BGuthrie Photos: CWPT -- Ceremony: Slaughter Pen Farm in Fredericksburg, VA (2006)

CWPT -- Ceremony: Slaughter Pen Farm in Fredericksburg, VA (2006):

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Description of Pictures: From http://www.civilwar.org/PressReleases/PressDetail.asp?lngPressID=120

CIVIL WAR PRESERVATION TRUST ANNOUNCES CAMPAIGN TO SAVE SLAUGHTER PEN FARM

Campaign to save the Slaughter Pen Farm at Fredericksburg is the most ambitious nonprofit battlefield acquisition project in American history.

(Fredericksburg, Va.) - The Civil War Preservation Trust (CWPT), America’s largest nonprofit battlefield preservation group, today announced the beginning of a $12 million national campaign to preserve the historic Slaughter Pen Farm, a key part of the Fredericksburg battlefield. The 205-acre farm, known locally as the Pierson Tract, was the scene of bloody struggle on December 13, 1862. Historians estimate that more than 5,000 casualties were incurred on the property.

“This is the most ambitious nonprofit battlefield acquisition in American history,” remarked CWPT President James Lighthizer. “The veterans themselves referred to the farm as ‘the slaughter pen’ because of the enormous amount of blood that was shed there. Despite the price tag, we simply could not sit idly by and watch this irreplaceable battleground become an industrial park. We will raise the money needed to save this historic treasure – because we must.”

Historians agree with Lighthizer’s assessment that preserving the Slaughter Pen Farm should be a national priority. According to Ed Bearss, Chief Historian Emeritus of the National Park Service, the farm is “without a doubt the most significant part of the battlefield at Fredericksburg that is not protected. Its acquisition will provide an opportunity to permit visitors to walk in the footsteps of history.” Historian Frank O’Reilly, the author of The Fredericksburg Campaign: Winter War on the Rappahannock, calls the Slaughter Pen Farm “the very heart and soul of the Fredericksburg Battlefield. This is the point where the battle was won and lost.”

The Slaughter Pen Farm is the largest remaining unprotected part of the Fredericksburg Battlefield. It is also the only place on the battlefield where a visitor can still follow the Union assault on that bloody day from beginning to end. Nearly all the other land associated with Union attacks at Fredericksburg – either on the southern end of the battlefield or in front of Marye’s Heights – has been destroyed by development.

“This is our last chance to save an irreplaceable portion of the Fredericksburg Battlefield,” stated Central Virginia Battlefields Trust (CVBT) President Mike Stevens. “Standing on that last unblemished landscape, where so many men gave their lives on a cold winter day, it is clear that such sacrifice and valor must be preserved to inspire future generations.” Stevens also noted that CVBT intends to play a key role in the campaign to save the Slaughter Pen Farm.

For years, the fate of the Slaughter Pen Farm has hung in the balance. The farm is located along historic Tidewater Trail (U.S. Route 2), which has witnessed tremendous industrial and commercial growth in recent years. The property is zoned for industrial use, and is immediately adjacent to a major north-south rail line, making it extremely attractive to developers. When the property was put on the market in December 2005, the listing agent described it as “one of the best industrial sites in the Commonwealth of Virginia.” “Under the circumstances, preservation of the farm seemed a long shot at best,” noted Lighthizer.

Once the Slaughter Pen Farm was placed on the market, preservationists were in a race against time. Fortunately, CWPT was able to secure the assistance of Tricord, Inc., a local family-owned development company that had previously cooperated with preservationists to save the 140-acre First Day of Chancellorsville Battlefield (formerly known as the Mullins Farm). Tricord brought to the table financial resources, a comprehensive knowledge of the area, and the wherewithal to move quickly to take the property off the market. Tricord and CWPT have an agreement that turns the Slaughter Pen Farm over to CWPT to be preserved in its entirety – no strings attached.

“Tricord has once again shown itself to be an exceptionally community-minded corporation,” Lighthizer stated. “They gave of their time and talents to secure this property, without any benefit other than the satisfaction that they were helping to save hallowed ground.” Stevens also lauded Tricord, noting: “Tricord deserves praise for allowing love for this community to guide their decisions; who, simply put, did an honorable and noble thing in helping to make this all possible.”

Russ Smith, Superintendent of Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park, also expressed enthusiasm for a cooperative effort to save the Slaughter Pen Farm: “We view this as a rebirth of the Fredericksburg battlefield. Preservationists had long ago given up on maintaining a vista from Union to Confederate lines, but CWPT and Tricord have given this historic landscape a second chance.”

In April 2005, CWPT presented Tricord, Inc. with its Shelby Foote Preservation Legacy Award, for its role in saving the First Day of Chancellorsville site. During its May 2005 annual conference in Fredericksburg, CVBT presented Tricord with a similar honor.

Reaching the $12 million goal for the Slaughter Pen Farm campaign is not going to be easy. CWPT intends to work with federal, state and local government officials to secure matching grants to help pay for acquisition of the property. Government grants will be leveraged with private sector donations from CWPT members, corporations and other conservation groups. According to Lighthizer, “we anticipate an unprecedented response for this fundraising effort from our members and all those who care about this great nation.”

With 75,000 members, CWPT is the largest nonprofit battlefield preservation organization in the United States. Its mission is to preserve our nation’s remaining Civil War battlefields. Since 1987, the organization has saved more than 22,000 acres of hallowed ground. CWPT’s website is located at www.civilwar.org.

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From http://www.civilwar.org/preservation/chancellorsville/history_slaughterpen.htm

The struggle for the Slaughter Pen Farm, a pivotal part of the Battle of Fredericksburg, has been well documented and studied. The battle on the Slaughter Pen Farm is depicted in the famous 19th century painting by Carl Rochling entitled “The Battle of Fredericksburg, December 13, 1862,” which resides in the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
Over the years, much interest on the Battle for Fredericksburg has been focused on the catastrophe that Ambrose Burnside’s Union Army of the Potomac suffered as wave after wave of men attempted to break the Confederate lines of Robert E. Lee at Marye’s Heights at the northern end of the battlefield. Indeed, the current battlefield visitor’s center is sited at the Sunken Road, adjacent to the storied stone wall behind which the Confederates stood, inflicting close to 8,000 Union casualties, while suffering perhaps 1,000.

More recent scholarship, however, has shifted attention to the important southern section of the battlefield, where the true outcome of the battle hung in the balance. Here, on the Farm, Stonewall Jackson’s Second Corps contended against William Franklin’s Left Grand Division. In some of the most desperate fighting ever described by the participants, the Union forces under George Meade and John Gibbon punctured the Confederate lines and, for a time, threatened to roll up Jackson’s line.

However, the timely arrival of Confederate reinforcements – and the notable lack of any such corresponding action on the Union side – ensured the Southern victory that day. The casualty totals clearly show what a close victory it was. On this part of the field, the attacking Union forces inflicted 4,000 Confederate casualties while losing 5,000 of their own men. These numbers attest to the savage closeness of the fighting, and historian Frank O’Reilly, in his seminal 2003 study on this battle, The Fredericksburg Campaign: Winter War on the Rappahannock, states, “Jackson’s engagement proved to be the decisive action on December 13, and can be rightfully called the true Battle of Fredericksburg.”

Fredericksburg is without question one of America’s most significant Civil War battlefields. With the exception of a few yards of land before the stone wall, all of the ground that saw the Union charges toward Marye’s Heights has been lost, obliterated as the city expanded over the decades. That same destruction threatens the southern part of the battlefield today.

The ground where this momentous battle was decided; the ground over which Gibbon’s division and part of Meade’s division attacked and were so bloodily repulsed; the hallowed ground that the Civil War Preservation Trust is attempting to save today, is the 205-acre Slaughter Pen Farm.

Historians now estimate that 5,000 of the total 9,000 casualties suffered on the entire southern end of the battlefield occurred on the Slaughter Pen Farm. Valorous actions on that ground led to the awarding of five Congressional Medals of Honor. The necessity of preserving this vital piece of America’s history cannot be overstated, as emphasized below by noted historians and authors.

Ed Bearss, Chief Historian Emeritus, National Park Service and Author:

"The Slaughter Pen Farm is without a doubt the most significant part of the battlefield at Fredericksburg that is not protected. Its acquisition will provide an opportunity to permit visitors to walk in the footsteps of history, from the launch of the Union attack all the way to its conclusion. If the advance by Gibbon’s Division on this land and by Meade’s Division, which breached and broke the Confederate lines just to the south, had been properly supported, the Union had an opportunity to win an overwhelming victory at Fredericksburg.

"To fully understand the battle and this lost Union opportunity, I would counsel that it is more important to save this land – which looks today much as it did on the day of the battle – than to try to reclaim any of the battlefield in front of Marye’s Heights.

"This is one of the most important pieces of battlefield land the Civil War Preservation Trust has ever attempted to save."

Robert K. Krick, Historian and Author:

"The Federal troops who charged boldly toward the R.F. & P. Railroad tracks south of Fredericksburg on December 13, 1862, penetrated the Confederate front line and wreaked havoc before rallying Southerners drove them back. While Ambrose Burnside’s bloody disaster unfolded a few miles to the north at Marye’s Heights, Northerners under George Meade and John Gibbon achieved the only notable success their army enjoyed in the Battle of Fredericksburg.

"The Confederate line toward which Meade and Gibbon attacked has been protected for many years, but very little of the ground across which they charged had been preserved for posterity. The Slaughter Pen Farm, which CWPT is buying in its entirety, is the only remaining undeveloped piece of Fredericksburg Battlefield. It also represents the most expensive acquisition ever undertaken by any battlefield group, by a factor of several multiples. What a preservation coup!"

Frank O’Reilly, Historian and Author of The Fredericksburg Campaign: Winter War on the Rappahannock (The authoritative book on the action at Slaughter Pen Farm):

"The Slaughter Pen is the very heart and soul of the Fredericksburg Battlefield. Without it, nothing makes sense. This is the point where the battle was won and lost on December 13, 1862. After Burnside’s bloody failure here, there was nothing the Union army could do to win the Battle of Fredericksburg-or the Confederates to lose it. Correspondingly, this is where Preservation ultimately will win or lose the struggle for Fredericksburg’s history. Once this national treasure is gone, there will be nothing left worthy of saving. Standing on this unblemished historic land— christened in the blood of brave men, North and South—one touches the Past and understands the sacrifices of these men on the most decisive point of the Fredericksburg Battlefield. They fought for this land, and paid for it with their lives for the future, for us. We need to fight for this land too-for the past, for them, lest we forget.

"This property means more to me than just about any other property in Civil War history. If it goes, then the whole Fredericksburg Battlefield will become meaningless and irrelevant. This battlefield may die if that field disappears."

---

From a subsequent CWPT press release about the event from http://www.civilwar.org/PressReleases/PressDetail.asp?lngPressID=135

INTERIOR SECRETARY KEMPTHORNE ANNOUNCES $2 MILLION GRANT FOR HISTORIC SLAUGHTER PEN FARM

Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne joins with Civil War Preservation Trust to announce $2 million grant for the historic Slaughter Pen Farm on the Fredericksburg Battlefield

(Fredericksburg, Va.) – At a news conference this morning, U.S. Secretary of Interior Dirk Kempthorne announced a $2 million federal matching grant for preservation of the historic Slaughter Pen Farm on the Fredericksburg Battlefield. The news conference, hosted by the Civil War Preservation Trust (CWPT), was the first public event held at the Slaughter Pen Farm.

“The effort to preserve the Slaughter Pen Farm is a model for conservation partnerships throughout the nation,” remarked Secretary Kempthorne. “The Civil War Preservation Trust, working with local preservationists and government officials on the federal, state and local levels, has been able to protect one of the most historically significant battlefield properties in the nation.”

The campaign to preserve the 208-acre Slaughter Pen Farm is the most expensive private battlefield preservation effort in American history. CWPT, working in partnership with Tricord, Inc., SunTrust Bank, and the Central Virginia Battlefield Trust, was able to purchase the property for $12 million earlier this year. CWPT is now engaged in an unprecedented campaign to raise the $12 million so the property can be protected in perpetuity.

CWPT President James Lighthizer thanked the Secretary for his support of battlefield preservation and his interest in the Slaughter Pen Farm: “We are enormously grateful for Secretary Kempthorne’s announcement of a $2 million federal matching grant for the Slaughter Pen Farm. Although we still need to raise millions more to pay off the property, this federal grant is a crucial component in our campaign. Without it, we would simply be unable to meet our $12 million goal.”

The Department of the Interior awarded the $2 million grant based on the significance of the land and the availability of non-federal matching funds. The money is provided through a Congressional appropriation from the Land and Water Conservation Fund. The fund supports non-federal efforts to acquire and preserve meaningful Civil War battlefield lands. The program is administered by the American Battlefield Protection Program, an arm of the National Park Service.

Joining Secretary Kempthorne and Lighthizer at the news conference were Speaker of the Virginia House of Delegates Bill Howell and Virginia State Senator Ed Houck. Both Howell and Houck are long-time supporters of battlefield preservation in Virginia, and advocated creation of the new Virginia Civil War Historic Site Preservation Fund earlier this year. The state is expected to allocate money from the new fund for the Slaughter Pen Farm. According to Speaker Howell, preserving sites like the Slaughter Pen Farm is the exact purpose that the legislature had in mind when it inaugurated the program this spring.

The struggle for the Slaughter Pen Farm was among the most intense in Civil War history. More than 5,000 casualties were inflicted on the farm during the Battle of Fredericksburg on December 13, 1862. Five Congressional Medals of Honor for valor were awarded for actions taken on site that day. National Park Service Historian Frank O’Reilly, author of The Fredericksburg Campaign: Winter War on the Rappahannock, says, “The Slaughter Pen is the very heart and soul of the Fredericksburg Battlefield. Without it, nothing makes sense. It is where the battle was won and lost.”

The Slaughter Pen Farm is the largest remaining unprotected part of the Fredericksburg Battlefield. It is also the only place on the battlefield where a visitor can still follow the Union assault on that bloody day from beginning to end. Nearly all the other land associated with Union attacks at Fredericksburg – either on the southern end of the battlefield or in front of Marye’s Heights – has been destroyed by development.

For years, the fate of the Slaughter Pen Farm has hung in the balance. The farm is located along historic Tidewater Trail (U.S. Route 2), which has witnessed tremendous industrial and commercial growth in recent years. The property was zoned for industrial use, and is immediately adjacent to a major north-south rail line, making it extremely attractive to developers. When the property was put on the market in December 2005, the listing agent described it as “one of the best industrial sites in the Commonwealth of Virginia.” “Under the circumstances, preservation of the farm seemed a long shot at best,” noted Lighthizer.

Once the Slaughter Pen Farm was placed on the market, preservationists were in a race against time. Fortunately, CWPT was able to obtain the expertise and assistance of several corporate and nonprofit partners to save the property. Tricord, Inc. helped CWPT move quickly to take the property off the market before it could be sold for commercial development. Once the property was secured, SunTrust Bank provided CWPT with a loan package to enable the organization to embark on a lengthy fundraising campaign.

In addition, the Central Virginia Battlefields Trust (CVBT), one of most effective local battlefield preservation organization’s in the nation, has committed $1 million toward the Slaughter Pen Farm fundraising campaign. According to CVBT President Mike Stevens, “Standing on that last unblemished landscape, where so many men gave their lives, it is clear that such sacrifice and valor must be preserved to inspire future generations.”

The Civil War Preservation Trust is a 70,000-member nonprofit battlefield preservation organization. Its mission is to preserve our nation's endangered Civil War sites and promote appreciation of these hallowed grounds. Since 1987, the organization has saved more than 23,000 acres of hallowed ground. CWPT's website is located at www.civilwar.org

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Specific picture descriptions: Photos above with "i" icons next to the bracketed sequence numbers (e.g. "[1] ") are described as follows:
1. CWPTCE_061016_093.JPG: William Howell, Speaker, Virginia House of Delegates
2. CWPTCE_061016_131.JPG: Jim Lighthizer, President, Civil War Preservation Trust
3. CWPTCE_061016_150.JPG: Frank O'Reilly, Historian, National Park Service
4. CWPTCE_061016_201.JPG: Dirk Kempthorne, United States Secretary of the Interior
5. CWPTCE_061016_251.JPG: Bill Howell, Speaker, Virginia House of Delegates
6. CWPTCE_061016_269.JPG: Edward Houck, Virginia State Senate
7. CWPTCE_061016_401.JPG: Civil War Preservation Trust ceremony acquiring Slaughter Pen Farm property in Fredericksburg, Virginia.
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  - 2018_VA_ABT_Banquet_180602 ABT Annual Conference (2018) in Yorktown, VA -- Reception and Banquet
  - 2018_VA_ABT_Photo_Extra_180601 ABT Annual Conference (2018) in Yorktown, VA -- Peninsula Photo Extravaganza!
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  - 2018_SC_CWT_Welcome_180209 CWT Color Bearer Thank You Weekend (2018) in Greenville, SC -- Welcoming Event and Reception
  - 2017_VA_CWT_Goose_Creek_171206 CWT -- News Conference: Goose Creek Battlefield
  - 2017_VA_CWT_Sentry_171014 CWT Grand Review (2017) in Fredericksburg, VA -- Walking Tour and Open House @ Sentry Box
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