Petersburg Battlegrounds & Fredericksburg Explorations

On Friday night we finally explored the battlegrounds that surround Fort Lee.
The battlegrounds are from the siege of Petersburg. The siege was almost 10 months long and way too many men lost their lives.
So here is a short history of the battle and siege of Petersburg.
In May of 1864 General Grant tried to capture Richmond and when he failed, he decided to attack Petersburg instead. After Richmond, Petersburg was the second largest city in Virginia and the seventh largest in the south. He knew if he could capture Petersburg then Richmond would fall. Petersburg was a major supply hub as it was situated near the mouths of two major rivers and it had five railroad lines that connected it to Richmond. So without supplies from Petersburg, Richmond would be cut off.
On June 15th, the Union troops snuck around and attack the small confederate force that was guarding Petersburg, Most of the Confederate forces were still in Richmond, with only 2,200 men at Petersburg. But the confederate forces had not left the city unprotected. Ringing the city on three sides and stretching for nearly ten miles, the Confederate  had dug earthworks and trenches around the city and it presented a formidable obstacle.  With 16 batteries, the city was protected well by the natural obstacles and trenches.


Union General Smith led his troops to attack Petersburg, but he was impressed by the intimidating works that confronted him and delayed his assault until 7:00 p.m., expecting the momentary arrival of General Hancock’s Second Corps. With daylight waning, the best chance to capture Petersburg with relatively little fighting was gone. Smith was able to defeat two batteries but when General Hancock's troops finally showed up, they decided to halt the attack until dawn. This caused them to lose the opportunity to capture Petersburg that night.  It would be 291 days before the American flag would fly over Petersburg again.
And as predicted, once the Union forces captured Petersburg on April 3rd and it was only 6 days until General Robert E. Lee met with General Grant  at the Appomattox courthouse to discuss surrender and  how to peaceably end the war. The best estimate of the casualties from the battle of Petersburg is 42,000 Union casualties and 28,000 Confederate casualties. So many lives lost, it's really heartbreaking. 

So as we explored the battlegrounds we read markers and signs with facts and a history of the battle.
The kids loved seeing all the old cannons.

The battlegrounds are beautiful and awe-inspiring. It's completely heartbreaking to think of this field covered in the bodies of men dying while the fighting raged on.

We tried to explain to the kids what occurred here on the grounds, but they can't really understand the significance. Tanner did ask lots of thoughtful questions though.

Here are the kids overlooking the railroad tracks. This set of tracks is one of five that connected Petersburg to Richmond.

This canon is a Union canon that was called "The Dictator". It's completely massive. The mortar could lob a  200 lb explosive shell about 2 1/2 miles.The "Dictator" was usually  positioned in a curved section of the Petersburg & City Point Railroad and was employed for about three months during the siege. Imagine the damage a shell that size would do. It's incredible. 

This is Tanner in front of an artillery cellar. The confederate troops dug these storage spaces out of the sides of surrounding hills. Tanner thought that was pretty cool

One of the saddest parts of the siege of Petersburg was the attack in the mines that created a crater on the battlefield.We didn't get to see the crater on this visit, but we have plans to come back soon. 

Sometimes it's surprising to me that the south lost the war. Battle after battle proves that the Confederate officers and leadership were smarter and better equipped when it came to understand logistics and warfare. If it weren't for the sheer numbers that the North had,  I  really wonder if the war would have had a very different outcome. 

Are you feeling so informed now? Isn't the history amazing here? It's literally right outside our door. We can walk from our hotel onto the battlegrounds. So cool. Anyways, that was our Friday night. 

On Saturday we drove up to Fredericksburg. Fredericksburg is a very historic city and it did not disappoint. We learned so much. But before going on his historic tour of the town, we took the kids to Alum Springs to play. Alum Springs has quite a bit of history tied to it. George Washington even surveyed the Alum Spring property for his brother-in-law, who later operated a mill at Alum Springs.  It was also thought to have curative powers, since there was a large natural infusion of alum in the spring. 

We played at the park and then my dear friend Kimberly Allen met us so we could hang out together. Kim lives in D.C. and made the short drive over to meet us.

The tire swing was a big hit with the boys.

Then we walked over to the spring and played for a couple hours. The kids loved it.

And it was completely gorgeous.

The water looks dirty, but it wasn't. It was cool and the kids loved splashing around.

Then we decided it was time to eat. We drove into downtown Fredericksburg for lunch. 

We all ate lunch at this hole-in-the-wall pizza place called Benny Vitali's. It was delicious and the pieces were huge. The kids loved it.  This picture doesn't even do the size justice.

Just to give you an idea, a whole pizza was 28 inches wide. Isn't that crazy? A single piece was over 12 inches long and very wide.

After Lunch, Kim had to head home. It was sad to see here leave. Bailey was especially obsessed with Kim and it was cute to see her interact with my kids. 

After Kim left, we decided to take a trolley tour of the town. It was so cool.

The kids were tired and a little bored, but they were very good.

Some of the kids favorite stops included the site of George Washington's childhood home of "Ferry Farm".  George Washington was only 6 years old when his family moved to the farm. It's called "Ferry Farm" because they used a ferry to cross the river into the town of Fredericksburg. Tanner loved seeing where George Washington lived when he was his age. So cute. 

We also saw Mary Washington's home. Mary Washington was George Washington's mother. He bought the house for his Mother and she moved from Ferry Farm and lived in the house during the last 17 years of her life. George visited his mother here for the last time before being elected as president. Mary died of breast cancer before his election. But many of her belongings still remain in the house.  Pretty cool. 

One of Chris' favorite stops was the "Kenmore Plantation". This is the home of George Washington's Sister, Betty, and her husband, Fielding Lewis. You can actually see canon balls still wedge in the brickwork of the house, from the attacks during the revolutionary war. How cool is that? 

The tour was about 1 1/2 hours and included lots of revolutionary war history as well as the town's history. The town itself suffered three major fires that damaged many of the buildings. However, despite the fires, so much of the history of the town is still intact. It's such a cool town. We really enjoyed our tour.

After our tour, we stopped by the visitor center and they gave Tanner a George Washington mask to wear. He thought it was so fun and immediately put it on. Isn't this the creepiest thing you have ever seen? He wore his mask as we walked down the street and he actually scared some people. One guy was so startled that he said "Dude. That's super creepy." Lol. It was pretty funny. I love my little Washington fan.

After the tour, we walked over to a local ice cream shop and bought some treats.
It was pretty hot, so this ice cream tasted amazing!

We had so much fun in Fredericksburg. We would love to come back and get to tour some of the buildings we missed. But it was a wonderful day in a really cool little town.