The Gettysburg Address was a speech delivered by US President Abraham Lincoln on 19 November 1863. It was given during the formal dedication of the Soldiers’ National Cemetery - now the Gettysburg National Cemetery - on the site where the bloody Battle of Gettysburg had been fought in the American Civil War just four months earlier. Only 271 words long, the speech argued that the soldiers who had fallen at Gettysburg and other battlefields had not died in vain, that their sacrifice had been made to preserve the Union and all the principles it stood for - primarily including that of human equality. The address remains one of the most important and oft-quoted speeches in US history.
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19 Nov 1863The Gettysburg Address is delivered by President Abraham Lincoln at the formal dedication of a Soldiers' National Cemetery following the Battle of Gettysburg in July of the same year, now known as the Gettysburg National Cemetery. The famous speech was read in less than two minutes and has only 271 words in it but has come to be regarded as among the greatest in US history.
