The National Park System, of which Richmond National Battlefield Park is a unit, is dedicated to conserving the scenic, scientific, and historic heritage of the United States for the benefit and inspiration of its people.
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[Richmond] 1 [The Army of the Potomac] 2 Part One THE PENINSULA CAMPAIGN, SUMMER 1862 [On to Richmond] 3 [Up the Peninsula] 4 [Drewry’s Bluff] 5 [Seven Pines (Fair Oaks)] 6 [Lee Takes Command] 9 [The Seven Days Begin] 12 [Beaver Dam Creek (Ellerson’s Mill)] 13 [Gaines’ Mill] 16 [Savage Station] 18 [Glendale (Frayser’s Farm)] 21 [Malvern Hill] 22 [End of Campaign] 24 [The Years Between] 27 Part Two THE FINAL STRUGGLE FOR RICHMOND, 1864-65 [Lincoln’s New Commander] 28 [Cold Harbor] 29 [Fort Harrison] 37 [Richmond Falls] 40 [The Park] 46 [Administration] 46
Richmond, 1858. From a contemporary sketch.
The American Civil War was unique in many respects. One of the great turning points in American history, it was a national tragedy of international significance. Simultaneously, it was the last of the old wars and the first of the new. Although it began in a blaze of glamor, romance, and chivalry, it ended in the ashes of misery, destruction, and death. It was, as Walt Whitman said, “a strange, sad war.”
Richmond National Battlefield Park preserves the scenes of some of the great battles that took place in the vicinity of the Confederate Capital. When we visit these now quiet, peaceful woods and fields, we feel an association with our past that is impossible to achieve with the written or spoken word. Here we are not reminded of the Blue or the Gray as such, only of the heroic struggle of men—men with two different beliefs and philosophies, welded together by the blood of battle, to give us our America of today.