Photograph as originally submitted to this page in the Historical Marker Database www.HMdb.org. Click on photo to resize in browser. Scroll down to see metadata.

Photographer: Sean Flynn
Taken: May 6, 2021
Caption: First Shot Marker at Gettysburg
Additional Description: Marcellus Jones is credited with firing the first shot of the Battle of Gettysburg on Chambersburg Pike outside of Gettysburg, on July 1, 1863. After a column of Confederate troops was spotted around 6:45 a.m. that morning, Lt. Jones borrowed a carbine from Sgt. Levi Shafer and fired at an officer on a white horse, missing the officer but opening what would become the largest battle ever fought on the Western Hemisphere. In 1886, Jones, Shafer and Alex Riddler, also a veteran of the 8th, erected the First Shot Marker, made of DuPage County limestone (from Naperville), near the location of Jones' first shot.
Submitted: July 20, 2023, by Sean Flynn of Oak Park, Illinois.
Database Locator Identification Number: p738540
File Size: 0.296 Megabytes

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