Earthworks
Battle of Chancellorsville - 1863
"We were digging and fortifying all night."
Charles E. DeNoon, Mahone's Brigade
Civil War earthworks, sometimes referred to as breastworks, were built in a fashion much different than modern military trenches. Soldiers started at ground level and built up, using felled trees to build a barricade. Behind the logs, they dug a shallow trench, throwing the dirt over the logs and banking it up against the logs until they had constructed apposition about chest-high.
Confederates worked feverishly using anything available to them – including cups, plates and bayonets, as well as axes, spades and a hoe taken from the nearby McCarty House. But the works were never used. Instead of awaiting an attack by the enemy, General Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson seized the initiative and took the offensive.
These gentle mounds of earth are all that remain of the defensive line constructed by Confederates on the night of April 30 and morning of May 1. Please help preserve these fragile resources by not walking on them.
Marker is on Plank Road/Germanna Highway (Virginia Route 3) near Harrison Road.
Courtesy hmdb.org
