Evening Star Newspaper, September 20, 1931, Page 73

Petersburg. A two-hour drive from Washington, through ranges of wooded hills, tumbled mountains in miniature, brings one t0 Fredericksburg. Through the quaint streets of the old town goes the traveler, and five miles out the Or- ange Court House road to the first battlefleld. Here at Salem Church on May 3, 1863, Gen. John Sedgwick, marching from Fredericksburg to join Gen. Hooker at the battle of Chancel- lorsville, which was then in , encoun- tered McLaws’ Confederate Division, and after sharp fighting took the church with its gar- rison. A Confederate counter attack almost immediately recaptured it. Six miles or so further along the turnpike is Chancellorsville. No other battle in this country is so much studied as this, and interest in it is not confined to those whose business is military strategy and tactics. An eminent judge of New England is considered to know more about the battle of Chancellorsville than any other one person. In April, 1863, Gen. Lee was deterred from taking the offensive and initiating & Mary- land campaign because Gen. Longstreet was in the useless siege of Suffolk part of the Confederate forces. i E?gfi attacked Hooker in front. The result was a complete victory for the Confederates, and the retirement of Hooker and of Sedgwick, who had come up past Salem Church too late to be of much help, back of the Rappahannock. A simple granite shaft stands beside the turnpike near the place where, late in the evening of May 2, Jackson was mortally wounded by his own men as he went forward to reconnoiter. In sight of this, toward Chan- cellorsville, is the unmarked spot where Gen. G. battle was added the greater horror of fores es which everywhere broke out, consuming both the dead and the wounded, so that out of the total casualties of 49,127 men, 10,667 Union soldiers and 3,400 Confederates were “missing.” Leaving the Wilderness, a drive of 8 or 10 and fortifications already thrown up. As the traveler comes in on the Brock road the first thing he sees is the monument to Gen. Sedg- wick, who was killed here, near the woods which hide the breastworks at the “Bloody Angle.” Around Spotsylvania fierce battles were fought for 11 days. Eleven terrible, bloody yet Spring days, with sunshine and green grass and tender green leaves. One who reads the letters and diaries of the men of both armies is struck with the number of times they mention the flowers, particularly the carpets of violets in the woods and the flelds of red poppies. But to Gen. Grant D meant that the roads were passable, and finally he decided to move again around Iee’s right flank and continue the advance which his men described as “sidling toward Richmond.” : one-day tourist from Washington cannot i8. follow the path of the two armies on toward the North and South Anna Rivers, Cold Harbor and the fortifications at Richmond and Petersburg, Back to Fredericksburg he goes, for lunch and rest before driving south and east of the city to view the scenes of the first and second Battles of PFred , on De- cember 13, 1862, and May 3 and 4, 1863. The main boulevard into the Fredericksburg Battle- flelds Park will be opened early in October. It leaves the Richmond highway a short distance south of Maryes Heights and follows the line of the Confederate fortifications on the hill. Back in Fredericksburg once more, the tour- THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C, SEPTEMBER 20, 1931 -~ 8.4 ‘- Virginia Battlefields Now Being Parked The first act in the siege of Petersburg, June 15, 1864, was at Battery 5, which is now parked and open to the public. A P ‘::uguinesbuigt by Gen. Butler and the site of a huge mortar he brought up, have been restored. . development is not on as complete a scale War Department plans for Predericks- and Petersburg, a good start has been and o § 4 it is to do much more. Be- Malvern Hill, Fort Harrison and other of less importance, the corporation has Harbor, Where i one hour CGirant lost gest number of men killed in any hattle campaign begun May 4 in the Wiider- and ended June 14, when he crossed a his army over the James River to move cERERL n Ej -3 The last battle in the siege of Petersburg was fought at Fort Gregg, the western- most fortification of the Confederates, on the morning of April 2, 1865, as Les began his retrecat to Appomatox. the slaughter at Cold Harbor, Grant gave up idea of taking Richmond by frontal attack, his eyes to Petersburg. By sending 1 | i _E the east, known as Bat- was defended only by cld men and Home Guard. §i% Confederate first lines driven gone right on into the town taken it and ended the t know what force might It was late, and he waited 355 Maj. Gen. John L. Clem, retired, chairman of the Fredericksburg Battle- field Parks Commission, at the age of 12, when he was “Sergt. Johnny Clem,” and famous as “The Drummer Boy of Shiloh.” platform 150 feet in the from which the Union officers could look ever I ever witnessed, being a hand-to-hand struge gle for 25 minutes after my troops reached the parapet. Fifty-seven of the enemy’s dead were found inside the work.” It is said that every Confederate not dead was wounded before the post was surrendered. The man who coms= manded the ‘“sharpshooting” battalion in the fort still lives in Petersburg. desperate game of war. These visitors are down in Government automobiles as guests the War Department at Washington, or in motors belonging to the embassies and tions. As they return to England and and Germany, to Italy, Turkey, Persia Japan, ands tell of the cleared vistas earthworks, the roadways leading from which can be seen the entire topography, of the ground which governed the plan of ate tack and often the result of the 3 eager students of the art of from the North and South, our own continent.