Lincoln Memorial   • Print   • Cite   In November 1863,
President Abraham Lincoln was invited to deliver remarks, which
later became known as the Gettysburg Address, at the official
dedication ceremony for the National Cemetery of Gettysburg in
Pennsylvania, on the site of one of the bloodiest and most
decisive battles of the Civil War. Though he was not the
featured orator that day, Lincoln’s 273-word address would be
remembered as one of the most important speeches in American
history. In it, he invoked the principles of human equality
contained in the Declaration of Independence and connected the
sacrifices of the Civil War with the desire for “a new birth of
freedom,” as well as the all-important preservation of the Union
created in 1776 and its ideal of self-government.  From July 1
to July 3, 1863, the invading forces of General Robert E. Lee’s
Confederate Army clashed with the Army of the Potomac (under its
newly appointed leader, General George G. Meade) at Gettysburg,
some 35 miles southwest of Harri