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11 Most Endangered
Chancellorsville Battlefield
Year Listed: 1998
Location: Spotsylvania County , Virginia
Current Status: Endangered
Threat: Development
Significance
Considered to be Lee's greatest battle, the 1863 Battle of Chancellorsville encompassed some of the boldest strategy of the Civil War. More than 30,000 casualties were suffered here, among them Confederate icon Stonewall Jackson, mistakenly shot by his own troops. In 1927 sections of the battlefield were incorporated into the Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park, but most of the land is still privately owned. Today, this once-rural area sits astride a major transportation corridor in one of the nation's fastest growing regions. With land values skyrocketing, the National Park Service needed financial assistance to acquire and preserve key parts of the battlefield that were still subject to development. Ever-increasing traffic led to calls for wider roads, culminating in a proposed superhighway called the Outer Connector that would pass within a mile of the park boundary. Motels, fast-food outlets and parking lots already surround Old Salem Church, a central landmark of the battle.
Updates
In 2003, in what National Trust president Richard Moe called the “most significant battlefield preservation victory since Disney,” the Coalition to Save Chancellorsville Battlefield (now the Spotsylvania Battlefields Coalition) defeated a commercial mega-development threatening to destroy the Chancellorsville Battlefield. The Coalition was led by the Civil War Preservation Trust, National Parks Conservation Association, and the National Trust’s Southern Field Office, with an extraordinary alliance of local groups, including Battlefields Sierra Group, Central Virginia Battlefield Trust, Concerned Citizens of Spotsylvania, Friends of Fredericksburg Area Battlefields, Friends of Wilderness Battlefield, National Parks Mid-Atlantic Council, Piedmont Environmental Council, Spotsylvania Preservation Foundation Inc., and Spotsylvania Battlefield Education Association. After a 9-month grassroots campaign by the Coalition, the Spotsylvania County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously to reject a plan to rezone the 800-acre Mullins Farm, which would have allowed 1,995 houses and as much as 2.2 million square feet of office and retail buildings on the site. Threats to the Chancellorsville Battlefield continue to surface, and continue to meet strong opposition. Most recently, in November 2006, the Spotsylvania Board of Supervisors unanimously approved a developer's rezoning request that will protect a 74-acre battlefield on Mullins Farm. The rezoning will permit 33 additional homes to the 89 homes allowed by right; in exchange, Toll Brothers will sell 74 acres of the First Day at Chancellorsville Battlefield to the Civil War Preservation Trust for the reduced price of $1 million
Share your memories of this endangered place
Submitted by G. L. at: May 7, 2009
Seems strange to see the old Ashley Farm, one of the largest & oldest family-operated farms in this part of Virginia, referred to as the "Mullins Farm" -- just because some funeral director bought the place a couple of years ago for its yuppie development prospects. Everyone in the area still refers to it as the Ashley Farm. Of course, the sleazy Yankee developers that are ruining the area have no sense of history anyway. Seeing what the Toll Brothers company have done to beautiful farmland on the area they WERE allowed to develop is enough to gag a maggot -- cheaply-built, cookie-cutter designs aimed for the high end of the market ... basically making sure none of the "undesirable element" can afford to move in there. Development should not be stifled, but watching what Mullins & Toll Brothers have done to legitimate historical property is saddening.