Bentonville Battlefield

Well, here's a history lesson, folks. 

Justin and I wanted to check out an outlet mall and on the way there, we saw a sign for the Bentonville Battlefield.  This was right up our alley seeing that we were kid-less and very interested in Civil War history.  But we figured we would stop after we saw the outlets.

And so we checked out the stores at the outlet.  Nothing exciting to report.  Boo.

We headed back to the Civil War site and drove way out in the middle of nowhere.  I didn't expect much...maybe a field with a plaque? 

No...it was so much more!  Long story short, this battlefield was the last big battle before the Confederate army surrendered.  It was on March 19-21, 1865.  Basically, the Union army was advancing to Goldsboro in order to take control of the railroad that was there.  This way they would have supplies and such and then render the Confederate Army without a way to get any further supplies.  But, the rebel army surprised the Union Army on the road to Goldsboro and so the last big battle ensued.  You can read more in depth history here.

Our first stop was the Harper House.  This house was commandeered by the Union Army and the bottom level of the house was used as a hospital.  (The battle actually happened about a 1/2 more or more down the road.)

And I do have to note that today they were having demonstrations of life back in the Civil War.  People were in period costumes.  And we missed out because we just had to check out the outlet mall.  But I guess that was ok, because it was not crowded at all while we were there.

I would love to go back when that is going on though.

Anyways, we did make it in time for the tour of the house.  Only the downstairs was open and it was set up like the Union hospital.

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See the make-shift surgery area?  The guide told us that they would just open the windows and amputate arms and legs of injured soldiers.  And then throw the limbs out the window.  Yeow!

Glad we have made some huge advancements in medicine.

Anyways, onto the kitchen.  The kitchen was separate from the house.  It was drab and rustic. But I guess you don't want a kitchen in your house heating it up in the summer time.

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The Harper's owned three slaves and this is what their slave quarters would have looked like.  It was drab as well.

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After the tour, we went to the Visitor's Center to watch a short film of the battle.  And then we were ready for the driving tour!

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We drove a little ways down the road and came across the battlefield.  And it was a field with a plaque out in the middle of a bunch of farms.  But you could stand out and look at it to see which way the different armies were coming at each other. 

It was actually a sombering kind of moment to realize what happened on this ground we were standing on.

We continued down the road and would see where the Union army would camp at, where the Confederate army would line up their youth reserves to help the soldiers.  It was a very interesting tour and I highly recommmend it.

But I will say one thing about the driving tour. Those grayish signs really need to be a bright color.  Like bright neon yellow.  We'd be driving along the road and barely see the sign before we passed it!  We would use our eagle eyes, but then would only catch one or two words on the sign.  So a lot of tour started out like this...

"Wait, there's a sign...it says Conferederate army something.  Maybe they camped here?  I dunno.  I couldn't read the rest." 

But we soon realized that being on country road with no other cars, we could just slow down and then read it.

Silly us.

Anyways, this was a great tour and I'm so glad we stumbled upon it!