to queue in on. The things that he's saying are so powerful. So I'll try and do a little bit of both.
11:45 Jocko Willink? So here we are going to the book, Bayonet Forward. Once again, this little section is called, "Hold the Line at All Costs."
11:55 Jocko Willink? "As we neared the summit of the mountain, the shot so raked the crest that we had to keep our men below it to save our heads. Although this is, did not wholly avert the visits of treetops and splinters of rock and iron, while the boulders and clefts and pitfalls in our path made them seem like the replica of the evil den across the sweetly named Plum Run."
12:23 Jocko Willink? So here they are. They're just trying to get in position and they can't go over the crest of the mountain or they'll get killed. But there's so much shrapnel coming down on them that it seems like to him, over across the way, over across Plum Run, which is a little, like a little road, is the Devil's Den, which is another part of the Gettys, Gettys Field, Gettysburg Battlefield. It's another part of it. And there's all these rocks and weird little formations in there where there was a lot of heavy fighting and death. But he's saying this was like their own little replica of the Devil's Den. Just imagine, you're going
13:05 Jocko Willink? to get in position on a line that you're being, gonna be told you have to hold. And there's so much fire coming your way that you can't dare to get your head over that crest. So that's what they're rolling into. Back to the book, reaching the southern face of Little Round Top, I found Vincent there with intense poise and look. He said with a voice of awe, as if translating the tables of eternal law. Like, who writes that? Right there. So this is Strong Vincent, one of the commanders. He said with a voice of awe, as if translating the tables of eternal law. First of all, I don't even know what that means. I mean, I've never heard of the eternal law. Have you? No.
13:50 Jocko Willink? No. It's just, but we know what it means, but we don't know what it means. We know that the tables of eternal law. We know what they are, but we don't know what they are. He says, "I place you here. This is the left of the Union Line. You understand. You are to hold this ground at all costs." I did understand full well, but had more to learn about costs. So, the left flank of the Union Line. So of the, I forget, I think it's 80 or 90,000 Union soldiers that are there. They're all in a big line. And the far left flank is these guys from the 20th Maine.
14:34 Jocko Willink? He goes on to say, "The regiment coming up right in the front was put in position by a quite uncommon order, on the right by file into line, both that we should thus be facing the enemy when we came to a front and also be ready to commence firing as fast as each man arrived." This is a rather slow style of formation, but this time it was it was needful. Knowing that we had no support on the left, I dispatched a stalwart commander under the level-headed Captain Morrell in that direction with orders to move along up the valley to our front and left between us and the eastern base of the Great Round Top to keep within
15:19 Jocko Willink? supporting distance of us and act and to act as the exigencies of the battle should require." This is decentralized command coming at you. So when you're on Little Round Top, and thankfully I've been there a bunch of times now, when you're on Little Round Top, it just kind of, it's a smaller knoll, and then it goes down into a little valley, and then it picks up, and that's the big round top, Great Round Top. And he sends Captain Morrell with a few other guys, these sharpshooters, he sends them down and maintains supporting distance. So that means they're supposed to stay close enough that they can hear each other, that they can definitely support each other with fire. And he says, "Hey, you do what you need to do as the battle requires."
16:03 Jocko Willink? That's decentralized command, loud and clear. "Hey, go over there and be ready to just do what you gotta do." Next, "The 20th Maine Regiment had 358 men equipped for duty in the ranks with 28 officers. They were all well-seasoned soldiers, and what is more, well-rounded men, body and brain." So he's got 358 men and then he goes on to this. "One somewhat important side note must have place here in order properly to appreciate the mental and moral attitude of the men before us. 120 of these men from the 2nd Maine were recruits whom some recruiting officer had
16:47 Jocko Willink? led into the belief that they should be discharged with their regiment at the end of its term of service. In their enthusiasm, they had not noticed that they were signing enlistment papers for quote, "three years of the war," end quote. And when they had been held in the field after the discharge of the regiment, they had refused to do military duty and had been sequestrated in a prisoner's camp as mutineers waiting court martial." So, 100 of these guys are people that had gotten screwed over by their recruiter. The recruiter said, "Hey, you'll, you'll, you're just going when the regiment goes and when the regiment disbands, you, you guys don't have to do anything else." The fine print was you owe three years to the war.
17:33 Jocko Willink? So these guys were like, "Oh, we're not doing it anymore. We're done." And they get put into a prison camp as mutineers and they're waiting for a court martial.
17:44 Jocko Willink? Continuing on. "The exigency of our movement, the last of May, had not permitted this semi-civil treatment and orders from the Secretary of War had directed me to take these men upon my rolls and put them to duty." So now they didn't have time for all this, so they tell him, "Hey, you're going to take these guys." "This made it still harder for them to accept as they had never enlisted in this regiment. However, they had been soon brought over to me under the guard of the 118th Pennsylvania with fixed bayonets, with orders to me to take them into my regiment and make them do duty or shoot them down the moment they refused."
18:28 Jocko Willink? So, there's a bunch of Pennsylvania soldiers that have these guys at bayonet point. They march them over and tell Chamberlain, "All right, you can have these guys do military duty. If they don't do it, kill them."
18:42 Jocko Willink? These had been the very words of the Corps Commander in person. The responsibility I had thought gave me some discretionary power. So I had placed their names on our rolls, distributed them by groups to equalize companies, and particularly to break up the esprit de corps of banded mutineers. That's a good move, right? You got 100 guys roll in? You don't want to keep them in a pack because now they're talking to each other. No, you, you put them in the different companies. So now they're around a bunch of other guys that are going to kind of sway them in another direction. Then I had called them together and pointed out to them the situation.
19:20 Jocko Willink? That they could not be entertained as civilian guests by me, that they were by authority of the United States on my rolls as soldiers and I should treat them as soldiers should be treated. That they should lose no rights by obeying orders and I would see what could be done for their claim. It is pleasant to record that all but one or two had gone back manfully to duty to become some of the best soldiers in the regiment as I was to prove this very day.
19:53 Jocko Willink? How's that for a leadership story? Freaking prisoners that just want to leave the war. They've seen enough, they've had enough, they've done what they believed they should have done. They show up as prisoners at bayonet point and he gets them to fight and fight hard.
20:12 Jocko Willink? This next section is called "Not a Man Waivers Now."
20:17 Jocko Willink? "The exigency was great. I released the prisoners and provost guards all together and sent them to their companies. All but the drummer boys and hospital attendants went into the ranks. Even the cooks and servants not liable to such service asked to go in." So here you are, you're a cook. They're taking the line, you're taking fire and you're like, yo, I'm putting down my spatula, I'm picking up a rifle, let's go. "Others whom I knew to be sick or foot sore and had given a pass to fall out on the forced marches of the day and night before came up now that the battle was on, dragging themselves along on the lame and bleeding feet, finding their regiment."
21:01 Jocko Willink? With the sagacity of the brave and their places where need is greatest and hearts truest. So guys that were hurt, guys that were sore, guys that had fallen out of the force march, they finally get up there and they're getting in the line.
21:17 Jocko Willink? Places, did any of these heroic men ever leave them? Although for all too many, we passed their names at evening roll call thereafter, with only the heart's answer here forever.
21:34 Jocko Willink? So, did these guys maintain their place? Yes, they did. And to the point where when they passed their evening roll call, only the heart answered that they were there forever.
21:50 Jocko Willink? Our line looked toward the great round top, frowning above us, not a gunshot away and raising grave thoughts of what might happen if the enemy should gain foothold there, even if impracticable for artillery. We had enough of that as it was. For the tremendous candidate from across the Plum Run Gorge was still pounding the little round top crests happily, not as yet striking my line, which it would have enfilade if it got into range. So they are looking at the bigger of the two round tops, and he realizes that it's going to be bad if they get up there. And they're still taking fire this whole time.
22:33 Jocko Willink? The other regiments of the brigade were forming on our right. The 83rd Pennsylvania, the 44th New York, and the 16th Michigan. I was observing and meditating as to the impending and the possible, when something of the real was substituted by a visit from Colonel Rice.
22:55 Jocko Willink? He thought it would be profitable for us to utilize these few minutes by going to the clear space on the right of the regiment to take a look at the aspect of things in Plum Run Valley, the direction of the advance on our front. It was a forewarning indeed. The enemy had already turned the 3rd Corps left. The Devil's Den was a smoking crater, the Plum Run Gorge a whirling maelstrom. One force was charging our advance batteries near the wheat field, the flanking force was pressing past the base of the round tops, all rolling toward us in tumultuous waves. That's gotta be a freaking nightmare right there. So, you're standing on
23:40 Jocko Willink? Little Round Top, and you, you move over a little bit, cuz where, where the 20th Main's end, ends up, because it's further south, you don't get quite get the, the vantage point, as if you move a little north on Little Round Top, and then you can kinda see the whole battle. So Colonel Rice comes over and comes like, "Come check this out, bro." And they walk out there, and they just see, they see this epic force moving forward, these Confederate soldiers. They, they, they were, Devil's Den was a smoking crater, Plum Gorge was a whirling maelstrom.
24:17 Jocko Willink? The 3rd Corps had already broken, like this is just, it's gnarly. And you're sitting up there with like, what'd he say, 350 guys?
24:31 Jocko Willink? It was a stirring, not to say appalling sight. Here, a whole battery of shot and shell cutting a ragged chasm through a serried mass, flinging men and horses like drift aside. There, a rifle volley at close range with reeling shock, hands tossed in air, muskets dropped with death's quick relax, or clutched with last convulsive energy, men falling like grass before the skith, others with manhoods proud, calm, and rally. There, a little group kneeling above some favorite officer slain, his intense spirit still animating the fiery steed, pressing headlong with empty saddle into the van.
25:18 Jocko Willink? Basically, every one of those little phrases.
25:24 Jocko Willink? Flinging men and horses like drift aside, just people getting thrown around by cannonballs. There a rifle volley at close range with reeling shock, hands tossed in the air, muskets dropped at death's quick relax. Or clutch with last convulsive energy, men falling like grass before the skythe, others with manhood's proud calm rally.
25:50 Jocko Willink? There, a little group kneeling above some officer slain, so there's a bunch of guys huddled around some favorite officer, and yet his horse is still going forward with nothing in the saddle, towards the front of the battle.
26:08 Jocko Willink? Here, a defiant regiment of ours, broken, slaughtered, captured, or survivors of both sides, crouching among the rocks for shelter from the terrible crossfire where there is no rear.
26:23 Jocko Willink? But all advancing.
26:26 Jocko Willink? All the frenzied force, victors and vanquished, each scarcely knowing which, surging and foaming towards us.
26:37 Jocko Willink? Death around, behind, before, and madness everywhere.
26:47 Jocko Willink? It's mayhem. It's mayhem. The people that are winning and the people that are losing, they don't even know. There's no rear, there's nowhere where you're safe.
26:58 Jocko Willink? Surging and foaming, death everywhere.
27:03 Speaker 01 Advancing all.
27:05 Jocko Willink? And everyone's advancing.
27:10 Jocko Willink? Yes, brave Colonel Rice, it was well for us to see this. The better to see it through. A look into each other's eyes without a word, we resumed our respective places.
27:29 Jocko Willink? So they're looking. Like I said, with Little Round Top, which isn't a hu- it's not like a mountain. It's a knoll. Maybe a little bigger than a knoll, but it's not huge. But when you move to that northern part of it, it gives you a really good view of the rest of the battlefield. So they go out there, they see this mayhem in the wheat field, which the wheat field doesn't get talked a lot about, but the wheat field, there were so many people. It's probably about the size of
27:59 Jocko Willink? two or three football fields, maybe four football fields, and this is from memory, I apologize if I'm wrong. But there's accounts of it that there were so many dead on the wheat field that you could walk from one side to the other without touching the ground.
28:14 Jocko Willink? So that's what they're looking down on. They're looking down on all this. And they know that they're, it's their job that they're the last defense for the Union. Next section's called a low. Then the crash of hell, ten minutes had not passed. Suddenly the thunder of artillery and the crash of iron that had all the while been roaring over the round top crests stopped short. We understood this too. The storming lines that had swept past the third corps flank had got up to the base of Little Round Top. And under the range and reach of their guns.
28:54 Jocko Willink? They were now close upon, they were now close upon us among the rocks, we knew unseen because so near.
29:03 Jocko Willink? In a minute more came the roll of musketry. It struck the exposed right center of our brigade, promptly answered, repulsed and renewed again and again. It soon reached us, still extending. Two brigades of Hood's division had attacked Texas and Alabama. The fourth Alabama reached our right. The forty-seventh Alabama joined and crowded in, but gradually owing to their echelon advance. Soon, seven companies of this regiment were in our front.
29:38 Jocko Willink? We had all we could stand. My attention was sharply called. Now here, now there, in the thick and smoke, Lieutenant Nichols, a bright officer near our center, ran up to tell me something queer was going on to his front. Behind those engaging us. I sprang forward, mounted a great rock in the midst of his company line, and was soon able to resolve the queer impression into positive knowledge. Thick groups in gray were pushing up along the smooth dale between the round tops in the direction to gain our left flank. There was no mistaking this. If they could hold our attention by a hot fight in front,
30:21 Jocko Willink? while they got in force on that flank, it would be bad for us and our whole defense. So. They're getting attacked.
30:31 Jocko Willink? From the base of Little Round Top. And one of the lieutenants, Lieutenant Nichols, runs over to him and says, yo, look down there. And sure enough, he sees, what does he call it, a mass of gray. They, thick troops in gray, they're pushing and they're trying to sneak in between the two round tops, so they can get over to the flank. That's what's happening.
30:55 Jocko Willink? And actually, when you go to Little Round Top, you can stand on that rock. And there's a couple, there's a debate on which rock it is. JD's got his opinion.
31:04 Speaker 01 He loves that rock.
31:05 Jocko Willink? I'm gonna go, I'm gonna go agree with him. We'll take it. Uh, because when you get up on that specific rock, you can definitely see a lot of what is going on. There's another rock that's up for debate. Doesn't quite give you the vantage, but we're going with JD.
31:22 Jocko Willink? Back to the book. How many were coming, we could not know. We were rather too busy to send out a reconnaissance. If a strong force should gain our rear, our brigade would be caught as by a mighty Shears Blade and be cut and crushed. What would follow, it was easy to foresee.
31:42 Jocko Willink? This must not be. Our orders to hold that ground had to be liberally, liberally interpreted. That front had to be held and that rear covered. Something must be done quickly and coolly. I called the captains and told them my tactics to keep the front fire at the hottest without special regard to its need or immediate effect. And at the same time, as they found opportunity to take sidesteps to the left, coming gradually into one rank, file closers and all. Then I took the colors with their guard and placed them at our extreme left where a great boulder gave token and support.
32:23 Jocko Willink? Thence bending back at a right angle, the whole body gained ground leftward and made twice our original front. And were not long in doing it. This was a difficult movement to execute under such a fire, requiring coolness as well as heat. Of rare quality were my officers and men. I shall never cease to admire and honor them for what they did in this desperate crisis. So they're in one line and basically what he tells them to do is we're about to get flanked. So he has to kind of fold that line back at a right angle so that they can protect the rest of their flank.
33:04 Jocko Willink? And that's what he does and he does this under fire, which requires coolness as well as heat. Meantime, the tremendous blow of the fourth and fifth Texas struck the right of our brigade and our 16th Michigan reeled and staggered back under the shock. Confusion followed. Vincent felt that all was lost unless the very gods should intervene. Soared aloft and face of flame, he rushed in among the broken companies in desperate effort to rally them, man by man.
33:46 Jocko Willink? By sheer force of his supreme personality, he restored a portion of his line and was urging up the rest. "Don't yield an inch now, men, or all is lost," he cried. When answering, a volley scorched the very faces of the men. And Vincent's soul went up in a chariot of fire. So this is one of the other commanders up there. They're about, they get, they get smashed by the, uh, fourth and fifth Texas. And they're about to break and Strong Vincent goes in the line and man to man, getting them to hold the line and under one of these volleys, he's killed.
34:30 Jocko Willink? In that agonizing moment came tearing up the 140th New York gallant O'Rourke at the head. Not waiting to load a musket or form a line, they sprang forward into that turmoil. Met by a withering volley that killed its fine young Colonel and laid low many of his intrepid officers and a hundred of his men, this splendid regiment, as by a providence we may well call divine, saved us all in that moment of threatened doom. So this is the, this is the 140th New York with O'Rourke and you can go to, if you go to Gettysburg, you can go to O'Rourke's pub.
35:13 Jocko Willink? But these guys come up, they don't even, a- as Vincent is about to like get overrun, up shows O'Rourke and they don't even, they don't even organize, they just freaking go into the line. And when you get up there to Little Round Top, this is like the northern section of Little Round Top, it's, it's a little bit steeper of like a cliff. So they're kind of diving off this cliff in order to engage in combat. I mean, by cliff, I mean, you know, it's like little rocks, four or five feet, they're jumping down, um, chaos. To add a tragic splendor to this dark scene, in the midst of it all, the indomitable Haslet
35:55 Jocko Willink? was trying to get his guns, ten pounder rifled parrots, up to a working place on the summit close beyond. Finally, he was obliged to take his horses entirely off and lift his guns by hand and hand spike up the craggy steep, whence he launched death and defiance wide and far around.
36:17 Jocko Willink? What a description, launching death and defiance. The roar of all this tumult reached us on the left and heightened the intensity of our resolve. Meanwhile, the flanking column around to our left and joined with those before us in a fierce assault which lasted with increasing fury for an intense hour. These two lines met and broke and mingled in the shock. The crush of musketry gave way to cuts and thrusts, grapplings and wrestlings. The edge of conflict swayed to and fro with wild whirlpools and eddies.
36:58 Jocko Willink? At times, I saw around me more of the enemy than of my own men. Gaps opening, swallowing, closing again with sharp, convulsive energy. Squads of stalwart men who had cut their way through us disappearing as if translated. All around, strange mingled roar, shouts of defiance, rally and desperation. And underneath murmured entreaty and stifled moans. Gasping prayers, snatches of Sabbath song, whispers of loved names.
37:38 Jocko Willink? Everywhere, men torn and broken, staggering, creeping, quivering on the earth. And dead faces with strangely fixed eyes staring stark into the sky. Things which cannot be told nor dreamed.
38:02 Jocko Willink? Lot going on, a lot going on.
38:08 Jocko Willink? I wonder when they make movies, you know, like the Gettysburg movie and they try and they do their best to sort of capture this chaos. I wonder how well they do that. I don't think you can do it.
38:22 Speaker 01 Yeah.
38:23 Jocko Willink? How about Braveheart when they are like charging at each other and then as the two lines meet, it just gets into chaos. I think. Cause the scale they did that out and they must have filmed it. In a way where they must have said, hey, you just get in there and cause chaos. It's it has to be unplanned completely.
38:43 Speaker 01 Yeah, there's a, there's a fictional Game of Thrones. Does a, a pretty good job with their production. There's a, a battle that, that takes place and. I, watching it, it, it causes that kind of anxiety. You almost feel like you can't breathe because it's there. They're all packed in so tight and there's, you know, co- you know, combat happening and. I, that was one I remember watching and being like, damn, like they, they really did a. Solid job of kind of capturing some of that.
39:13 Jocko Willink? Did you watch The Terminal List?
39:15 Speaker 01 Yeah.
39:15 Jocko Willink? So like the opening of The Terminal List where they're doing this mission. And I was watching it with my wife. And we got done watching like that opening scene and I had actually already seen it because I went to the premiere. Jack Carr hooking a brother up, but I went to that and so I, I had seen it before and I'm watching it with my wife and I had already told. I'd already told Jack like that scene and Chris Pratt. I told them both. I was like, yo, this opening scene. Cause what makes it good is there's like flashes of light. You don't know what's happening. You're confused. And so we get, I get done watching this with my wife. And she's like, that was like, I'm not sure what happened. That was really confusing. I'm like, exactly. They nailed it. It's freaking chaos.
39:59 Jocko Willink? It's, you don't know what's going on. There's flashes of light. There's muzzle flag. What? You know how you can tell the difference between a muzzle flash from the enemy and your friendly? You can't really. Oh, well, that was an AK. Okay. Now you're in like a city like it's, it's chaos, man. It's chaos. Can you tell the difference a little bit by the sound? Sure. Can you look at the muzzle flash? But man, when, when you're on nods, like half nods, half nod on nods. Freaking crazy, man. It's freaking mayhem. That's what it is.
40:30 Jocko Willink? When they captured that. And so this right here, these guys. Just this, this battle being so close. That there's, they go from shooting each other to cutting each other with, with bayonets. Now they're grappling, they're wrestling. The, the line is changing back and forth like we don't know who's winning. We don't know who's losing.
40:56 Jocko Willink? Hmm.
40:59 Jocko Willink? Back to the book, how men held on, each one knows, not I. But manhood commands admiration. There was one fine young fellow who'd been cut down early in the fight with a ghastly wound across his forehead and who I had thought might possibly be saved with prompt attention. So I had sent him back to our little field hospital, at least to die in peace. Within a half an hour, in a desperate rally, I saw that noble youth amidst the rolling smoke as an apparition from the dead with bloody bandage for the only covering of his head in the thick of the fight, high born and pressing on as they that shall see death no more.
41:43 Jocko Willink? Hee haw.
41:48 Jocko Willink? Ah.
41:52 Jocko Willink? I shall know him again when I see him on whatever shore.
41:58 Jocko Willink? So to another, in the very deepest of the struggle, while our shattered line had pressed the enemy well below their first point of contact and the struggle to regain it was fierce, I saw through a sudden rift in the, in the thick smoke, our colors standing alone. And if you don't know what that is, that's our flag.
42:19 Jocko Willink? I first thought some optical illusion imposed upon me, but as forms emerged through the drifting smoke, the truth came to view. The crossfire had cut keenly, the center had been almost shot away. Only two of the color guard had been left and they were fighting to fill the whole space and in the center wreathed in battle smoke stood the color sergeant, Andrew Tozier.
42:48 Jocko Willink? His color staff planted in the ground at his side, the upper part clasped in his elbow, soul holding the flag upright, with musket and cartridges seized from the fallen comrade at his side. He was defending his sacred trust in the manner of songs of chivalry.
43:07 Jocko Willink? It was a stirring picture. Its import still more stirring. That color must be saved, and that center too. I sent first to the regiment on our right for a dozen men to help us here, but they could not spare a man. I then called my younger brother, Tom, the adjutant, and sent him forward to close that gap somehow. If no men could be drawn from neighboring companies to draw back the salient angle and contract our center. The fire down there at this moment was so hot, I thought impossible for him to get there alive. And I dispatched immediately after him Sergeant Thomas, whom I had made
43:48 Jocko Willink? a special orderly with the same instructions. It needed them both, and both came back with personal proofs of perilous undertaking.
43:57 Jocko Willink? It was strange that the enemy did not seize that moment and point of weakness. Perhaps they saw no weakness. Perhaps it was awe or admiration that held them back from breaking in on that sublime scene.
44:14 Jocko Willink? It's just freaking amazing. He sends his brother, and he's thinking, there's no way you're getting through this. It's not gonna happen. As soon as he sends his brother, he sends backup. That's sketch. Yeah, by the way, his brother is there with him, and he sends him right into this gaping maw of destruction. But they're able to maintain the colors.
44:41 Jocko Willink? When that mad carnival lulled from some strange instinct in human nature and without any reason in the situation that can be seen, when the battling edges drew asunder, there stood our little line, groups and gaps, notched like saw teeth but sharp as steel, tempered in infernal heats like a magic sword of the goths. We were on the appointed and entrusted line, line, we held the ground at all costs. But, sad surprise, it had seemed to us, we were all the while holding our own and had
45:26 Jocko Willink? never left it, but now that the smoke dissolved, we saw our dead and wounded, all out in front of us, mingled with more of the enemy. They were scattered all the way down to the very feet of the baffled hostile line, now rallying in the low shrubbery for a new onset. We could not wait for this, they knew our weakness now, and they were gathering force. No place for tactics now, the appeal must be to primal instincts of human nature. So there's a little lull, there's a little lull in the battle, that's what happens, and
46:06 Jocko Willink? as this lull takes place, they start to, the smoke starts to settle a little bit, they look down, little round top, they held the line, they're excited about that for a moment, they see that the smoke start to settle, now they're kinda, they're, they see all their wounded and all their dead, and that's horrific, and as they're contemplating that, what do they see? They see the Confederate soldiers preparing to attack again, and he knows, they can see, they can see that they're almost broken, they can see it. Before, they couldn't see it, whatever that moment was earlier, where the colors were
46:47 Jocko Willink? almost taken, and they were barely able to hold on, and push them back one more time, well now, the Confederates are reassembling, they can see that they've got these guys, you know, in a bad way. And it continues on. Shall they die there, under the enemy's feet and under our eyes? Words like those brokenly uttered from heart to heart struck the stalwart troops, holding together for a stand and roused them to the front quicker than any voice or bugle of command. So now all the boys start seeing their friends are all shot up down there. They get, they get to the line.
47:27 Jocko Willink? These true-hearted men, but a little before buffeted back and forth by superior force and now bracing for a dubious test, dashed down the death-strewn slope into the face of the rallied and recovering foe and hurled them, tore them from our fallen as the tiger avenges its young. Nor did they stop till they had cleared the farthest verge of the field redeemed by the loving for the lost, the brave for the brave. So they go for it. As they're reassembling, they go back down there and recover some of their guys. Now came a longer lull. So there's another lull.
48:10 Jocko Willink? But this meant not rest, but thought and action. First it was to gather our wounded and bear them to the sheltered lawn for saving life or peace in dying, the dead too, that, that not even our feet should do them dishonor in the coming encounter. But we're getting our dead off the field. We're not going to step on them. Then such is heavenly human pity, the wounded of our country's foes, brother, brothers in blood for us now so far from care, from other caring, born like refuge and succor by the drummer boys who had become angels of the field.
48:55 Jocko Willink? So even in that heat of this battle, there's a lull and they go and help the Confederate soldiers that are wounded but are too far from their own troops. The drummer boys go out and get them.
49:10 Jocko Willink? In this lull, I took a turn over the dismal field to see what could be done for the living in ranks a recumbent, and came upon a manly form and face I well remembered. He was a sergeant, earlier, in the field of Antietam and of Fredericksburg. And for refusing to perform some menial personal service for a bullying quartermaster in Winter Camp, was reduced to the ranks by a commander who had not carefully investigated the case. It was a degradation, and the injustice of it rankled his high-born spirit.
49:50 Jocko Willink? So, he sees a guy, and he sees this guy who had been busted down in rank by some bullying quartermaster.
50:02 Jocko Willink? Some freaking authoritarian asshole, is what we're talking about. Had busted this guy down, and now this injustice
50:14 Jocko Willink? had rankled his high-born spirit. But his well-bred pride would not allow him to ask for justice as a favor. I'd kept this in mind for early action.
50:27 Jocko Willink? Now he was lying there, stretched on an open front, where a brave stand had been made, face to the sky, a great bullet hole in the middle of his breast, from which he had loosened the clothing to ease his breathing, and the rich blood was pouring in a stream.
50:49 Jocko Willink? I bent down over him.
50:52 Jocko Willink? His face lightened, his lips moved. But I spoke first. "My dear boy, it has gone hard with you. You shall be cared for."
51:04 Jocko Willink? He whispered, "Tell my mother I did not die a coward."
51:10 Jocko Willink? It was the prayer of a home-bred manhood poured out with his life's blood.
51:17 Jocko Willink? I knew and answered him, "You die a sergeant. I promote you for faithful service and noble courage on the field of Gettysburg."
51:29 Jocko Willink? This was all he wanted. No word more. I had him born from the field, but his high spirit had passed to its place.
51:41 Jocko Willink? It is needless to add that as soon as a piece of parchment could be found after that battle, a warrant was made out promoting George Washington Buck to sergeant in the terms told him. And this evidence placed the sad, proud mother's name on the rolls of the country's benefactors.
52:09 Jocko Willink? This is happening in the middle of a hellacious battle.
52:15 Jocko Willink? He has kind of an interesting
52:19 Jocko Willink? tangent here. "As for myself, so far I had escaped. How close an escape I had had, I did not know till afterwards. I think I may mention here, as a psychological incident, that some years after the war, I received a letter, written in a homely but manly style, by one subscribing himself, a member of the 15th Alabama."
52:46 Jocko Willink? And he wrote, "Dear sir,
52:50 Jocko Willink? I want to tell you of a little passage in the Battle of Round Top Geddesburg, concerning you and me, which I am now glad of. Twice in that fight, I had your life in my hands. I got a safe place between two rocks and drew bead, fair and square, on you. You were standing in the open behind the center of your line, full exposed. I knew your rank by your uniform and your actions, and I thought it a mighty good thing to put you out of the way.
53:23 Jocko Willink? I rested my gun on the rock and took steady aim. I started to pull the trigger, but some queer notion stopped me. Then I got ashamed of my weakness and went through the same motions again. I had you, perfectly certain. But that same queer something shut right down on me. I couldn't pull the trigger and gave it up. That is, your life. I am glad of it now, and hope you are. Yours truly."
53:58 Jocko Willink? I thought he was that and answered him accordingly, asking him to come up north and see whether I was worth what he missed. But my answer never found him, nor could I afterwards. So who knows? But apparently, somebody was gonna kill him.
54:14 Jocko Willink? Decided not to.
54:17 Jocko Willink? This next section is called "The Last Cartridge in Bear Steel."
54:24 Jocko Willink? And before we get into that, well, the first sentence says, "The silence and the doubt of the momentary lull were quickly dispelled." This is something to think about in life. We used to putting guys through training, and you'd back the opposing force off. So you know, the SEALs would be out there in the desert or in the city, in a training environment. And there would be other SEALs, bad guy SEALs, we call them OPFOR, Opposing Force, and they would come and attack. Well, they would put the pressure, they'd start attacking, and then they'd back off. And what you'd see a good leader, what you'd see a bad leader do is like, "Oh, they're not attacking us. Cool, we can just sit here and like, get a grip and relax."
55:09 Jocko Willink? And take a minute to chill out. You know, maybe not necessarily, quote, "chill out," but, but basically, "Hey, let them get your breath, check your gear." And that's what you see a bad leader do. And what a good leader would do is maneuver. Like, they're not shooting because they're maneuvering on us. They're doing something, they're setting something up. So if we have the opportunity to move right now, because they're not shooting at us, let's, let's go. So when there's a lull in life,
55:37 Jocko Willink? that's, that's an opportunity to move, to get better, to improve your position. A lull, when there's not a lot going on, is not a time to say, "Oh, cool, I can take a break."
55:49 Speaker 01 Was that strategic from the the op four to pull back and see what would happen? Or were they just actually maneuvering?
55:55 Jocko Willink? A little bit of both. So sometimes we'd be like, sometimes it'd be they had too much pressure and they couldn't handle it. And look, you can just slaughter them all, but that's not, you know, that's a, that's like a black belt just trashing a white belt. Right? You, you want to let them work. So sometimes we be backing off just to let them work. But if we backed off and they didn't work, there's nothing we can do. I can't help you at that point. Like if you, if we back off and you sit there in that weak ass perimeter in the low ground, while, while the op four is moving to the high ground and enveloping your position, it's not going to go well for you. I can't help you.
56:30 Speaker 01 Going to get destroyed.
56:31 Jocko Willink? Yeah, you're going to get, you're going to get thrashed. But if they back off a little bit and you start to maneuver to you get to the high ground, now all of a sudden you got an opportunity to kick their ass.
56:41 Jocko Willink? But think about that with life. Think about those little opportunities you get like, oh, you got a break. Oh, finally it's a Sunday. You know, day off, whatever. If you're one of those people that has weekends, if you're one of those people that believe in weekends, what are you doing? What's going on? Got that little lull. You're sitting on an airplane. What are you doing on the airplane? Doing a little travel? What are you doing? You watch, did you download some pre downloads of Netflix, boy?
57:08 Jocko Willink? Got to watch out for that, man. So when you get the chance to, when there's a lull, take advantage of it.
57:15 Jocko Willink? Going on here, the silence and the doubt of the momentary lull were quickly dispelled. The formidable 15th Alabama, Alabama repulsed and as we hoped dispersed now in solid and orderly array. Still more than twice our numbers came rolling through the fringe of Sharperall on our left. And Sharperall is, I had to look that one up. It's like, like a little cluster of dense shrubs. No dash, no yells, no demonstration for effect, but settled purpose and determination. We opened on them as best we could. The fire was returned, cutting us to the quick.
57:55 Jocko Willink? So this time when they, when the 15th Alabama come, they're just no, no yelling, no screaming. War just coming.
58:04 Jocko Willink? The forty-seventh Alabama had rallied on our right. We were enveloped in fire and sure to be overwhelmed. In fact, when the great surge struck us, whatever might be other where what was here before us was evident. These far outnumbering confident eyes yet watching for a sign of weakness. Already I could see the bold flankers on the right darting out and creeping cat like under the smoke to gain our left. Thrown back as it was.
58:38 Jocko Willink? It was for us then, once for all. So he's looking around, he sees. Can you imagine how scary that is? Like you're, you're, you know, they're attacking and you're watching them crawl up to the flank, to your right, to your left flank where you're weak.
58:56 Jocko Willink? Our thin line was broken. And the enemy were in our rear of the whole round top defense infantry artillery. Humanity itself with the round top and the day theirs. So they're about to be surrounded. Now too, our fire was slackening. Our last rounds of shot had been fired. What I had sent for could not get to us. I saw the faces of my men, one after another, when they had fired their last cartridge, turn anxiously toward mine for a moment.
59:35 Jocko Willink? Then square to the front again.
59:38 Jocko Willink? To the front for them lay death, to the rear, what they would die to save.
59:46 Jocko Willink? My thought was running deep. I was combining the elements of a forlorn hope. And it just communicated this to Captain Spear of the Wheeling Flank on which the initiative was to fall.
1:00:02 Jocko Willink? Just then, so will a little incident fleck a a brooding cloud of doom with a tint of human tenderness. Brave, warm-hearted Lieutenant Melcher of the Color Company, whose captain and nearly half of his men were down, came up and asked me if he might take his company and go forward, pick up one or two of his men left wounded on the field, and bring them in before the enemy got too near. This would be a most hazardous move in itself, and in this desperate moment, we could not break the line. But I admired him. With a glance, he understood. I answered, "Yes, sir, in a moment.
1:00:45 Jocko Willink? I am about to order a charge." So this guy comes in, wants to go out and recover some of his people, he says, "Stand by, we're all going." Not a moment was about to be lost. Five minutes more of such a defensive, and the last roll call would sound for us. Desperate as the chances were, there was nothing for it but to take the offensive. I stepped to the colors. The men turned towards me, one word was enough. Bayonet. It caught like fire and swept along the ranks. The men took it up with a shout.
1:01:26 Jocko Willink? One could not say whether from the pit or the song of the morning star. It was vain to order forward. No mortal could have heard it in the mighty Hussana that was winging the sky, nor would he wait to hear it. There are things still as the, there are things still as of the first creation, whose seed is in itself. So he's saying, he said bayonet, but he never gives the order forward. Because the seed is in itself, that everyone knew, everyone knew what was gonna happen.
1:02:06 Jocko Willink? The grating clash of steel and fixing bayonets told its own story. The color rose in front. The whole line quivered for the start. The edge of the left wing rippled, swung, tossed among the rocks, straightened, changed curve from scimitar to sickle shape, and the bristling archers swooped down upon the serried host, down into the face of half a thousand, two hundred men.
1:02:41 Jocko Willink? So it just starts. He gives the order to fix bayonets, and they start going forward. They have five hundred enemy, two hundred of them.
1:02:50 Jocko Willink? It was a great right wheel. Our left swung first. The advancing foe stopped, tried to make a stand amidst the trees and boulders, but the frenzied bayonets pressing through every space forced a constant settling to the rear. Morel, with his detached company and remnants of our valorous sharpshooters, who had held the enemy so long in check on the slopes of the great round top, now fell upon the flank of the retiring crowd, and it turned to full retreat, some amidst the crags of the great round top, but most down the smooth veil toward their own main line on plum run.
1:03:31 Jocko Willink? So luckily, he'd thrown those guys out there, over on the great round top, and now as the bayonets come, and it's like a hammer and anvil scenario. This tended to mass them before our center. Here their stand was more stubborn. At the first dash, the commanding officer I happened to confront, coming on fiercely, sword in one hand, big navy revolver on the other, fires one barrel almost in my face.
1:03:58 Jocko Willink? But seeing the quick saber point at his throat, reverses arms, gives sword and pistol into my hands and yields himself a prisoner.
1:04:08 Jocko Willink? I took him at his word, but could not give him further attention. I passed him over into the custody of a brave sergeant at my side, to whom I gave the sword as emblem of his authority, but kept the pistol with its loaded barrels, which I thought might come in handy soon, as indeed it did. So dude just draws down on him, cracks off a round, misses the headshot, and then Chamberlain's got his sword at his throat, and the dude surrenders.
1:04:39 Jocko Willink? Ranks were broken. Many retired before us somewhat hastily. Some threw their muskets to the ground, even loaded, sunk on their knees, threw up their hands, calling out, "We surrender, don't kill us."
1:04:55 Jocko Willink? As if we wanted to do that.
1:04:58 Jocko Willink? "We kill only to resist killing." And these were manly men whom we could befriend, and by no means kill if they came our way in peace and goodwill.
1:05:10 Jocko Willink? Charging right through and over these, we struck the second line of the 47th Alabama, doing their best to stand, but offering little resistance. Their lieutenant colonel, as I passed a fine gentleman, was Colonel Bulger, introduced himself as my prisoner.
1:05:27 Jocko Willink? And as he was wounded, I had him cared for as best we could, still swinging to the right, as a great gate on its hinges, we swept the front clean of assailants. We were taking in prisoners by the scores, more than we could hold, or send to our rear, so that many made final escape up Great Round Top. Halfway down to the throat of the vale, I came upon Colonel Powell of the 4th Alabama, a man of courtly bearing, who was badly wounded. I sent him to the 83rd Pennsylvania, nearest to us, and better able to take care of him than we were.
1:06:08 Jocko Willink? When we reached the front of the 44th New York, I thought it far enough.
1:06:15 Jocko Willink? Beyond on the right, the Texas Brigade had rallied or rendezvous, or rendezvous, I took thought of that. Most of the fugitives before us, rather than run the gauntlet of our whole brigade, had taken shelter of the rocks of the Great Round Top on our left as we now faced. It was hazardous to be so far out in the very presence of so many baffled but far from beaten veterans of Hood's renowned division. A sudden rush on either flank might not only have cut us off, but cut in behind us and seize that vital point which it was our orders and our trust to hold. But it was no light task to get our men to stop. So he's trying to get the guys to stop,
1:06:58 Jocko Willink? like they're keep pushing and pushing. And if you push too far, all of a sudden, maybe some of the people that are on Great Round Top could sneak in behind him, and you can have a problem. So he's trying to get the guys to stop. But it was no light task to get our men to stop. They were under the momentum of their deed. They thought they were on the road to Richmond. They had to be reasoned with, persuaded, but at least, but at last faced about and marched back to that dedicated crest with swelling hearts. So he had to stifle their momentum.
1:07:33 Jocko Willink? Not without sad interest and service was the return. For many of the wounded had to be gathered up. There was a burden too of the living. Nearly 400 prisoners remained in our hands, two for every man of ours. Shortly, the twilight deepened, and we disposed ourselves to meet any new assault that might come from the courage of exasperation. But the attack was not renewed.
1:08:05 Jocko Willink? Whether that cold steel had chilled the ardor which flaming muzzles seemed to enliven and sustain, or the revulsion of retiring mood was not yet over, a wide silence brooded over the hostile line. That's an interesting point. Like, shooting your guns gets you all fired up, but that seeing that bayonet blade coming at you, kinda chills you out a little bit, maybe makes you second think, second guess what your, what your intentions are. Our worn-out men bid at last to rest, fitted themselves to their environment or followed their souls behest. Some bent as if senseless to the earth, some gazed up at the stars and sent wireless
1:08:50 Jocko Willink? message through them to dear ones far away. Some wandered dreamily away in a search for water to wash from their throats the nitrous fumes of battle. Others too manly to seek a surgeon, looked even for a shred of cartridge paper to staunch a too-free wound, or yet more deeply drawn sought the sheltered nook where our wounded had been born to render such aid as they could, and take the farewell message home from the lips of brave men to hearts that had to be more brave.
1:09:27 Jocko Willink? At nine o'clock the next morning, we were withdrawn, being relieved by our first brigade. But we were sent to anything but a place of rest. Our new position was in support of Hancock's troops near the left center of the Union Line, which proved to be the point aimed at by Pickett's Charge that afternoon. So, you have, what's about to come is Pickett's Charge, and they have the entire Union Line, so they pull these guys off the flank, which is where you think, okay, well, we'll pull them into the center, hopefully they can get like a little bit of rest, and hopefully
1:10:12 Jocko Willink? it won't be in the intense fighting, but that's exactly where Pickett's Charge comes. This is the story of my participation in the action and the passion of the second day at Gettysburg.
1:10:29 Jocko Willink? It was certainly a narrow chance for us and for the Round Tops. Had we not used up our ammunition and had we continued to meet the enemy musket to musket, this give and take would soon have finished us by reason of the enemy's superior numbers. So if they just kept shooting at each other, well, that's just a war of attrition and the enemy, the Confederates, had more weapons, had more bullets, so they would have lost. Or had the 15th Alabama continued their onset, not regarding our preposterous demonstrations, they would have walked over our bodies to their victory. Or still again, if one more Confederate regiment had come upon our flank, we must
1:11:14 Jocko Willink? have been rolled into a zero figure and swallowed up in the envelopment. It was a psychological success, a miracle in the scheme of military science. Those brave Alabama fellows, none braver or better in either army, were victims of a surprise of their quick and mobile imagination. So, this is where he kind of, uh, this is what we opened with, right? After this happens, this is when he goes up and he, he buries his men on the 4th of
1:11:59 Jocko Willink? July. And, once he has the men buried again, that's the part that I, I let off with, he says this. "I sat there alone, on the storied crest, till the sun went down as it did over the misty hills, and the darkness crept up the slopes, till from all earthly sight, I was buried, as with those before. But, oh, what radiant companionship rose around, what steadfast ranks of power, what
1:12:42 Jocko Willink? bearing of heroic souls, oh, the glory that beamed through those nights and days, nobody will ever know it here. I am sorry most of all for that."
1:12:56 Jocko Willink? The proud young valor that rose above the mortal, and then, at last, was mortal after all.
1:13:09 Jocko Willink? The chivalry of hand and heart that in other days and other lands would have sent their names ringing down in song and story.
1:13:33 Jocko Willink? They did not know it themselves, those boys of ours, whose remembered faces in every home should be cherished symbols of the true, for life or death, what were their lofty deeds of body, mind, heart, soul, on that tremendous day?
1:13:54 Jocko Willink? Unknown, but kept, the earth itself shall be its treasurer. It holds something of ours besides graves.
1:14:08 Jocko Willink? These strange influences of material nature. Its mountains and seas, its sunset skies and nights of stars, its colors and tones and odors, carry something of the mutual, reciprocal.
1:14:26 Jocko Willink? It is a sympathy.
1:14:29 Jocko Willink? On that other side, it is represented to us as suffering. The whole creation, travailing in pain together in earnest expectation, waiting for the adoption, having right then to something which is to be its own.
1:14:49 Jocko Willink? And so these Gettysburg hills, which lifted up such splendid valor and drank in such high hearts' blood, shall hold the mighty secret in their bosom till the great day of revelation and recompense, when these heights shall flame again with transfigured light. They too have part in that adoption, which is the manifestation of these sons of God.
1:15:31 Jocko Willink? So, that is how Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain spent the 4th of July, 1863, burying his honored dead. And, six years later, in 1889, he was on that hill again, to dedicate a monument for his men, the men of the 20th Maine. And luckily, we have some of the words that he spoke on that day. Also contained in the same book.
1:16:14 Jocko Willink? This book is like a compilation of a bunch of different things that he wrote and speeches that he gave.
1:16:23 Jocko Willink? And this is what he said, at that dedication, 1889. "Today we stand on an awful arena, where character, which was the growth of centuries, was tested and determined by the issues of a single day."
1:16:47 Jocko Willink? That's a bold statement, right? For centuries, you live a certain way, you learn, you follow the traditions, you follow the standards, but it all gets tested on a single day. We are compassed about by a cloud of witnesses. Not alone the shadowy ranks of those who wrestled here, but the greater parties of action. They for whom these things were done. Forms of thought rise before us as in an amphitheatre, circle beyond circle, rank above rank, the state, the union, the people, and these are one. Let us, from the arena,
1:17:32 Jocko Willink? contemplate the spiritual spectators.
1:17:38 Jocko Willink? There is an aspect in which the question at issue might seem to be of forms and not of substance. It was on its face a question of government. There was a boastful pretense that each state held in its hands the death warrant of the nation, that any state had a right, without show of justification, outside of its own caprice, to violate the covenants of the constitution, to break away from the union and set up its own little sovereignty as sufficient for all human purposes and ends, thus leaving it to the mere will or whim of any member of our political system to destroy the body and dissolve the soul of the great people.
1:18:21 Jocko Willink? But this was not our theory, nor our justification.
1:18:27 Jocko Willink? The flag we bore into the field was not that of particular states, no matter how many or how loyal a raid against other states. It was the flag of the union,
1:18:41 Jocko Willink? the flag of the people, vindicating the right and charged with the duty of preventing any factions, no matter how many nor under what pretense, from breaking up this common country.
1:18:57 Jocko Willink? It was the country of the south as well of the north. These men who sought to dismember it belonged to it. Its life was a larger life. Aloof from the dominance of self surroundings. But in it, their truest interests were interwoven. They suffered themselves to be drawn down from the spiritual ideal by influences of the physical world.
1:19:32 Jocko Willink? We fought against no state, but for its deliverance. We fought the enemies of our common country to overthrow the engines and symbols of its destruction wherever found upon its soil. We fought no better perhaps than they. We exhibited perhaps no higher individual qualities.
1:19:55 Jocko Willink? But the cause for which we fought was higher. Our thought was wider. We too were fighting for birthright and native soil, for home and all the sanctities of life wide over the land and far forward through the years to come. For all this belongs to us and we to it.
1:20:18 Jocko Willink? That thought was our power.
1:20:22 Jocko Willink? We took rank by its height and not of our individual selves.
1:20:34 Jocko Willink? It is something great and greatening to cherish an ideal, to act in the light of the truth that is far away and far above, to set aside the near advantage, the momentary pleasure, the snatching of seeming good to itself.
1:20:53 Jocko Willink? And to act for remoter ends, for higher good and for interests other than our own.
1:21:04 Jocko Willink? To us, this people in its life on earth was a moral personality, having a character and a commission, hence responsibility, hence duty, hence right, and its authority. The union was the body of a spiritual unity.
1:21:24 Jocko Willink? Of this, we were part, responsible to it and for it.
1:21:31 Jocko Willink? And our sacrifice was its service.
1:21:39 Jocko Willink? Talk about the ultimate in, um,
1:21:44 Jocko Willink? looking out for others above yourself and in delayed gratification, right?
1:21:53 Jocko Willink? To act in the light of the truth that is far away and far above, to set aside the near advantage, the momentary pleasure, the snatching of seeming good to self, and act for remoter ends, for higher good, and for interests other than our own.
1:22:13 Jocko Willink? Word.
1:22:16 Speaker 01 I was frantically trying to write those down as you read them.
1:22:20 Jocko Willink? Yeah, um, again, like you read these things and he's just making it so, I guess clear wouldn't be the right word because it can be difficult to follow, but it's just stated in a way that's kind of undeniable.
1:22:41 Jocko Willink? "We fought against no state but for its deliverance.
1:22:47 Jocko Willink? We fought no better perhaps than they. We exhibited perhaps no higher individual qualities, but the cause for which we fought was higher and our thought was wider."
1:23:04 Jocko Willink? And he goes on to say this.
1:23:08 Jocko Willink? Hence, it is
1:23:11 Jocko Willink? that in question of rank, of rights and duties, country must stand supreme.
1:23:21 Jocko Willink? The thought goes deeper. There is a mysterious law of our nature that in this sense of membership and participation, the spirit rises to a magnitude commensurate with that of which it is part. The greatness of the whole passes into the consciousness of each. The power of the whole seems to become the power of each and the character of the whole is impressed upon each.
1:23:55 Jocko Willink? The inspiration of a noble cause involving human interests far and wide enables men to do things they did not dream themselves capable of before and which they were not capable of alone.
1:24:13 Jocko Willink? The consciousness of belonging vitally to something beyond individuality, of being part of a personality that reaches, we know not where, in space and time, greatens the heart to the limits of the soul's ideal and builds out the supreme character.
1:24:33 Jocko Willink? Now, you might think to yourself, well, I mean, aren't we, uh, don't we believe in individual rights? Isn't that, what about individuality and all those things? And yeah, I get it. But if you, if you buy into that, your goals aren't high enough.
1:24:50 Jocko Willink? There's something better you can become. There's no one individual person that can bring what a team can bring, what a unified, what a unified group can bring. You just can't accomplish the same things. And importantly, let's not be arrogant enough to think that, oh, we could hold our own personal ideals higher than the group can. That's naive. It's naive and arrogant at the same time. It's like positive peer pressure. How far can you push yourself? You can't push yourself as far as the team can.
1:25:31 Jocko Willink? What standards can you hold? You're not going to hold the standards as high as the team can. Who would you rather let down? You can let yourself down pretty easily. You don't want to let down your friends. You don't want to let down your family. You don't want to let down your country.
1:25:46 Jocko Willink? When you're part of this, this greatness of the whole passes into the consciousness of each. That's what happens. The standards that we create, that have been created for this country,
1:26:01 Jocko Willink? it, it
1:26:03 Jocko Willink? passes into the consciousness of each of us. That's what's supposed to happen.
1:26:11 Jocko Willink? He goes on. "The inspiration of a noble cause involving human interests far and wide enables men to do things which they did not dream themselves capable before."
1:26:24 Jocko Willink? And then it continues. "It was something like this, I think, which marked our motive, which made us strong to fight the bitter fight to the victorious end, and
1:26:37 Jocko Willink? made us un-revengeful and magnanimous in that victory."
1:26:43 Jocko Willink? Just don't forget that these guys went out, fought, and then helped the wounded Confederate soldiers and accepted their surrender and brought them to medical aid when they could.
1:26:57 Jocko Willink? And then he says, "We rose in soul above the things which even the Declaration of Independence pronounces, the inalienable rights of human nature, for the securing of which governments are instituted among men. Happiness, liberty, life, we laid on the altar of offering, or committed to the furies of destruction while our minds were lifted up to a great thought and our hearts swelled to its measure."
1:27:30 Jocko Willink? So those things that you're promised in the Declaration of Independence, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, they gave them up, they gave all those up. They sacrificed all those things. They offered them up on the offer of, on the altar of freedom. The things that you're guaranteed in the Declaration of Independence, the reason that governments exist is to protect these rights for people, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. These men, on this day, rose in soul above those things and offered them and sacrificed them.
1:28:09 Jocko Willink? Continuing on, "We were beckoned on by the vision of destiny. We saw our country moving forward, charged with the sacred trusts of men, of man. We believed in its glorious career, the power of high aims and of strong purpose, the continuity of great endeavor, the onward, upward path of history to God. Every man felt that he gave himself to and belonged to something beyond time and above place, something which could not die."
1:28:52 Jocko Willink? These are the reasons, not fixed in the form of things, but formative of things.
1:29:02 Jocko Willink? Reasons of the soul why we fought for the Union.
1:29:10 Jocko Willink? And this is the spirit in which, having overcome the dark powers of denial and disintegration, having restored the people of the South to their place and privilege in the Union, and set on high the old flag telling of one life and one body, one freedom and one law, over all the people and all the land between the four great waters, we now come as it were home.
1:29:40 Jocko Willink? We look into each other's eyes, we speak in softer tones, we gather under the atmosphere of these sacred thoughts and memories, like the high, pure air that shines down upon us today, flooding these fields where cloud and flash and thunder roll of battle and shrouded us and them in that great three-days burial to celebrate this resurrection, to rear on these far-away fields memorials of familiar names and to honor the states whose honor it was to rear such manhood.
1:30:24 Jocko Willink? Now you have gathered these bodies here. You mark their names with headstones and compass them about with the cordon of the state's proud sorrow. You station them here, on the ground they held. Here they will remain, not buried, but transfigured forms, part of the earth they glorified, part also of the glory that is to be.
1:30:57 Jocko Willink? No chemistry of frost or rain, no overlaying mold of the seasons' recurrent life and death can ever separate from the soil of these consecrated fields the life-blood so deeply commingled and incorporate here.
1:31:17 Jocko Willink? Ever henceforth, under the rolling suns, when these hills are touched to splendor with the morning light or smile a farewell to the lingering day, the flush that broods upon them shall be rich with a strange and crimson tone, not of the earth, nor yet of the sky, but mediator and hostage between the two.
1:31:46 Jocko Willink? But these monuments are not to commemorate the dead alone.
1:31:52 Jocko Willink? Death was but the divine acceptance of life freely offered by every one. Service was the central fact. That and that truth, these monuments commemorate.
1:32:10 Jocko Willink? They mark the centers around which stood the manhood of Maine, steadfast in noble service, to the uttermost, to the uppermost.
1:32:22 Jocko Willink? Those who fell here, those who have fallen before or since, those who linger yet a little longer, soon to follow, all are mustered in one great company on the shining heights of life with that star of Maine's Armorial ensign upon their foreheads forever, like the ranks of the galaxy.
1:32:50 Jocko Willink? In great deeds, something abides.
1:32:54 Jocko Willink? On great fields, something stays. Forms change and pass, bodies disappear.
1:33:02 Jocko Willink? But spirits linger. To consecrate the ground for the vision place of souls and reverent men and women from afar and generations that know us not and that we know not of, heart drawn to see where and by whom great things were suffered and done for them,
1:33:24 Jocko Willink? shall come to this deathless field to ponder and dream. And lo, the shadow of a mighty presence shall wrap them in its bosom. And the power of the vision pass into their souls.
1:33:45 Jocko Willink? That is the great reward of service, to live far out and on in the life of others. This is the mystery of the Christ, to give life's best for such high sake that it shall be found again unto life eternal.
1:34:18 Jocko Willink? And that is what Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain had to say.
1:34:25 Jocko Willink? "To those who fell here, those who have fallen before, since, those who linger yet a little longer, soon to follow."
1:34:38 Jocko Willink? And that's us.
1:34:41 Jocko Willink? But we are here, we are lingering, but we are soon to follow.
1:34:52 Jocko Willink? And I think that's something to think about on the 4th of July.
1:34:59 Jocko Willink? What can you do? What great deeds can you do? Who can you help? Who can you serve?
1:35:09 Jocko Willink? Forms change and past bodies disappear, but spirits linger. That is the great reward of service.
1:35:21 Jocko Willink? And it can be certainly hard to see, especially with everything that's going on in the world, even what's going on in this country right now. There is divisiveness in our country. There are differences of opinion. There are different beliefs. There are different ideas.
1:35:44 Jocko Willink? And yet, for all of us, I mean, other than those who truly just detest liberty, the rest of us,
1:35:56 Jocko Willink? we have this great privilege
1:36:01 Jocko Willink? of living
1:36:03 Jocko Willink? in this country.
1:36:06 Jocko Willink? One union, one freedom, one law, one people, one flag.
1:36:16 Jocko Willink? That is who we are.
1:36:21 Jocko Willink? Remember that
1:36:24 Jocko Willink? on this 4th of July.
1:36:31 Jocko Willink? And I think that's all we've got for tonight. If you want to support this podcast. If you need some supplements, go to Jocko Fuel.com. If you want some American-made clothes, go to OriginUSA.com. If you want to represent while you're on the path, go to JacoStore.com. If you need help with leadership inside your organization, go to EchelonFront.com. If you want to come see me live, go to JacoLive.com. I'm going to be in Ann Arbor, Michigan, July 7th, Chicago, July 8th, Boston, July 21st, and Philly, July 22nd. JacoLive.com.
1:37:16 Jocko Willink? I'll see you there. Written a bunch of books, you know what they are. Go get them for you, your kids, your friends. And of course, if you want to connect with us, we're on the interwebs. Kerry's at Kerry underscore Hilton. I'm at Jocko Willink. And I want to thank all our service men and women out there in the world right now, standing ready to sacrifice their lives for our higher ideal, for our flag, and for our freedom. Thanks to all of you.
1:37:57 Jocko Willink? And also, thanks to our police and law enforcement, firefighters, paramedics, EMTs, dispatchers, correctional officers, Borough Patrol, Secret Service, and all first responders here at home. You all sacrifice to keep us safe, and we thank you for that. And for everyone else out there, I want to leave you with a final message from Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain and his thoughts. And this is as he stood after the surrender of the Confederates. And he stood there at Appomattox and looked at them. And this is what he thought of that situation.
1:38:45 Jocko Willink? He said, "We could not look at those brave bronzed faces and those battered flags we had met on so many fields where glorious manhood lent a glory to the earth that bore it and think of personal hate and mean revenge.
1:39:04 Jocko Willink? Whoever had misled these men, we had not.
1:39:09 Jocko Willink? We had led them back home. Whoever had made that quarrel, we had not.
1:39:17 Jocko Willink? It was a remnant of the inherited curse for sin.
1:39:23 Jocko Willink? We had purged it away with blood offerings.
1:39:29 Jocko Willink? We were, all of us together, factors of that high will which, working often through illusions of the human and following ideals that lead through storms, evolves the enfranchisement of man.
1:39:48 Jocko Willink? Forgive us therefore, if from stern steadfast faces, eyes dimmed with tears, gazed at each other across that pile of storied relics so dearly laid there down, and brothers' hands were feigned to reach across that rushing tide of memories which divided us,
1:40:11 Jocko Willink? yet made us forever one."
1:40:20 Jocko Willink? Chamberlain offers forgiveness.
1:40:27 Jocko Willink? And if he could, if they could, after what they had been through,
1:40:34 Jocko Willink? then perhaps we can.
1:40:39 Jocko Willink? Perhaps we can reach across our divides and remember that we are one people, one law, one union,
1:40:52 Jocko Willink? under one flag.
1:40:58 Jocko Willink? Let us not forget that.
1:41:04 Jocko Willink? And until next time, this is Kerry and Jocko. Out.
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