Existing comment:
The Chancellors of Chancellorsville
The Chancellor family -- Frances Chancellor, her seven daughters and one son, supported before the war by about 20 slaves -- lived in a large brick inn that stood along the Orange Plank Road at a key crossroads. Several other Chancellor homesteads stood nearby.
In May 1863, the Chancellor farm, called Chancellorsville, was overrun by the Union army, and the family huddled in the basement. On the morning of May 3, the fighting surged into the yard and the house caught fire, threatening all inside.
A Union soldier saw the Chancellor girls on April 30, when the Union army arrived at Chancellorsville.
Upon the upper porch was quite a bevy of ladies in light, dressy, attractive spring costumes. They were not at all abashed and intimidated. [They] scolded audibly and revised [us] bitterly. They... had assurances from General Lee... that he was... anxiously awaiting an opportunity to extend [to us] the 'hospitalities of the country.' [These women] had little conception of the terrors in store for them.... |