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Another victory for preservationists at Brandy Station Date published: 7/28/2010
IMAGINE: It could have been a 3.4-million-square-foot development of condominiums, a multiplex theater, a water park, an equestrian center, a hotel and asphalt, lots of asphalt. Instead, thanks to some generous landowners, 443 acres in Culpeper County, part of the Brandy Station battlefield, has been preserved. The property, owned by brothers Chuck and Pete Gyory, joins another piece of battlefield land--349 acres owned by Beauregard Farms LP--placed in conservation easements. These two parcels bring the total property in Culpeper and Western Fauquier counties donated by landowners in recent years to more than 2,000 acres. Civil War buffs are rightfully overjoyed. It's difficult to imagine a 19th-century field of conflict when houses and shopping centers have overcome the land, hence the value of conservation easements. These leave the land in the hands of the property owners, who give up the rights to develop it in exchange for tax credits. The 1863 Battle of Brandy Station marked the beginning of the Gettysburg Campaign. Gen. Robert E. Lee had amassed his army near Culpeper, preparing to make the march north. Gen. J.E.B. Stuart's cavalry was centered at Fleetwood Hill near Brandy Station. A Union cavalry detachment in Fauquier County discovered Stuart's presence and, early in the morning of June 9, initiated a surprise attack. What followed was a 12-hour, saber-on-saber battle around St. James Church and all over Fleetwood Hill--the largest calvary engagement of the Civil War. One Confederate cavalryman later wrote that the Union attack on the guns positioned at St. James Church was "the most brilliant and glorious" cavalry charge of the war. The fascination with the Civil War only seems to grow. Motives and methodologies, strategies and personalities come to light as we study and learn. America's great family feud created heroes and villains and left scars that still linger. Binding up the nation's wounds is made easier when battlefields are preserved. Now, thanks to landowners, the Virginia Department of Historic Resources, and the Civil War Preservation Trust, part of the Brandy Station battlefield will withstand one more attack--from 21st-century development.
Where choices of preservation vs. convenience arise, the default should be the former. Destroying locations of historical significance for trivial commercial purposes reflects who we are. The Civil War was a seminal event in this nation's history. Because someone valued these places, we can walk the hills of Gettysburg or cross the bridge at Antietam to absorb, understand and appreciate the events that transpired there. Why sacrifice that privilege for another CVS, McDonalds or WalMart? What do we value?
"443 acres....HAS been preserved"?
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More than a million men were killed or wounded in the Civil War, and the economic toll persisted for generations. Is "family feud" really an accurate description of a conflict that produced such consequences?
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The editorialist writes: "Binding up the nation's wounds is made easier when battlefields are preserved." How does that work? What wounds? What battlefields?
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