Nearly eighty years elapsed from the first attempt to memorialize the Manassas battlefields in 1861 with the Bartow monument to the 1940 establishment of the Manassas National Battlefield Park. Many factors contributed to this delay. Preservation of battlefields became a popular idea at the turn of the century, and Manassas competed with several other battlefields for designation as a national military park. With the increased numbers of possible parks, Congress had to consider the costs involved and therefore displayed reluctance in automatically approving a proposal. Since this legislative body made the final decision to establish a military park, sites having the vigorous support of individual members of Congress had a better chance for success. In the case of Manassas, local residents, Civil War veterans, and a few local Virginia representatives campaigned for its protection. Additional congressional support was weak, possibly because Manassas represented two stunning Confederate victories. This sectionalism translated into political votes, with largely Democratic-supporting Confederate veterans at odds with Republican presidential administrations and a Republican House in the first decade of the twentieth century. The power-wielding North found it easier to support preservation of Gettysburg and Vicksburg, for example, because these battles were turning points that helped to determine the war's outcome—the preservation of the Union.

While obstacles clearly existed in creating Manassas National Battlefield Park, citizens and their representatives supported the protection of former battlegrounds as a way to reestablish national unity and preserve a sense of the past. As a response to the expansive nationalism in the United States during the 1890s popular opinion swung toward preserving former battlefields. Chickamauga and Chattanooga, Shiloh, Gettysburg, Vicksburg, and Antietam became the original battlefield parks and, in the process, created a unified system. They provided criteria for the future inclusion of other historic areas, including examination of campaign strategy, losses suffered, armies involved, and overall significance of the battle to the welfare of the nation. As Congress expanded its consideration for battlefield parks to the Revolutionary War and other non-Civil War military encounters, it continued to debate the possibility of setting aside the Manassas landscape. [1]

Examination of some of the early steps taken toward preservation of the Manassas battlefields helps establish why this site was significant to Americans following the Civil War. This information, in turn, lays a foundation for understanding the mission of the eventual national park, since ideas about its preservation shaped its administration. Early preservation attempts varied from individuals making regular pilgrimages to the battlefields to Congress reviewing legislative proposals. A summary of the most important events relating to preservation from the 1890s to the 1920s helps to highlight the reasons why the Manassas battlefields warranted protection by the federal government.

Manassas Monuments

Only six weeks following the First Battle of Manassas, soldiers from Col. Francis S. Bartow's brigade placed a marble column on Henry Hill to honor his memory. This monument was the first of a number of memorials that individuals and governments placed on the Manassas battlefields. Two widely recognized and well-visited monuments soon followed. Under orders from the U.S. Army at the conclusion of the Civil War, Lt. James M. McCallum of the Sixteenth Massachusetts Battery oversaw scores of troops from the Fifth Pennsylvania Heavy Artillery. They constructed a twenty foot-high, obelisk-shaped memorial ornamented with five 200-pound shells on Henry Hill and a complementary sixteen-foot monument at Groveton, which had seen heavy action during Second Manassas, decorated with relic shot and shell found on the battlefield. Both monuments display the inscription "In memory of the patriots who fell." Consecrated on 11 June 1865 in a well-attended ceremony performed by chaplains from Kentucky and Illinois, these monuments came to represent the commitment that the U.S. government had toward preserving the memory of events at Manassas. [2]

Fig. 1. One of the enduring monuments dedicated to the "memory of the patriots who fell" at Manassas reminds park visitors of the two Civil War battles fought here. (National Archives photo)

Other markers graced the area encompassed by the First and Second Battles of Manassas. The Bull Run Chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy erected a Confederate monument in 1904 in the Groveton cemetery, which had been established in 1867 by women of the local community for the purpose of reinterring Confederate remains. The Groveton Confederate cemetery represented just one of many such soldiers' cemeteries established in the aftermath of the Civil War battles. They became one of the earliest efforts to commemorate the soldiers and permanently mark the general locations of the battlefields. Following Abraham Lincoln's famous address at the newly established Gettysburg cemetery in November 1863, these burial grounds gained prominence, and Americans began erecting formal cemeteries with monuments at other battlefields. The marker at the Groveton cemetery echoed this effort. [3]

In 1906 the state of New York added three impressive granite monuments to commemorate the Fifth New York Volunteers, the Tenth New York Volunteers, and the Fourteenth Brooklyn (84th New York), each of which had experienced significant losses during Second Manassas. The state legislature made the authorization, established commissions with representatives from each regiment to oversee each design, purchased 5.8 acres of land in Manassas, and funded the work. Henry Vollmer created the memorials and John Tillet erected fences and gates to protect them. [4]

These New York monuments, as they have since been called, represent the actions taken by a host of states at the turn of the century to erect markers memorializing the Civil War fallen. These physical reminders helped keep the bravery and sacrifices of the soldiers alive while also forging ties between the war-torn North and South. Memorials to the New York volunteers stood near those for Confederate dead. One did not overshadow the other. The unveiling ceremonies for the New York monuments tried to foster this sense of unity. Col. Edmund Berkeley, wartime commander of the Eighth Virginia Volunteers, shared the podium with his onetime Union opponents. Both saw the value of preserving the past through the monuments and the eventual establishment of a battlefield park. [5]

Erection of durable markers on the battlefields represented overtly public statements about the Civil War and its memory. Private actions involved the regular pilgrimage of Northerners and Southerners to the site. Some people came to remember relatives who had fought and died at Manassas. Others sought to understand the military maneuvers by examining the actual landscape. The local chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy held annual commemorations for each battle, which were well attended. Mr. Hugh Fauntleroy Henry, who lived on Henry Hill, welcomed visitors and provided tours of the battlefield. He had amassed a considerable collection of artifacts from the war, and he allowed the curious to view them. His house in effect became a museum and favorite stopping place for tourists. A 1918 visitor register for the Henry House shows people from thirty-one states, ranging from California to Maine, Alabama to New Mexico. Indicating the popularity of this place, in 1900 Henry published a souvenir booklet for the two Manassas battles. [6]

Fig. 2. Caught in heavy fighting during both battles of Manassas, the Henry House was rebuilt twice and later served as an informal museum of artifacts collected from the war. (National Park Service photo)

George Carr Round

George Carr Round, a Union veteran who had settled in the small Manassas community following the Civil War, recognized that people needed to visit this battle-scarred landscape to come to terms with the past and move forward with their lives. He wanted to provide the same opportunity to later generations of Americans, making federal preservation of the battlefields necessary. Round made protection of the Manassas battlegrounds his personal goal. He was not alone in wanting to save battlefields and other historic sites. Other equally dedicated individuals campaigned to establish a national military park and erect a peace monument at Appomattox, Virginia, and to acquire land related to the Civil War at Wilson's Creek, Missouri. [7]

Round's background played an important role in shaping his commitment to these lands. Born in the Wyoming Valley of eastern Pennsylvania in 1839 and raised in upstate New York, Round enlisted in the Union Army while still in college. Eventually assigned to the Army Signal Corps, he sent the last message in the Eastern theater for the war from the dome of the North Carolina state capitol in Raleigh, proclaiming in colored rockets, "Peace on earth, good will to men." This signal foreshadowed Round's post-Civil War efforts to bring the North and South together in a respectful fellowship. In 1868 Round earned a law degree and also worked for a law firm in New York before deciding to move to North Carolina where he had relatives. Passing through the Manassas area on his way south, he decided instead to settle at this quiet railroad junction, where he opened a law office and engaged in the real estate business. [8]

Round established himself in the civic affairs of the town by supporting public education, which he saw as "the hope of a true reunion" between the former Confederates and Federals. He obtained funding to open the first free public school in Virginia in 1869 and later became the area's first Superintendent of Public Schools. He also prompted an appropriation for the construction of the first state high school in Manassas and started Prince William County's first public library. He saw his efforts toward a complete public school system as helping in the "true reconstruction" of tine "great republic" which George Washington had founded and Abraham Lincoln had preserved. [9]

Round further promoted the emotional reunification of the North and South by organizing the Manassas National Jubilee of Peace, held on 2l July 1911 in observance of the fiftieth anniversary of the first battle. As remembered by one longtime resident of the area who witnessed the event when he was seven years old, 350 Confederates and 125 Federals "marched" up to each other, shook hands, and then joined in "laughter and smiles and backslapping." Round considered this display of camaraderie "absolutely unprecedented." [10]

A diverse range of individuals and organizations displayed their support for the Peace Jubilee. Virginia Governor William Hodges Mann delivered the introductory speech, and President William Howard Taft, who was joined on the trip from Washington by an entourage of members of Congress, provided the keynote address to an estimated crowd of ten thousand people. The Southern Railway offered discounts for round-trip travel on its lines for the commemoration, perhaps explaining the larger numbers of Confederates in attendance. Local residents covered the town with bunting, and the United Daughters of the Confederacy took responsibility for the picnic that followed the ceremonies. Several companies of the Virginia state militia and troops from the United States cavalry participated in exercises on the battlefield. [11]

For Round, the outpouring of generosity and goodwill during the Peace Jubilee demonstrated that the "hatred, resentments, misunderstandings and injustices" which had precipitated the Civil War were "buried, forgotten and forever settled." Two years later, he received a resounding endorsement for his efforts when fifty-five thousand veterans joined hands at Gettysburg, marking a national recovery from the many wounds of the Civil War. [12]

Early Legislative Attempts

Round directed his energies toward persuading the federal government to legally acquire the battlefield. He began his legislative attempts with a petition to Congress on 1 December 1901. Rep. John F. Rixey of Culpeper County, Virginia, introduced H.R. 277 the following day, and Round testified before Subcommittee No. 2 of the House Committee on Military Affairs on 2 April 1902. [13]

At the same 1902 hearings, Brig. Gen. George Breckenridge Davis, a distinguished career officer of the U.S. Army, offered a strategy for battlefield preservation, later known as the "Antietam Plan." Davis believed that the federal government need acquire only small tracts of land and place historical plaques at key positions, keeping the remainder of the battlefield in the same agricultural condition it had been in at the time of the war. He based this recommendation on survey work he had done in the early 1890s at Antietam and on his experience as chairman of the Commission for Publication of The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, a massive historical source for which he also conducted surveys at various battlefields. At Antietam, General Davis had the government purchase only narrow lanes along several battle lines, leaving the rest as privately owned farmland, resulting in significant cost savings while memorializing the historic events. [14]

The Antietam Plan provided an attractive alternative to the significant land acquisition and maintenance costs the House Military Affairs Committee had been considering. In addition to H.R. 277, at least eighteen other bills as of April 1902 proposed the establishment of military parks at such locations as Valley Forge and Brandywine, Pennsylvania. The federal government had already spent more than $2 million in acquiring, developing, and maintaining the five original battlefield parks, and the prospect of adding more than a dozen more sites gave pause to the committee members. Although never formally adopted, the Antietam Plan remained a major influence in the federal government's battlefield preservation program until well after 1933 when the National Park Service began administering the national military parks. [15]

Early Manassas legislative proposals serve as specific examples of the influence of the Antietam Plan on battlefield preservation. H.R. 277, which never made it out of the subcommittee, emphasized the protection of the 1865 monuments through limited land acquisition rather than recommending the establishment of a large battlefield park. The bill, which had an overall appropriation of $25,000, allowed the secretary of war to purchase at a reasonable price for the United States a "sufficient" amount of land surrounding the monuments to permit visitation. The bill also provided for the construction of "suitable roadways and approaches" between the sold property and public highways to improve accessibility. [16]

When testifying in support of H.R. 277 and subsequent Manassas bills, Round adopted General Davis's suggestions and argued for acquisition of the "historic positions where the monuments are located," as opposed to a larger parklike area that might be "laid out with walks and driveways and flowers." Significantly, Round's conception of the battlefield park focused on its importance as a historic area rather than an inviting public park filled with diversions to please a range of visitors. Round believed that, most importantly, the battlefields must remain preserved in the condition they had been in between 1861 and 1865, meaning as farmland, and that steel towers—another Davis recommendation—should be built to facilitate viewing the entire scene where First Manassas had occurred. He envisioned the purchase of a total of two hundred acres, including Henry Hill, about twenty-five acres of the Dogan Farm where the Groveton monument stood, and a few isolated strips of land around Maj. Gen. John Pope's headquarters and the unfinished railroad cut. At Henry Hill, Round thought a former soldier should reside at and care for the property, or, if the federal government established a national park at Fredericksburg, this commission could administer the Manassas reservation. [17]

Despite Round's claim that H.R. 277 was the first proposal for purchasing lands at Manassas, an earlier bill introduced by Rep. Peter J. Otey of Lynchburg, Virginia, proposed the establishment of a "national battle park" in recognition of the "world-renowned" conflict along the Bull Run. Introduced on 1 February 1900, H.R. 7837 would have preserved for "historical and professional study" the battleground where soldiers had fought at First Manassas. The bill did not delineate the amount of land to be acquired or create a mechanism for administering the proposed park, and Congress failed to act. [18]

Support of Veterans Organizations

Congressional concern over the multitude and diversity of battlefield preservation bills submitted in the first decades of the century prevented further action on H.R. 277 and the many subsequent Manassas proposals that Congressman Rixey and others submitted. The Antietam Plan may have provided the federal government with an economically attractive solution to establishing parks, but Congress also saw the need for a national historic preservation policy to determine which areas most deserved park status. Toward this goal, Congress debated, but never resolved, the value of a National Military Park Commission that would identify, survey, investigate, and acquire lands for parks. As the possibility of a national commission persisted through the 1920s, Congress delayed action on specific park proposals, including Manassas, resulting in only five battlefield bills becoming law between 1900 and 1925. [19]

While Congress remained stalled on the Manassas bills, George Carr Round garnered support for the battlefield park from the Grand Army of the Republic (GAR), the largest of the Civil War veterans groups, which met in annual reunions called encampments. Capt. C. A. E. Spamer, impressed by a tour of the battlefield he took in 1901, wrote a personal recommendation to the Cleveland national encampment to call attention to the idea of establishing a park at Manassas. The encampment failed to address the subject due to the furor resulting from the assassination of President William McKinley. [20]

With interest aroused within the Grand Army of the Republic, Round pursued the idea of a Manassas park. In 1903 he attended the San Francisco national encampment as a delegate-at-large from the Department of the Potomac and secured the endorsement of the committee on resolutions of H.R. 1964, which Congressman Rixey introduced that year. During the same convention, the Manassas Picket Post of Union Veterans presented a memorial to the encampment, asking for such action by the organization to carry on the "pious and patriotic" goals that had inspired the erection of the Manassas monuments. Despite the favorable support of the committee, Round failed to get the full endorsement of the encampment due to resistance by the Department of Pennsylvania. The following year, the Department of Maryland reintroduced the resolution at the Boston encampment, but action did not reach beyond the committee. [21]

Grand Army of the Republic support for the Manassas park proposal gained a new infusion of energy when the Society of the Army of the Potomac met in Manassas in May 1905. Some of the Pennsylvania delegates who had opposed the 1903 proposition attended this convention, and Round took the opportunity to educate them on the resolution's significance. He succeeded in converting at least one of the opponents, Brig. Gen. Lewis Wagner, who later worked with Round to provide the phrasing for one of the subsequent Manassas bills.

In 1906 Round finally succeeded in gaining the formal support of the Grand Army. The 1905 Denver encampment established the Bull Run Battlefield Monument Committee and authorized it to consider the original proposition. This committee, composed of three Grand Army members, reported favorably the following year at the Minneapolis encampment. At this convention, the Grand Army resolved that the United States should acquire the land where the 1865 monuments stood and provide for roadways to these areas. The resolution also suggested that the federal government administer Manassas through the proposed park at Fredericksburg.

E. W. Whitaker, one of the Bull Run Battlefield Monument Committee members, testified in 1912 before the House Military Affairs Committee and provided Congress with the Grand Army's resolution. [22]

Promise of Action

Round waited an entire decade from his first appearance before Congress until April 1912 when the full House Committee on Military Affairs conducted a hearing on H.R. 1330, the ninth incarnation of H.R. 277. Submitted by Rep. Charles C. Carlin of Alexandria, Virginia, Rixey's successor, H.R. 1330 provided for the secretary of war to purchase sufficient lands around the 1865 monuments and to build roadways from the property to public highways. The bill recognized that United States troops had erected the Henry Hill and Groveton monuments following the conclusion of the Civil War, and that the federal government had never obtained legal title to this land. H.R. 1330 also acknowledged the interest of veterans organizations in further memorializing the Manassas landscape and provided for the establishment of a commission to consider the perpetual care of additional monuments erected by these groups. [23]

Discussion in the 1912 hearing embodied many of the central issues that battlefield preservationists encountered in trying to obtain park designations, namely, justification of national significance and demonstration of reasonable cost. Round addressed the first concern by gathering a diverse group of supporters who testified to the patriotic reasons for having Manassas formally acknowledged and preserved by the federal government. But, as Thomas H. Lion of Manassas recognized, Congress also placed importance on "practic[ing] economy" when deciding how best to display national pride. Committee member Lynden Evans (D-Ill.) agreed with Lion and admitted that "patriotism is a valuable sentiment" that should be kept "alive in the hearts of the people," but he also wondered what exactly Round's group wanted done and how much it would cost. Questions then proceeded to uncover what parcels of land the government should buy at what price and where access roads should be placed for what distance. [24]

Land costs consumed the remainder of the hearing, though committee members agreed in the end that the proposal deserved further investigation. At the heart of the discussion, Congress wanted to know at what price the Henry heirs would sell their land. Committee members understood that the historical associations of the 128-acre farm justified some increase in price over comparable lands in less historically significant areas, but they questioned the reasonableness of paying more than $100 per acre, the amount paid for the New York monument land. Acting as a legal representative for the Henry family, Round defended the $20,000 amount the Henry heirs requested, which equaled about $156 per acre, by reminding Congress that the family had cared for the Henry Hill monument long after the federal government had abandoned it. In Round's mind, the historic value of the land justified am amount ten times over the $50 per acre other farms might receive. [25]

Attainment of battlefield park status appeared closer when Congress passed and the president signed into law the Manassas bill on 3 March 1913. Under the provisions of P.L. 412, the War Department appointed a board of three officers who surveyed the site, interviewed the land owners, and attempted to obtain a reasonable purchase price for the 128-acre Henry Farm and the identified 145 acres of the Dogan Farm. Still representing the Henry family, Round continued to justify in correspondence to the board $20,000 as a reasonable price for the historically significant land. The Dogan family agreed to sell their 145 acres, which included the Groveton monument and a section of the unfinished railroad where fighting in the second battle ensued, for $80 an acre. [26]

Success seemed imminent when the War Department submitted its report in December 1913 recommending that the federal government repair and preserve the two 1865 monuments and purchase the lands on which they stood. By obtaining these two tracts, the board noted that "ample means" would then be provided for the protection of the monuments and for allowing visitor access to the "principal points" of historic interest associated with the two battles of Manassas. In its opinion, acquisition of additional lands for memorial purposes was not warranted. However, Congress failed to act on the board's recommendation as international events turned its attention away from commemoration of past wars to the demands of World War I. [27]

George Carr Round, who died in 1918, did not see the Manassas battle fields he had fought so long to preserve attain park status. A year before his death, he made one more public plea, in a Manassas Journal pamphlet titled "Is the United States Too Poor to Own Its Own Monuments?" Driven by the knowledge that he and his fellow remaining Civil War veterans were quickly passing away, he pleaded that Congress replace this "National Disgrace" with a park. He argued that while the United States expended "billions for preparedness in the future," the nation should devote a few thousand dollars to preserve the Manassas monuments as "lessons for posterity." The Manassas battlefields traversed a few more curves along the national park route before the federal government satisfied Round's pleas. [28]