The air at Ball’s Bluff is soft and warm, just whispering of spring. Sunlight spills through the trees, and a wisp of a breeze rustles the dried leaves that still cling to branches here and there.
My husband and I stop at the edge of the ridge and look down the tumbling chasm to the waters of the Potomac flowing mutely below.
Apart from an odd series of muffled cracks, like rifle fire in the distance, it’s quiet as can be. We have the place, near Leesburg, Va., pretty much to ourselves on this Sunday morning, our only companions a jogger or two and a couple of dog walkers.
Oh, and of course, the shades of the past.
They’re with us every step of the way along the interpretive trail. I see their silent outlines on the forested landscape where they fought and fell nearly 150 years ago. I imagine them at my shoulder as I read the historical markers describing the scenes that took place here then. When I walk into the little stone-walled cemetery with its circle of small white gravestones — “Unknown,” “Unknown,” “Unknown,” they repeat, over and over — I can almost hear someone sighing in concert with me.
That’s what happens on a Civil War road trip.
Or a Journey Through Hallowed Ground, the formal designation of the trail we’re following, from Gettysburg, Pa., to Orange, Va., 150 miles and three days along scenic U.S. 15, through bucolic farms and fields and an area that’s a beehive of sites significant to various periods of the nation’s history. We’re concentrating on the Civil War as the sesquicentennial celebration begins — the first shot of the war was fired on Apr. 12, and Gettysburg will fire 150 cannon rounds later this month.
What happens is: You get caught up in stories from the past. You visit battlefields you didn’t know existed. You meet some people so steeped in the minutiae of the War Between the States that you — well, you wonder about them, just a little.
And then the next thing you know, you totally get how they became that way. Because it’s happening to you too.
“Standing in the battlefield”
“We are standing, right here, in the battlefield,” says Nancie Gudmestad, punctuating each word with her forefinger. “This is what many people do not realize. But we are standing. In. The battlefield.”
We are standing, precisely, in the gloomy attic of the Shriver House Museum in Gettysburg. I’m staring at a couple of rifles propped in front of holes knocked into one of the walls, beneath the eaves: Confederate sniping positions. At least two men in gray died here, Gudmestad says: A CSI team found lots of blood spatter after spraying the attic with luminol.
But soldiers go to war. Not so the good citizens of Gettysburg, to whom the war simply came. And what happened to them was tragic too. Like the Shrivers, husband and wife and two young daughters, whose elegant new home in the heart of town was commandeered for the three-day battle and hospital service beyond: Father George, serving in the Union Army, was taken prisoner and died of starvation at Andersonville, Ga. Mother Hettie, forced to sell the house, remarried. Both girls were dead of consumption by 21. Within little more than a decade of the war, Hettie had buried her entire first family.
“It’s a sad story, because it’s a war story,” says Gudmestad after the tour, which she gives in full 1860s hoop- skirted regalia, fashionable jailbird- striped stockings included. It’s the kind of story she wanted to tell when she opened the museum in 1996. Running a B&B in town before that, “I’d hear guests at breakfast talking about General this and Major that and the Peach Orchard . . . and I’d think, what about the townspeople?”
We forget them, don’t we? Most folks just make a beeline for the battlefield because that’s where all the drama is.
But the town, too, is dripping with drama. It pulls us in: central Lincoln Square (it was “the Diamond” back then), occupied by the rebel army; the many, many walls everywhere pockmarked still with shockingly large bullet holes; the railroad depot where Abraham Lincoln arrived in November 1863 for the dedication of the Soldiers’ National Cemetery; the David Wills House and the bedroom where Abe polished his famous address (no, he did not write it on the back of an envelope).
It’s all fascinating, sobering, saddening, moving. This could get a little depressing. “I think it’s time for a stop in McClellan’s Tavern,” my husband says. But I still want to see the Jennie Wade House, so we forgo the restaurants and pubs with hokey war-related names and head down Baltimore Street, through a gantlet of souvenir shops and battling billboards touting tours and goods and lodgings and meals.
The Jennie Wade House — well, it’s as sad a war monument as any ever erected. Jennie, 20, was the only civilian killed during the battle. A stray bullet pierced two doors (can you believe it?) and struck her in the back while she was making bread. Right after finishing her morning devotions, during which she reportedly prayed that if anyone in the house had to die that day, please Lord, let her be the one.
The first Civil War museum in Gettysburg, opened in 1900, it’s a major attraction, plastered with signs. The little house is dark and cramped. The tour guide’s story is unspeakably sad. I’m feeling woebegone, staring at the dough tray Jennie was using that day, when somebody remarks on the sign taped to the door above the second bullet hole. Put your ring finger through it if you’re single, girls, and you’ll be engaged by the end of the year, it avows. I roll my eyes.
But Lea Sacks, a young woman in our group, inserts her finger into the worn opening as her boyfriend, Tedd Fabryk, and his two young daughters look on, grinning. Everybody laughs then, and the mood lifts.
Less glorified grounds
“You know,” says my husband, “none of these battlefields has a visitors center.”
This epiphany has come to him at the end of a day of Civil War battlefield reconnaissance. Not the battlefields you think, though, although U.S. 15 runs right past — or through — the biggies: Gettysburg, Antietam, Manassas. Our marching orders are to skip those well-visited haunts and make for less glorified but equally grave grounds.
Of which there are a startlingly high number. The night before, we’d already stumbled onto the Battle of Fairfield. What — you’ve never heard of it? We hadn’t, either. It took place July 3, 1863, in the town of Fairfield, Pa., at the same time as Pickett’s infamous charge at nearby Gettysburg.
The Confederates under Gen. William “Grumble” Jones overcame the Union cavalry on their tail, apparently in the fields right out back of the Fairfield Inn, a 250-year-old hostelry where we spent the night. Jones’ victory cleared a route for the rebels’ retreat into Virginia, and soon Gen. Robert E. Lee himself was stopping in midflight for some nourishment at the inn.
There’s Civil War history everywhere you turn in these parts. And there’s always someone around who can fill in the story for you.
Roger and Carol Healy, owners of the Norris House Inn in Leesburg, where we encamp another night, enthusiastically tell us all about Ball’s Bluff: Oct. 21, 1861, a turning point in Washington’s war spin. Not only did a sitting U.S. senator lose his life in the battle, but once the bodies of Union soldiers, shot trying to escape across the Potomac, started washing ashore in the capital, Lincoln’s administration couldn’t pretend that everything was going well anymore.
Finding the battlefield, though — that’s another story. We drive a mile or so through cookie-cutter suburbs following little brown signs that eventually bring us to a cul de sac, where we follow the unmarked dirt road at the end of the street to the forested park.
Yes, there are no visitors centers at these battlefields. Just do-it-yourself tours with historical markers and information boards. It’s the same at the Battle of Cedar Mountain north of Culpeper, Va. (Aug. 9, 1862), and the bloody Wilderness (May 5-6, 1864, a quick foray beyond strict Hallowed Ground territory, into Spotsylvania County).
At least the Battle of Brandy Station, the largest cavalry conflict of the war (June 9, 1863), has the Graffiti House. Imagine walls covered with signatures and drawings scrawled by soldiers of both sides (maybe even the legendary J.E.B. Stuart) bivouacked there at various points in the war.
In 1993, the frame house by the railroad tracks in Brandy Station, north of Culpeper, was waiting to be demolished when a young man scavenging for wood tore some paneling from a wall and saw the first scribbles. Wow.
“This is going to be great,” I tell my husband as we approach the front door. On which hangs a sheet of paper. “Winter hours,” it reads, “Monday-Saturday, 11 to 4.”
It’s Sunday.
Aargh. I try the door anyway, and whoa! It swings open. A man’s voice floats down from upstairs, but nobody appears to greet us.
We hesitate, then head up the worn wooden stairs to the second floor where a group is apparently listening to a lecture. The speaker breaks off and comes out onto the landing.
“We’re actually closed,” he says.
“Could we just quickly peek into one room?” I plead.
He says, “Yes, ma’am.”
We duck into the Small Room and stare at the flowing autographs that run floor to ceiling over the white wall.
Robert E. Lee’s church pew
My husband wants to sit where Robert E. Lee sat.
We’re in St. Thomas’ Episcopal Church in Orange, a pretty, white- spired brick building. My husband is sitting in a worn wooden pew outside the nursery school. A brass plaque identifies it as the pew the Southern commander used when worshiping here during the winter of 1863-64, while regrouping after Gettysburg.
Another plaque on a newer pew says it occupies the former spot of Lee’s pew.
I can easily picture Lee’s horse, Traveller, tied to the spindly locust tree outside the church. It looks 150 years old, although town visitors center volunteer Phil Audibert tells us it’s just a descendant of the original. “It’s fallen over several times,” he says, “but then new sprouts come up.”
In other places, imagination is all you have. Like A.P. Hill’s boyhood home in Culpeper. The Confederate hero grew up in this blocky commercial building? Bank of America Home Loans? Really?
In Warrenton, the house named Brentmoor looks just as it did when Confederate Col. John Singleton Mosby, a.k.a. the Gray Ghost, lived there briefly after the war. It beckons from behind its wrought-iron fence, and it was all ready for visitors too, says the friendly volunteer at the visitors center. Then the recession hit.
And speaking of ghosts: On a Civil War tour, every place has a ghost story. Every town has its Civil War ghost tour. Every museum and inn, it seems, has been scanned by “Ghost Hunters” or “Ghost Lab.”
Which doesn’t negate the truth:
There may be no actual ghosts of the Civil War. But those who lived and died in it will haunt us forever.
Some major commemorations on the East Coast
A century and a half after the first shots were fired, the Civil War still burns in the nation’s memory, and the battlefield states are making sure that this will be even truer during the war’s 150th anniversary. Key cities and historic sites are hosting months-long activities and commemorations, ranging from the erudite (lecture series) to the ceremonial (parades and military bands). Here’s a sampling of major happenings on the East Coast.
Pennsylvania
One word: Gettysburg. OK, three words: Gettysburg Kick-Off Event, to be held April 29-30 and featuring living history encampments, the lighting of 150 luminaries and a 150 cannon blasts. Info: . Other battlefields are also doing some kicking off, such as Greencastle (earlier this month) and Fairfield (April 22-23).
For events across Pennsylvania: .
Maryland
The big event in Baltimore wraps up today, the third day of the Civil War 150: The Baltimore Commemoration. The pomp and circumstance includes the Grand Procession from President Street Station, a dramatization of the Pratt Street Riot and a candlelight tour of Fort McHenry. Info: .
For events beyond Baltimore, check out .
Virginia
Pick a battle and it’s probably being re-enacted: the Battle of Cloyd’s Mountain (April 30-May 1), the Battle of New Market (May 14-15), the Battle of Cedar Creek (Oct. 14-16). One of the more momentous remembrances will occur July 21 at Manassas National Battlefield Park with name-brand speakers, tours, films, etc. Info: ; . West Virginia
There’s no shortage of ways to relive this historic period, such as the re-enactment of the Jones and Imboden Raid (April 30), the Meeting of the Civil War Generals in Clarksburg (May 14-15), the First Campaign Tour (July 6) and the Civil War Fashion Show and Tea in Philippi (July 16). For those rare days when there isn’t a special activity, follow the Civil War Discovery Trail. Info: ; .
Info on other states
Georgia:
New Jersey: index.asp
New York:
North Carolina:
Ohio:
Kentucky:
Tennessee: civil-war
Andrea Sachs, The Washington Post
Insider’s Guide
To trace the Journey Through Hallowed Ground, follow U.S. 15 south from Gettysburg, Pa., through Maryland and Virginia. The full designated route is roughly 175 miles, ending in Charlottesville, Va. Download a map from .
STAY
The Fairfield Inn, 15 W. Main St., Fairfield, Pa., 717-642-5410, . Historic, atmospheric 1760s inn where Robert E. Lee ate on the retreat from Gettysburg. Six suites and guest rooms from $130, including breakfast.
Norris House Inn, 108 Loudoun St. SW, Leesburg, Va., 800-644-1806, . Gracious B&B run by British expats who do it up in style. Six rooms from $145 weekends, $110 weekdays, including breakfast.
The Inn at Willow Grove, 14079 Plantation Way, Orange, Va., 540-672- 7001, . Beautiful country inn on the sylvan grounds of a former plantation, with the latest amenities and a fabulous restaurant. Rooms from $295 weekends, $250 weekdays.
DINE
Mansion House Restaurant, in the Fairfield Inn. Have some ham and bean soup and chicken and biscuits like Lee, or try a dish prepared from recipes handed down from innkeeper to innkeeper for 250 years. Dinner entrees from $18.
Eiffel Tower Cafe, 107 Loudoun St. SW, Leesburg, Va., 703-777-5142, . Traditional French restaurant with a typically Parisian ambiance. Dinner entrees from $22.95.
Foti’s Restaurant, 219 E. Davis St., Culpeper, Va., 540-829-8400, . Artful farm-to- table fare served in elegant but casual surroundings. Dinner entrees from $21.
Elmwood at Sparks, 124 W. Main St., Orange, Va., 540-672-0060, . Casual cafe serving contemporary American cuisine. Lunch entrees from $11.25.
SEE
Shriver House Museum, 309 Baltimore St., Gettysburg, 717-337-2800, . April-October, Monday-Saturday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.; Sunday 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Nov. 1-21, noon-5 p.m. $7.95, 12 and under $6.
Jennie Wade House, 548 Baltimore St., Gettysburg, 717-334-4100, . Spring and fall, daily 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Summer, 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. $7.50, ages 6-12 $3.50.
David Wills House, 8 Lincoln Square, Gettysburg, 866-486-5735, . Learn about the effect of the war and its aftermath on the town. April and September-November, Wednesday- Monday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. May-August, daily 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. $6.50, seniors $5.50, ages 6-18 $4.
Ball’s Bluff Battlefield Regional Park and National Cemetery, Ball’s Bluff Road, Leesburg, Va., 703-737-7800, . Open daily dawn to dusk. Free.
Graffiti House, 19484 Brandy Road, Brandy Station, Va., 540-727-7718, . April-October, Friday-Sunday, 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Donations accepted.
St. Thomas’s Episcopal Church, 119 Caroline St., Orange, Va., 540-672- 3761, stthomas.html. Call or e-mail for a docent-led tour of the church where Lee once worshiped.
MORE INFO
Civil War Traveler:
Civil War Trust: 150th-anniversary
National Park Service:
Zofia Smardz
