Gettysburg 75th Anniversary pin

This is a Battle of Gettysburg 75th anniversary pin! The button is very rare in this condition. But what really makes this stand out is that it has a baseball attached just below the pin. The total length of the pin measures approximately 4 inches.

I have not seen another pin like this that has a baseball attached.

This is a major historical artifact! This is your chance to own it.

This beautiful celluloid button shows an image of Union and Confederate soldiers shaking hands under a crossed U.S. and Confederate States flags. The pin reads “75th ANNIVERSARY BATTLE OF GETTYSBURG 1863 – 1938”. The original pin is still attached to the reverse. It also has the original Red, White, and Blue ribbons hanging from the pin.

Between June 29 and July 6, 1938, approximately 1,870 Union and Confederate veterans gathered at that fateful battlefield where many of them had fought 75 years earlier. The veterans stayed in camps and took part in various ceremonies and parades, including a parade of veterans from all wars since 1863, as well as a military flyover. The highlight of the ceremonial events, however, was the dedication of the Eternal Light Peace Memorial on Oak Hill outside of town. President Franklin Roosevelt made the dedication speech on July 3, 1938, around the same time Pickett made his charge 75 years before. More than 200,000 people attended, watching the friendly reunion of men who had once been enemies.

So, what is the significance of the baseball?

In Gettysburg, the annual festival brings the 1864 version of “base ball” to players and spectators alike to consider the history behind the great American pastime. So, they actually played baseball during the Civil War in Gettysburg.

This two-day July festival brings history alive in a way typical reenactments do not. As 24 teams play 48 games across five ball fields, abiding by a historical set of rules for the sport we now know as baseball. The fields where they gathered were on the Schroeder Farm which was used as a staging area for Pickett’s Charge and a post-battle field hospital during the Battle of Gettysburg.

Here is a quote about this era and the risks they took while playing the game:

“It is astonishing how indifferent a person can become to danger. The report of musketry is heard but a very little distance from us … yet over there on the other side of the road is most of the company, playing [baseball] and perhaps in less than half an hour they may be called to play a ball game of a more serious nature.”