The Silver Cos.’ proposed development near State Route 3 in Spotsylvania County, dubbed Legends of Chancellorsville, has many interesting features to it–as shown in considerable detail on the project’s website, with some very good maps.
In Saturday’s Free Lance-Star, I reported on Silver’s agreement with the national Civil War Trust to preserve 479 acres of the Chancellorsville battlefield. As the story states, what Silver proposes would be one of the largest donations of battlefield land made in the Fredericksburg area.
The National Park Service and the Central Virginia Battlefields Trust were also important to these negotiations, which have quietly been taking place for years.
Modern-day land ownership and May 2, 1863, troop movements on the Binns Tract. SILVER COS.
This map showing troop movements across the property on May 2, 1863, didn’t make it into the paper (space on newsprint is a precious commodity), but history buffs will enjoy it.
Click here to view a short video in which historian and author Robert K. Krick discusses Confederate Lt. Gen. Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson’s flank attack as it moved across what the Civil War Trust calls the Wagner Tract, now-preserved land that adjoins the Binns Tract.
Here’s a wonderful aerial photo, which Krick took about a decade ago and kindly shared this week, of the Chancellorsville battlefield stretching east along both sides of State Route 3. What the Park Service calls the Jackson Flank Attack property, which park visitors daily drive onto now, is visible at center. The trust’s Wagner Tract is east of two or three treelines, above that property.
The Jackson Flank Attack area of Spotsylvania County’s Chancellorsville battlefield. ROBERT K. KRICK
The Binns Tract is much of the forested land that you see to the left of and above those parcels, which you may give you a sense of why preservationists feel it’s important Binns is to keeping the Flank Attack area whole so the public can understand and appreciate what happened there during the American Civil War.
I’ll share a full-size version of the Civil War Trust map of the area that ran in Saturday’s print edition as soon as I can post it in a readable format.
And for a bit more context, I’ll link to earlier stories–here and here–about the Binns Tract project.
There will more in coming days.
