Regiments have arrived in harrisburg. The eighth and 71st new York State National guard, put them on cvrr trains, and they head south to shippensburg. With chambersburg cut off, shippensburg is the new Central Organization point for the Pennsylvania State militia. You obviously cant get to chambersburg because it is south of the bridge at scotland which is no longer in existence. So they have to walk from shippensburg down to scotland, and they are going to guard bridge crews that are definitely trying to put cvrrs bridge back into place so that the army can use this if they need to. Jenkins hears about the militia roaring down the tracks heading towards his position. Jenkins withdraws into west virginia. Actually into maryland, sorry. Well, jenkins moves back into pennsylvania on june 22. Fronting the division. The new your curse, no hearing infantry is coming with artillery, abandon ship and head back to harrisburg, now leaving the Cumberland Valley totally unprotected other than a few scattered calvary units, the first new york cavalry, for example. There are some local home guard Cavalry Units floating around there. But most of the calvary in these units are not very experienced, with the exception of the first new yorkers. They thought the rebels are coming into the Cumberland Valley. Jenkins, fronting the infantry, follows the railroad. They go to mechanicsburg, and he will set up shop. The map shows you the Railroad Tracks on the main streets of mechanicsburg, and this is the largest hotel, one of the most Important Hotels in town during the civil war years, the railroad hotel, appropriately named. It was also a ticket office. It had the unheard of powder rooms for women, and an indoor powder room for the men. It had indoor plumbing, at least for a while. They had a very nice hotel there. Jenkins takes over the hotel, makes it his personal headquarters, and starts collecting new york and pennsylvania and other local newspapers that have been brought into the gift shop, if you will, of the railroad. Jenkins puts his feet up on the table and starts getting yankee intelligence, including, we believe from harrisburg. While this is going on, behind them comes the rest of the army of northern virginia, including George Pickett bringing up the rear of the army of northern virginia. Picketts men, many of them which are of course destined to die or be captured in gettysburg, many of them will spend the last weeks or days of their free lives or lives entirely wrecking the Cumberland Valley railroad. They will basically duplicate what stuart was doing in 1862. But they will do it long before shermans neckties, these guys are taking rails and heating them over bonfires and letting the rails droop so they are not valuable anymore. In some cases, they are wrapping bowties around trees like sherman will do in 1864. Picketts men are doing it in 1863 in the Cumberland Valley. Not in georgia, of course. They will show up at chambersburg and burn everything thats been rebuilt. This poor railroad had already rebuilt virtually every one of its facilities bigger and better than they were before jeb stuart hit them, and now George Pickett has arrived, with infantry. These guys do a very, very thorough job on the Cumberland Valley railroad, particularly on july 1. 156 years ago today, while battles are raging at gettysburg, George Pickett is destroying the Cumberland Valley railroad in chambersburg, pennsylvania. On this very day, hence the reason for this talk and its utility as far as anniversary celebrations in gettysburg. Pickett has a jolly old time. I outline a lot of this in the book, what picketts boys are doing in chambersburg is all this is going on. In the harrisburg area, especially the west side of the river, the new york state militia is still guarding what is left of the Cumberland Valley railroad. The yankees pretty much control the railroad from camp hill north. Thats not much. The rebels control the rest of the railroad from mechanicsburg all the way through carlisle, shippensburg, chambersburg, greencastle. 90 of the railroad is in confederate hands. But the new york state militia, this is one of the very few drawings done by soldiers during the Gettysburg Campaign that show the Railroad Tracks of pennsylvania during the campaign. You can see the 22nd new York State National guard camping. Not in the sketch is the susquehanna river. Those would be the bridge abutments. The land on the right, and on the left is the river running into downtown harrisburg. They are going to, the state militia is going to take over many of the railroad buildings, including an engine house near bridgeport, and they will convert it into block houses and try to protect the railroad as best they can. This shows the camp of the new york state militia barely in the background were i have labeled the cvrr. My coauthor did this. You can barely see the train. The Cumberland Valley railroad is still operational, at least in taking troops and refugees who can still make it into unionheld territory. They are still running trains, at least for a little while. All of that is finished up in the battle of gettysburg is over. Herman haupt appears on the scene. There are 31 railroad bridges destroyed in york county alone. Railroad bridges of the gettysburg railroad, running from here to the east, to hanover and hanover junction, that is destroyed as well as the railroad bridges on the spur going to wrightsville, and the Worlds Largest railroad bridge burned by the pennsylvania militia, actually by civilians under orders from the militia. To prevent the confederates from crossing into Lancaster County and potentially marching on harrisburg from the rear. Well, haupts job is to rebuild the railroads. He needed to get ammunition in, get the wounded out of here and get relief supplies brought in. Haupt would spend most of his personal time in york county. He would come to the Cumberland Valley on one or two occasions as well, and they would rebuild the railroads. But watts makes a critical decision. The rebels were supposed to come in 1861 and they didnt. Jeb stuart came in 1862 and destroyed my railroad, particularly much of the chambersburg railroad facilities. I rebuilt it, and gallatin jenkins destroyed it. He makes an interesting decision, not to rebuild the railroad facilities. They rebuild the tracks of course to get the railroad running, but we wont rebuild the turntables, warehouses, ticket offices, oiling stations, the engine houses, any of this until after the war. It is a good decision, because does anybody know what happens in 1864 to chambersburg . John mcconnell and shows up on the scene. He makes yet another incursion into pennsylvania, aimed at chambersburg. The third time in three years chambersburg has been targeted. He is of course coming under the guise of orders from joe worley. He is upset about the destruction in virginia by david hunter and union troops, and he has made the decision that somebody is going to pay for this. He says, you can start ransoming northern towns. They are going to ransom hagerstown. And by the time they get to chambersburg, he asks for 100,000 in gold. In 1863, he has ransomed york, pennsylvania where i live for 100,000 in cash and three days worth of supplies, 2000 pairs of shoes and boots. He gets almost all of that. 28,006 hundred 10 in cash. So he knows that the stunt of ransoming people works. So he tells, ransom chambersburg. The chambersburg citizens are like, they didnt burn york down, they didnt burn down gettysburg, didnt burn down carlisle. And the last two times they were in chambersburg, they only burned down the railroad. We dont have railroad buildings to burn. We are safe. By the way, only 10 miles away is william averills union regular cavalry, not regulars, but volunteer calvary. So the people of chambersburg in effect tell him to pound salt. He responds, i wasnt kidding, and orders the town torched. The confederate officers protest and he ignores them or puts them under arrest in most extreme cases, and the confederates porch chambersburg. They dont have railroad buildings to torch this time, but they have the town itself and they lay waste to it. We have all probably seen the pictures of what chambersburg looks like after this devastating raid. Now, the railroad suffers very little damage, but Railroad Employees are devastated. There are a lot of Railroad Employees who live in and around chambersburg. That is the railroads home before the war. Home of most of the offices, etc. The cvrr is still operational and can still haul refugees out of chambersburg, and they do it. And men and women who have lost their homes, the cvrr at no charge will haul you to harrisburg if you want a fresh start. A lot of chambersburg residents will ride cvrr a final time and never return to chambersburg. Some do, but many start all over somewhere else. The railroad makes its final shipment of troops into chambersburg, bringing the 201st penciling in to police the town pennsylvania in to police the town and restore order. 1865, anticipating the war will still last a while, there are two powerful new locomotives but the war ends before they can use them. April 22, the cvrr makes its final wartime contribution. Watts organizes a special train to bring any mourners from the Cumberland Valley to carlisle,. Remember its the same station as the northern central train that is bringing abraham lincolns body from washington, d. C. So the northern central train arrives at the station and the cvrr has already brought in mourners from the Cumberland Valley. The cvrrs final act is to bring soldiers home from the civil war back to places like chambersburg, some of which the soldiers only know that their homes are gone. They havent seen them and they go back to rebuild homes. On behalf of my publisher, on behalf of the gettysburg heritage center, thank you for your time and attention today and hopefully you know a little more about one of the key railroads in pennsylvania that ran between maryland and the commonwealth during the civil war. Thanks for your time and attention. [applause] scott we have time for a couple of questions. Does anybody have anything . Good. In that case, any questions on the railroad . This was a pretty important railroad, that most people dont realize. How many of you knew that George Picketts men spent time wrecking railroads up here . Not many. Thats one of the revelations, that many people reading the book did not realize that was picketts main role, to wreck the railroads. Thanks very much. I will turn it back over to tammy. Tammy thank you so much. Appreciate it, scott. Thank you. This is American History tv, on cspan3. We feature 48 hours of programs exploring our past. May 8 is known as ve day, or victory in europe day, marking the date 75 years ago when the allies accepted nazi germanys Unconditional Surrender of its armed forces, bringing an end to hostilities in world war iis european theater. Cspan was live to mark the anniversary with Pulitzer Prize winner rick atkinson, author of the guns at last light the war 19441945. Europe, the Program Begins with an archival newsreel from may, 1945, showing the signing of the surrender and a statement from president harry truman. [video clip] [applause] narrator throughout the world, throngs of people hailed the end of the war in europe. Its been five years and more since hitlers march into poland. Now, the war against germany is won. A grateful nation gives thanks for victory. Hundreds of thousands crowd into american churches to give thanks to god. Narrator president truman announced the official surrender. This is a solemn but glorious hour. I wish that franklin d. Roosevelt had lived to see this day. General eisenhower informs me that the forces of germany have surrendered to the United Nations. The flags of freedom fly all over europe. For this victory, we join in offering our thanks to the providence, which has guided and sustained us through the dark days of adversity and into light. Much remains to be done. The victory won in the west must now be won in the east. The whole world must be cleansed of the evil from which half the world has been freed. United, the peace loving nations have demonstrated in the west that their arms are stronger, by far, than the might of dictators or the tyranny of military that once called us salt and wheat. The power of our peoples to defend themselves against all enemies will be proved in the pacific war as it was proved in europe. Narrator historic pictures of the last days of war in europe show american and Russian Troops as they join on the river elbe. Reinhardt met , a meeting that spelled out certain german defeat. Inside germany itself, the allied sees the sight of countless nazi party rallies. The American Flag now drowns out the swastika. In a symbolic gesture, american troops destroy the nazi party emblem. [explosion] rick American History tv and washington journal are marking the end of world war ii, the 75th anniversary of the end of world war ii in the european theater, ve day, victory in europe day. We welcome author and historian rick atkinson, whose final book in the liberation trilogy is guns at last light. The final of the three books focusing on 1944 and 1945. Rick atkinson, to get our conversation lets start with a quick timeline of where things were and how they came from the day on june 6, 1944 in late august, the liberation of paris on august 25, 1944. The battle of the bulge in december of that year and then thend into january of 1945 to ve day. Take us back, rick atkinson, to may 7 and 8th of 1945. How did the war end in europe . Rick well, the war ended with the germans basically deciding, with hitlers having killed himself more than a week earlier, that there was no profit in dragging it out with the russians in berlin. The russians were murdering civilians, killing german soldiers by the hundreds of thousands. So, the germans decided that trying to make peace with the western allies, the americans in particular, was their best bet. And that they were going to get a better deal from the western allies than they were going to get from the soviets. So, eisenhower had his forward headquarters in the french champagne town in northeastern france. There was a delegation and a lot of palaver about what the conditions would be. They were told in no Uncertain Terms that Unconditional Surrender would be the only terms by which the war would end. And so the general, the operations chief of the german armed forces, showed up at eisenhowers headquarters, which was in a former technical college, red brick building. Reporters and photographers were there. It was 2 00 in the morning on may 7, 1945. And the articles of surrender had been boiled down to barely 200 words. The whole ceremony with the cameras rolling lasted only about 10 minutes. The general signed. Eisenhower told him he would be personally held responsible for ensuring that the terms of the capitulation were honored. And that was that. Now, it was going to go into effect the next day, may 8. Giving them time to alert german uboats in the atlantic and the german detachments in norway. The soviets felt that it was important to have a surrender ceremony on german soil. They didnt want the germans to be able to say, as they had in world war i, that they had never been actually defeated and they had never actually capitulated in germany proper. So, they insisted on yet another surrender ceremony in a suburb of berlin, which happened on may 9. So the soviets, now the russians, consider that to be ve day. But for the rest of the world, the surrender went into effect on may 8 and that was the end of the war in europe. Now, there was still a war in the pacific and that certainly had a moderating effect on the jubilation that wouldve taken place otherwise. Host on that timeline from dday, june 6, 1944, did the final victory in europe, based on your research of u. S. Forces and british forces, did that happen sooner than they thought or did it take longer than they thought . Rick you know, it took longer in the sense that after the battle of the bulge ended at the end of january, 1945, there was widespread understanding that the germans could not recover from this catastrophe, that they had lost the war. What no one in the west could understand is why they wouldnt give up, why they continued to fight. Why one little town, one mediumsized city or even big cities continued to resist. There were 10,400 american soldiers killed in action in april, 1945 in germany. Thats almost as many as were killed in june, 1944, the month of invasion. So, it was awful virtually until the last gunshot. And as a consequence, there was great consternation really about whether they were going to surrender, whether every last german soldier was going to have to be killed, whether more german civilians were going to have to die, and of course, whether more allied soldiers were going to have to die. So i think, you know, there had been hope that the war would end sooner. The day turned out to be the day. Host our guest is rick atkinson, its the 75th anniversary of ve day. We would love to hear from you, your questions and comments. Heres how the lines are broken up. For the eastern and central time zones. And then the mountain and pacific time zones. And for those of you that are world war ii veterans or their families, if your parents served in world war ii, we ask you to call in. In your book, the guns at last light, rick atkinson, its really alarming to read the death tolls. In one story you write about the training, just the training alone, for ve day alone, there was one accident in the tr