UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — "We are hard pushed, but intend to live through this storm of war." Evan Pugh wrote these words in a letter to Penn State Trustee Hugh McAllister regarding the exodus of several students who enlisted in armies during the Civil War. Pugh, a Quaker and president of the Agricultural College of Pennsylvania — now called Penn State — was a staunch believer in the power of education and saw it as a mistake for anyone to leave school before completing his degree. Despite his impassioned pleas, students withdrew and signed up for militias that were raised to defend a small town to the south of the state's capital: Gettysburg.
Carol Reardon, George Winfree Professor of American History at Penn State talks about Penn State students' role in the Battle of Gettysburg.