![]() By November the cemetery was ready for dedication. ![]() The federal government provided the coffins. An interstate commission was formed, money was raised, and seventeen acres of land at the battle site purchased. ![]() Pennsylvania Governor Andrew Curtin appointed David Wills, a prominent Gettysburg lawyer, to oversee the project. The bodies of the fallen had to be given a proper internment. The arrival of summer's humid heat brought with it the nauseating stench of decaying flesh that attracted swarms of flies and marauding pigs to the former battlefield. Soon after the battle, torrential rain exposed the bodies lying in their hastily-prepared shallow graves. ![]() In the aftermath of the three-day carnage that took place at its doorstep in early July, the hamlet of Gettysburg found itself surrounded by thousands of bloating corpses. ![]()
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