“The several states having soldiers in the army of the Potomac who were killed at the 
battle of Gettysburg or have since died at the various hospitals which were established in 
the vicinity have procured grounds on a prominent part of the battlefield for a cemetery 
and are having the dead removed to them and properly buried.

These grounds will be consecrated and set apart to this sacred purpose on Thursday the 
19th instant.  It is the desire that you as chief executive of the nation formally set apart 
these grounds to their sacred use by a few appropriate remarks.  It will be a source of 
great gratification to the many widows and orphans that have been made almost 
friendless by the great battle here to have you here personally and it will kindle anew in 
the breasts of the comrades of these brave dead who are now in the tented field or nobly 
meeting the foe in the front a confidence that they who sleep in death on the battlefield 
are not forgotten by those highest in authority and they will feel that should their fate be 
the same their remains will not be uncared for.”

From letter of invitation to Abraham Lincoln President of the United States who on 
November 19 1863 near this place delivered the address at the dedication of the 
cemetery.