In the Path of War

At the time of the Civil War, Spotsylvania Court House was a small community of about one dozen buildings surrounded by woods and rolling fields. “It was not a town,” a chaplain in the 126th Pennsylvania noted. “It was composed of just the county building, the tavern, a house or two, and one or two country churches.”

The Civil War shattered Spotsylvania’s rural tranquility. In August 1862, Union troops raided the village, and nine months later Confederate authorities converted the courthouse yard into a temporary stockade to hold Union prisoners captured at the Battle of Chancellorsville. Worse was yet to come.

In May 1864, the Union and Confederate armies collided just outside the village. Spotsylvania was under fire for two weeks before the armies moved on. In their wake, they left battered buildings, miles of earthworks, and more than 30,000 casualties.

“The place looked quite desolate, very few persons remained and what few houses remained standing were pretty well riddled with shot and shell.”

- Union soldier, 1865.

Marker is on Courthouse Road (Virginia Route 208) near Brock Road, on the right when traveling south.

Courtesy hmdb.org

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