Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park

Where Uncommon Valor Was Commonplace

Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park memorializes the battles of Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, the Wilderness, and Spotsylvania Court House – four major engagements of the Civil War. No other area of comparable size has witnessed such heavy and continuous fighting. Here, within a radius of 17 miles, occurred more than 100,000 American casualties. The park preserves and interprets some of the scenes of those battles. The quiet, peaceful woods and fields are constant reminders of how much we owe to the sacrifice of others.

Lee Dominates Fredericksburg

The Union army commanded by Ambrose E. Burnside arrived on Stafford Heights overlooking Fredericksburg in mid-November 1862. Not until December 11, however, did the Federals cross the Rappahannock River. By that time Robert E. Lee’s forces were firmly posted on the high ground west of the city. On December 13, Burnside ordered two attacks. An assault led by George G. Mead against Jackson’s corps at Prospect Hill achieved temporary success before Confederate reserves drove the Federals back to their original position. The second attack was launched against the heart of Lee’s defenses on Marye’s Heights west of Fredericksburg. Confederate artillery on the heights and infantry behind a stone wall slaughtered the Union soldiers. When the day ended, Lee had won his most one-sided victory of the war.

Stonewall Jackson Shot at Chancellorsville

Following the Fredericksburg debacle, President Abraham Lincoln replaced Burnside with Joseph Hooker. On April 27, 1863, the new commander marched most of his army upstream, crossed the Rappahannock and Rapidan rivers at various fords, and within three days was at the Chancellorsville crossroads. Lee discovered this threat to his position and rushed westward, prompting Hooker to abandon the initiative and establish a defensive line, which was vulnerable on the right flank. Stonewall Jackson exploited this weakness on May 2 by leading his corps on a risky 12-mile march around the Union army and destroying Hooker’s right in a spectacular surprise attack. The day ended tragically for the Confederates when Jackson was unwittingly shot and mortally wounded by his own troops. For three more days Lee pressed his advantage and eventually drove the Federals back across the river.

Grant's Tactics in The Wilderness

The first of the classic encounters between Lee and Ulysses S. Grant took place in the dense thickets and tangled undergrowth of the Wilderness on May 5-6, 1864. Along the Orange Turnpike the armies sparred indecisively for two days. To the south, on the Orange Plank Road, Grant almost crushed A. P. Hill’s troops on May 5, only to be thrown back by a dramatic Confederate counterattack the next day. Tactically the battle was a draw, but Grant broke the stalemate by marching his army south toward Spotsylvania Court House.

Grant Abandons Spotsylvania Courthouse

On the night of May 7-8, 1864 both armies raced for the vital intersection at Spotsylvania Courthouse that controlled the shortest route to Richmond. Lee arrived first, entrenched, and successfully withstood a series of Union attacks. On the morning of May 12, two Federal corps charged from the woods opposite a vulnerable section of the Confederate line known as the "Mule Shoe Salient." Thanks in part to thick fog and wet Confederate power, the initial Union advance overwhelmed the Southerners. Confederate reinforcements counterattacked, and for the next 20 hours this sector witnessed the most intense hand-to-hand combat of the war. This desperate fighting came to be called the "Bloody Angle" and earned Lee enough time to build new earthworks, which he held until Grant abandoned the field on May 21.

Stonewall Jackson Shrine

Following his accidental wounding on the night of May 2, 1863, Jackson’s left arm was amputated at a field hospital near Wilderness Tavern. On May 4, he endured a 27-mile ambulance ride to Thomas C. Chandler’s Fairfield Plantation at Guinea Station. Here, well behind Confederate lines and at a point convenient to the railroad, Jackson lay in a small frame office building. Pneumonia set in after his arrival and he died here on May 10.

Old Salem Church and Military Hospital

Built in 1844 to provide the Baptists of upper Spotsylvania County a more geographically convenient place of worship, this structure harbored scores of refugees who fled Fredericksburg during the 1862 battle. Union and Confederate soldiers later fought here during the Battle of Chancellorsville. When the fighting ended, Southern surgeons attended to wounded soldiers of both armies in the building.

Chatham

This gracious Georgian plantation house, built by William Fitzhugh beginning in 1768, hosted two of America’s most famous Presidents – George Washington in 1785 and Abraham Lincoln in 1862. During the Battle of Fredericksburg the building served as headquarters for Edwin V. Sumner, commander of the Union army’s Right Grand Division, and as a field hospital. Army medical personnel, assisted by volunteers like Clara Barton, treated hundreds of Union soldiers within its walls. Graffiti scrawled by soldiers is still visible today.

Fredericksburg National Civil War Cemetery

More than 15,000 Union soldiers killed in and around Fredericksburg are buried in this 12-acre cemetery located on Marye’s Heights. The identities of 85 percent of the soldiers are unknown. Confederate soldiers are buried in Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania Confederate cemeteries.