- Civil War Series - The 1862 Peninsula Campaign, intended by the Union to put a decisive end to the Civil War by capturing the Confederate capital of Richmond, began with a slow start. Gen. George McClellan, despite setting out in March 1862 with the largest army the continent had ever seen, inched up the …
- Civil War Series - Malvern Hill is one of the country’s best-preserved Civil War battlefields and marked the culmination of the Seven Days’ Battles, a series of engagements outside Richmond, Virginia in June-July 1862 that ended Union Gen. George McClellan’s Peninsula Campaign. McClellan’s Army of the Potomac, in the midst of a retreat to …
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- Civil War Series - Following General Robert E. Lee’s defeat the day prior at Beaver Dam Creek, the Confederate Army won a decisive but costly victory on June 27, 1862 in the Battle of Gaines’ Mill. Attempting to catch the Federal Army as it was retreating south to the James River, Lee sent the …
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- Civil War Series - The Battle of Beaver Dam Creek—also known as the Battle of Mechanicsville or Ellerson’s Mill—is widely remembered today for being General Robert E. Lee’s debut as commander of the Army of Northern Virginia. With the Union Army on the doorstep of Richmond in June 1862, Lee embarked on a series …
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- Civil War Series - As Union gunboats approached Richmond, the Confederate capital, on the morning of May 15, 1862, they were greeted with a hail of heavy artillery fire from what would come to be known as Drewry’s Bluff, a Civil War fortification perched high above Virginia’s James River. Named for local property owner …
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- Civil War Series - Nearly a year after the onset of the conflict at Fort Sumter in April 1861, the Civil War had seen very few significant military engagements in the Eastern Theater. Following the Battle of Bull Run in July 1861, both sides played defense: strengthening their fortifications, bolstering their ranks, and eyeing …
- Civil War Series - On May 5, 1862, as Confederates clashed with the Union Army nearby, Redoubts 1 and 2 remained silent during the Battle of Williamsburg, the first pitched battle of the Civil War’s Peninsula Campaign (March-July 1862). These redoubts constituted the far right flank of Confederate Col. John Magruder’s “third line” of …
- Civil War Series - On the eve of battle in May 1862, Confederate Col. John Magruder’s “third line” of defenses on the Virginia Peninsula comprised 14 redoubts—small, enclosed defensive fortifications built from earth, sod, and timber. Together they served to temporarily delay the Union Army of the Potomac during the Peninsula Campaign (March-July 1862) …
- Civil War Series - The Twin Forts Loop Trail in Virginia’s Newport News explores the site of the Battle of Dam No. 1, a failed Union attack on a Confederate fortification on April 16, 1862. Part of the three-month Peninsula Campaign, the Union defeat was the second of the month (a similar effort failed …
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- Civil War Series - The Battle of Lee’s Mill on April 5, 1862 was, by all accounts, a minor engagement in the Civil War: it produced only 10 Confederate and 12 Union casualties. In the narrative of Union Maj. Gen. George McClellan’s Peninsula Campaign, however, it was very consequential; a fierce Confederate resistance forced …
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