Wilderness Wal-Mart Vote Delayed
By Eric Wills | Online Only | July 28, 2009
The Battle of the Wilderness, where 26,000 men were killed or wounded in May of 1864, may not be as well known as Gettysburg or Antietam, but it marked a milestone in the Civil War. It was the first time generals Robert E. Lee and Ulysses S. Grant met in battle. Now the Orange Co., Va., battlefield where the Union and Confederate armies squared off for two long days has suddenly gained renewed attention because retailer Wal-Mart plans to build a superstore there.
The site of the proposed Wal-Mart, at the intersection of Routes 3 and 20, is just outside National Park Service-owned land. Keith Morris, a Wal-Mart spokesman, says the company chose to build a new store in Orange County after discovering that many area residents were driving to Wal-Mart stores in Fredericksburg and Culpeper. Some locals welcome the convenience of a new store, not to mention the tax revenues and jobs that would help bolster the economy during a recession.
"We looked at every available site in the [Orange County] market, and this site met the guidelines," Morris says. The land was zoned for commercial use in 1973, so Wal-Mart didn't have to apply for a zoning change. "That's where the county wanted growth to occur," he says.
Some of the ground where fighting took place belongs to the national park and is protected from development. But Robert Nieweg, the director of the National Trust's Southern Field Office, says that historians now use an expanded definition of battlefield boundaries to include areas where troop movements occurred and hospital tents were stationed. The Civil War Sites Advisory Commission, established by Congress to identify threatened battlefields, assessed the boundaries of Wilderness Battlefield in 1993. By its official definition, the proposed Wal-Mart store would be built on the battlefield site.
Nieweg worries that the new store will attract additional development and irreparably harm the site of one of the war's pivotal moments: After the bloody fighting at Wilderness Battlefield ended in a stalemate, Lee retreated, and Grant had to decide whether to return north to refit his army or head south and follow Lee. At an intersection near the property where Wal-Mart's superstore would rise, Nieweg says, Grant decided to head south—and the ensuing battles led to Lee's surrender at Appomattox.
Wal-Mart needs the approval of Orange County's board of supervisors to proceed with construction. The vote, scheduled for this week, has been delayed because a previous planning hearing was not advertised in the local paper, as required by law. The county intends to hold another planning hearing before scheduling a vote.
Governor Tim Kaine and House Speaker Bill Howell recently urged Orange County leaders to work with Wal-Mart to find a different site that would bring economic benefits to Orange County without threatening its historic heritage. "Every acre of battlefield land that is destroyed means a loss of open space and missed tourism opportunities, and it closes one more window for future generations to better understand our national story," they wrote in a letter. Humorist Ben Stein, in an American Spectator column, also asked Wal-Mart to relent and demonstrate that it "has a heart as well as a calculator."
Morris says Wal-Mart remains open to choosing an alternate site if it meets the retailer's criteria, and continues to talk with the Wilderness Battlefield Coalition, which includes the National Trust, the Civil War Preservation Trust, Preservation Virginia, and other groups. "The discussions have been productive," Morris says, "and I see the dialogue continuing."
Nieweg says that the National Trust has worked with Wal-Mart in the past to find new locations for stores, particularly in Vermont, and hopes the two sides can reach an agreement. "The 150th anniversary of the Civil War begins in 2011," says Nieweg. "It would just be a shame if that happens at the same time as a huge big-box store is being built within the historic boundary of the Wilderness Battlefield."
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