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Show ' 2. ftfepfi? Spin sifesg By ELMO SCOTT WATSON .... . . . . JS & MONO the many national - parks ....VJ A which Uncle Sam has .set aside . . "PS J for the enjoyment of. his chll- -Z&M? Mmmmm Ten. none !5 . more Interest - -fcfSiSii 1 1 11 nor ,,as had a raore thrilling his- , A;:. mixy. - ' tory than the Trederlcksburg. ". " -' '' id flnd sPts.vlvan5l national bat- " C&CELItCZR&rXLZZ jBATZZZZZZ ' sMt J ito -iJefleld park, the latest adcTition Zf to the list of our national piny-f piny-f grounds. For here was Amer- 5 lea's greatest scene of courage, n small section that could he Included In-cluded within a semicircle with a radius of twelve miles, an area that has been appropriately called "The cockpit of America." where more armies maneuvered and more men were killed and wounded than on any other similar sim-ilar area in modern history prior to the World war. . Tills park, which was dedicated late last year by President Coolidge, Includes six battlefields battle-fields Fredericksburg, Chnncellorsvllle, Cold Harbor, Salem Church, the Wilderness, and Spotsylvania Spot-sylvania Courthouse. More In the space of nine days of actual fighting 700.000 men struggled heroically he-roically and 100,000 were killed or wounded. No less than nineteen generals were shot down on these fields. Among them were Jackson, Long-street, Long-street, .Cobb, Hays, Dennett, Grey, Jenkins, Daniel,, Dan-iel,, Sedgwick and Wadsworth. It. is a curious coincidence that the latler was the grandfather of Sen. James Wads worth of New York, chairman chair-man of the military affairs committee which passed on the'bill presented to congress last year for the establishment of this national battlefield park. . ' ..' History stumbles over Itself In this neighborhood." neighbor-hood." taya a recent writer. Confederate soldiers fought In the same trenches that their Revolutionary Revolution-ary ancestors had used In same sections. Two bat-t bat-t lies had to be fought at Manassas before the curse V of ,var left that field. Two were fought at Cold Harbor and two at Fredericksburg and two In ' the Wilderness thickets. ' In "Fredericksburg re- ) minders of Colonial,. Revolutionary and Civil, war f : 'X ttay:'re"?'ttf" lie-foun'dT'on the same block. The" Wilderness stretches as grim and tangled today as In the days of the Ws ; the Chancellor Uouse, Spotsylvania Courthouse, the trenches of Bloody Angle must all appear very much as they did then." For this region was the very heart of the. conflict between the two greatest forces of the Union and the Confederacy, the Army of Northern Virginia, defending Richmond and the Army of the Potomac, seeking to break its way through the -cordon of Gray -to the Confederate capital. The first fighting In the section took place In December, 18C2, when Burnside attempted to capture cap-ture Richmond by way of Fredericksburg. First bombarding the town he crossed the Rappahannock Rappahan-nock under cover of his own guns and attacked Lee's entrenchment on Marye's Heights to the west of It After a battle that lasted all day, 'during which Uie Irish Brigade made Itself Ira-, mortal by .Its -series .of hopeless charges on the Heights and the Sunken Road at the foot of them, Burnside withdrew, recrosslng the river. He lost 12,005 men and the Confederacy fi.377. . Burnside, after Fredericksburg, was succeeded by Hooker who early the next spring moved his men up the north bank of the Rappahannock and crossed at three different places, marching by as mnny different roads towards Chancellorsvllle, where his forces converged and started toward Fredericksburg. Through this move Hooker had' gotten behind Lee's army while Sedgwick, with 23,000 men, was In front of It. Learning of the move, Lee faced his army west and advanced to - - meet Hooker, leaving behind a small force to oppose Sedgwick, still at Fredericksburg. The Union forces planned to crush Lee between them Sedgwick broke through at Fredericksburg and advanced to Salem church where Lee sent rein-lorceme:jts rein-lorceme:jts to his troops which had retreated be fore the advancing Federals. The two forces clashed on May 3 and Sedgwick was driven back on the Rnppahannock. crossing at Banks Ford, seven nilles above Fredericksburg. In the meantime Lee met Hooker's advance at Chancellorsville, defeated the Federals and forced them to rccross the Rappnhaifnock several sev-eral miles above the ford at which Sedgwick's troops had crossed. The losses In the fighting were 1G,S4") for the Federals and 12,1(1?, for the Confederates. Lee followed up his advantage by adancing Into Pennsylvania, was defeated at Gettysburg and the two armies returned to Virginia where tlioy wintered. Grant had assumed command of the Northern army, Jackson had been killed and his place In the Southern army taken by Long-street Long-street On May 5. a year after the battle of Chancel lorsvlllc, Grant crossed the Rappahannock about fifteen miles above Fredericksburg and started towards to-wards the Wilderness. .Lee, who had wintered at Orange, moved east to intercept him. "It was critical time in the life of the Union. Notwithstanding Not-withstanding Gettysburg the North was discouraged. discour-aged. Her sea commerce was . badly . disrupted..-volunteering, disrupted..-volunteering, which had begun spontaneously and-with and-with burning enthusiasm, had slopped and she bad been forced to resort to the draft.-Tolltlclal plotting was rife, demands to end the war were Insistent. Had Lee forced Grant back across the Rappahannock there would have been a cry foi an armistice, backed by Europe. - At "the opening In the Wilderness" the two armies met and began what some historians place among the 20 decisive battles in the history of the world. For three days they struggled for the strategic key to the situation, the Brock road ., for Grant the way to Richmond, for Lee the means of blocking the movement-flnd forcing the Federals again across the Rappahannock. .... -. "TDe two great armies swayed and fell back and advanced In turn. One hour the Brock road appeared to be Lee's, again it was almost within-Grant's within-Grant's grasp. -Then, 'slowly, the tide of gray began to sweep past the Brock road. Grant's army fell back stubbornly, contesting every Inch ' of ground. His career threatened, Grant sent re luforcements. These, too, gave way before the slowly advancing rebels. But suddenly the Con federates ceased to move forward. Concentrated effort was momentarily succeeded4 by hesitation and confusion. For the second time chance and fate had combined com-bined against the fortunes of the South. A sin gle bullet, fired by one of his own men, had struck down General Longstreet within less than two-miles two-miles from the spot where almost exactly one year before "Stonewall" Jackson, - Longstreet predecessor, also had been killed by his own men Grant seized the situation and attacked. The Confederates withdrew lo tjielr . first lines. . The Brock road was Grant's. The next day he began moving over It towards' Spotsylvania Courthouse, on the way to Richmond. Lee, to the east of him, began to cut a road through the woods to meet him. At the Wilderness the Confederates had lost 10,641 men, and, the Federals 17,GG3. The race for Spotsylvania, ten miles away, con tinued with straggling encounters until the armies met nt Bloody Angle where took place the greatest hnnd-to-hand and small arms fight Ing that Is recorded In history. Here for 12 hours nearly 00,000 men struggled for the pes session of a section of land containing less than r.00 acres, not larger than the average Virginia farm. At times the ground became cluttered with the dead and dying. Lines of Union troops advanced to the trenches and fired blank Into the faces of the Confederates who rose to defend them, whole companies hacked each other to pieces with bayonets, bay-onets, a tree 12 Inches In diameter, a portion of which is preserved In the Smithsonian Institute, was cut down, bit by bit, by musket balls. The wounded could not be cared for and many were left on the field to die unattended. The fighting at Bloody Angle entirely overshadowed the fight-lug fight-lug on the other seven miles of line along the battle front at Spotsylvania. After Bloody Angle the exhausted armies fought no more for nearly a work. Then Grant began a "siding" movement toward Richmond and Lee moved along on parallel lines. In a short time both armies were on the North Anna river, out of the park area. The Union forces had losi at Spotsylvania 16,577 men and the Confederates proportionately more, their killed nnd wounded being ll.nSS. The total losses for both sides in the fivj battles on the park area was 10J.S11. The passage of the bill In congress last year which set allele this area, not as a memorial to war but as a monument to the 100.000 who gave their lives to the nation, marked the culmination of an effort which began more than thirty years ago and which had been made by the people of - both the North and the South. Although the effort ef-fort was unsuccessful for many years these fields of battle were places to which thousands of 'Americans made patriotic pilgrimages every year and In the march of modern progress they found golf balls Instead of cannon bulls. whizzing across the fields. For famous old .Mann.vfield ball on the battlefield of Fredericksburg, bad become a t-oun try club and the game of golf was being played over the Jield once drenched with blood Cannon balls -which had been unearthed In the vicinity were used as tee markers. It was on the porch of this country club that Present Coolidge stood last fall at the dedication of the new national na-tional park, and said: "The unanimous action of congress In passing the military parks bill and the Joint participation of the people of both the North and the South In carrying into effect the law Is. another welcome demonstration In a long line of events not only that the war Is over but that reconciliation Is becoming complete." General plans for l be pnrk which are now being be-ing carried forward by the government reveal tiiat the project Is one of t!ie greaiest of Us kind ever undertaken. The builders of the pail; pro po.-e to strive for beauty. Scores of miles of tine roads will be built, lined wi!h grass lawns and abutting the trenches In which the northern and southern armies met on the fields of Fredericks burg, Chuncellorsvllle. Spotsylvania and the Wll derness. Along these roads will be long lanes of blossoming trees, cherry trees, dogwood trees. Japonic nnd many other specimens, some of them very rare, the purpose being to so plant the trees that at all times of the year when any trees are In bloom many hundreds of blossoming trees .of one or. another variety will offer a colorful 1 drive longer and as beautiful us the famed cherry cher-ry drive at Washington. The roads will he well built and about the same width, but at spots the roads will swell Into large parks, with beautiful stone or rustic bridges In Imitation of nature, and will) memorials and markers placed upon them. Beside these areas, where the government will build large parks along the parL like loads, it Is expected that states, organizations and individuals will establish parks on the roads as memorials. An effort will be made to get nway from the stilled monuments peculiar to battlefields, nnd lo have placed upon these fields only monuments and markers which have Inherent beauty and which are to be placed in spots which can be made attractive and where shrubs nnd flowers will add charm and there nooks and benches will be provided for tho.se who want to rest. Kvery advantage Is lo be taken of the natural landscape to add beauty to the roads and parks. In order that the battlefield park may not be marred by 'ungraceful monuments or shrubbery, the fine arts commission in Washington will pass upon every design and nothing but those which they approve can be built. |