Hello GenTravelers!
If you’ve traced family members back to the nineteenth century, odds are you have some ancestors who fought in the Civil War. I hope you are planning a trip to where they actually lived. But what about where they actually died? Many family historians have ancestors that died in places like Andersonville Prison in Georgia. Do you have any desire to visit there? Nearly 13,000 prisoners died there. Were any of them your ancestors?
Conditions in the Andersonville Prison were atrocious. Understandably, prisoner Robert H. Kellogg wrote, “Can this be hell?” because scenes like this were common:
There are many such historic sites that conjure up unpleasant feelings. Do we visit these locations in order to firmly remind ourselves of the horrors that occurred there, and to do all we can to never allow those horrors to be repeated? I hope so. Just be sure to plan some other wonderful (and uplifting) locations on the itinerary for that GenTraveling trip as well!
Where have you GenTraveled to, that you would consider ‘unpleasant’?
Good luck for successfully researching your ancestors – and be sure to let me know where you are planning your next GenTraveling adventure!
I have been to Auschwitz and to Therienstadt. Nothing could be more unpleasant. In fact, unpleasant isn’t even an appropriate adjective for those places. They are hell.
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Oh! I can’t even imagine. I think I’d probably feel physically sick if I visited there!
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It was emotionally draining. I felt like I’d been hit all day with bricks. And yet I felt guilty feeling that way, knowing how much worse it was for those who were there, whether they survived or not.
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I hope to get to Andersonville one day to pay respects to my gg-grandfather who died there.
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Thanks for your post. I’ve also been to Auschwitz, although fortunately no relatives ever passed throught that I know of. I also had a 2nd great-grandfather at Andersonville, although he was one of the lucky ones who made it out.
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Both tragic locations – but important historically. Happy to know your civil war ancestor survived the nightmare!
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